Jill Montgomery is the Worst

she certainly isn't the only one. listen to that 10k world record recently in hengelo and you will see what we have been missing for the past 50 years. personally i use a vpn and go to an irish, australian, or british station to watch when i can. the announcers actually follow the race instead of having cliff notes that they keep reciting even when the runner they are talking about is totally out of the race. an example is the recent ncaa 10k womens race. she kept saying maybe 10 times that kiplimo was the one to watch, she could shift gears anytime she wanted. well, with 2 laps to go she shifted down to the "drop " gear. but did that phase the announcer, no way. she just kept going on until the 5 or 6 ahead of her crossed the finish line.

rojo wrote:

Did they not even mention that Henes is the daughter of the head coach? Like that's an amazing story. And an obvious one. And they don't know it - or did I miss something?

Mom won the race 30 years ago. JOKE.

Like even if you don't know that. Hire a stats guy. My god.

Dwight Stones mentioned it after she had won the race--but for most of the race Montgomery was blathering about workouts, doing 600s and cutdowns etc- wasn't she like a former pole vaulter...

+1

I'm ok with all the other announcers we've had over the years, but over the weekend, this girl had me wanting to drive nails into my ears.

I thought it was funny how she was like, "You DO NOT want to be on that rail". The race still had 800 meters to go. In a race like that, there is plenty of time to get in a good position, like 700 meters of time.

She is terrible. How did she get that job? Carol Lewis was terrible, but st least we know she got the job because of her last name.

hurdling wrote:

100m hills for 1500m runners is not speed endurance. I am surprised every now and then when Montgomery is actually correct though it does not happen often.

I did notice from this meet and a previous meet I heard her do that she loves to talk workouts. As in right down to the recovery interval, range of reps, etc. Ideally I would say that is great insight that you don't hear from the average commentator. However, you hear a couple of off the marks tidbits and it makes you wonder how accurate the rest of the information is.

Running commentators need to focus on the sob stories and touch more on the emotional side of things. My parents, who aren’t into track, will only catch onto what the commentator is saying if it’s something personal about what an athlete has overcome. Nobody cares what hypothetical workout they might have been doing three weeks ago. Most non-running fans can’t even conceptualize what a track workout is to begin with. Do better, commentators.

hurdling wrote:

100m hills for 1500m runners is not speed endurance. I am surprised every now and then when Mongomery is actually correct though it does not happen often.

pretty sure reps of 80m-150m when run close to all out is speed endurance no matter what distance you’re training for. pretty much the definition if speed endurance.

Done uphill they are strength endurance as they are resisted. Speed endurance is done flat on track or grass.

Thank god

Have to be more consistent. Theyhad so many commentators, Shorter, Rawson, Stones, Reavis, Eyestone, Cox, Goucher, Hammond, Etc. Maybe if they could a consistent commentator they could be decent.

ck3237 wrote:

Have to be more consistent. Theyhad so many commentators, Shorter, Rawson, Stones, Reavis, Eyestone, Cox, Goucher, Hammond, Etc. Maybe if they could a consistent commentator they could be decent.

In the case of Dan O'Brien and Ato Bolden, they have been consistent and both have improved considerably. Even Carol Lewis improved over time but remained incredibly difficult to listen to.

Chris Horner was terrible for the Tour de France coverage in his first year, but improved somewhat last year. I wonder if he’ll be on the broadcast team this year. Regardless, he’s better than any US track and field commentator, by miles.

juvie wrote:

Chris Horner was terrible for the Tour de France coverage in his first year, but improved somewhat last year. I wonder if he’ll be on the broadcast team this year. Regardless, he’s better than any US track and field commentator, by miles.

Chris Horner is good on Tv, his YouTube posts are much better

Headline on T&F News that links to her IG that she just announced her retirement.

Running in Ohio wrote:

Headline on T&F News that links to her IG that she just announced her retirement.

That announcement/link appeared within this thread yesterday.

Raysism wrote:

Just got done running some uphill 100m repeats so now I have the speed endurance and VO2 to run the 10K on the track.

Now I just need to remember never to pass someone on a turn.

You will never get there without cutdown 600s. That, and correct knee lift.

JO Coach wrote:

hurdling wrote:

100m hills for 1500m runners is not speed endurance. I am surprised every now and then when Montgomery is actually correct though it does not happen often.

I did notice from this meet and a previous meet I heard her do that she loves to talk workouts. As in right down to the recovery interval, range of reps, etc. Ideally I would say that is great insight that you don't hear from the average commentator. However, you hear a couple of off the marks tidbits and it makes you wonder how accurate the rest of the information is.

Yeah, that commentary would be interesting to a segment of the audience like us if accurate and represented actual sessions that were conducted by various programs. It became an issue IMO when she continually talked about this event being developed this way and obviously that's limited to her own experience/knowledge of training and not really relevant to what was done by various coaches and their athletes who were competing.