Athing Mu-Nikolayev looks HORRIBLE. Runs 2:03.44 for DFL. Dugume wins in 1:57.20.

she didn't win the race and shut it down with a time fade (and lost a position or two). example -- naguse the other day. she was last place and quit competing.

she will get to go to nationals because she's long ago banked the required time. as of nationals headgames and ducking end and you either do what it takes for worlds or not.

i doubt she's been sandbagging us. she probably needs to drop 5 seconds in a month to make the team. the psychological value in track is running well and frightening the opposition. there is no point to hiding because at nationals or worlds you can't hide and advance.

This is an interesting point.

People want to blame the coach, but maybe the athlete is uncoachable?

Maybe he is trying all of these oddball ideas to keep her interested, but she's just...not.

At first I blamed Bobby that Mu only got 0.07 faster under his coaching, but lately I wonder.

He had coached Sydney to NOSTOP PRs, after all.

It is actually amazing that she has PBed EVERY SINGLE YEAR since at least back to 2014, with one exception in 2023. (She was with Bobby since summer 2020, and first broke the WR under him in 2021 -- FOR THE FIRST OF SIX TIMES AND COUNTING.) Seriously, can you name another elite athlete to do this almost 10 years in a row in their key event, let alone doing it as a GOAT talent like Sydney? Not even Mondo has.

Yeah, I think the issue is Mu.

If Kersee treated her as a speed-based 800m runner, she probably would have been fine. The 1500m business was out of left field. She probably would be good at it, but she doesn’t like the event.

Not having training partners is another fail.

Despite all this, I feel like things started to fall apart when she and Brandon Miller broke up. Maybe the timing didn’t align, but you got a peek into her mentality. Getting distracted by non-running aspects of life.

Sydney has the mentality to be a champion for years to come.

That's correct. The breakup with Miller was the beginning of the end. That was a much bigger factor than Kersee's coaching. Mu has never fully recovered mentally from that. Add in the stress from the fall at the Olympic Trials and she no longer has the mental motivation to do what it takes to maximize her potential.

I think what Coach Kersee (who seems to be willing to try unconventional things with Mu) needs to do is, instead of the usual workouts this week, have Athing work a shift in a warehouse, another shift in a meat-packing factory, a shift at a boring office job, etc. My attitude towards all this handwringing about "I just need to rediscover my passion" is that it's a symptom of someone who is too much inside their own head, and maybe has seen too many cheesy movies about people who need to go to India to rekindle their "inner flame". That kind of garbage seems real when you get a little spoiled and start overthinking things. Getting a chance to see how the hoi polloi live might give her a sense of perspective, and remind her that however uninspiring track might currently seem to her, it's better than 99.9% of what's out there. And it pays well (for an athlete of her caliber), and you get lots of time off.

I'm not going to write her off yet. Granted, things are looking bad right now. But I look at it this way: she's in at least 2:01 shape (if she runs the whole 800m). If she could run a race next weekend in a modest (for her) 1:59, she'd see how fast the narrative would change. A little momentum, a couple more small steps in the right direction, and things could do a full 180 in the space of a few weeks. Then instead of reading sad articles about how wrecked she is, we'll see loads of sickening videos about her beautiful redemption arc and "How Athing Got Her Groove Back", etc.

It's only talent that matters. And doping. Training is just the smoke screen.

Correct. Also she stopped posting about her dog "Bentley The Pug" last summer. Maybe something happened to it? She really loved that dog. It could be as well that her aspirations of modelling got bursted too and many heart-breaking things happend for her in a short period of time. I am curious what moral support system does (did) Mu have in L.A. Family, friends, relationships... She really used to post about her private life a lot on Instagram and now she posts almost nothing. That's definitely a sign of a change in mentality.

Dutch 400m B runner Eveline Saalberg has run 2:02.97 over 800m this year. Heptathlete Anna Hall has run 2:01.23 at the end of a friggin heptathlon.

Watching the Tokyo Olympic Champion run 2:03, clearly struggling with fitness in the latter part of the race, was very sad to watch. As much as I loathe Kersee, I don't dislike Mu, and I blame him and his lack of experience coaching the 800m, not her. Yes, perhaps she has had some 'distractions', but that's understandable at her young age, and she has just got married. I think we can forgive her for that!

But I repeat what virtually everyone else has said on here: Kersee has no business making a 400/800 runner do 5ks. No. Just no. Even running 1500s is ridiculous. He is destroying her career with his mad formula & perverse desire to avoid McLaughlin & Mu overlapping at 400m.

when is Mu's next race?

disturbing in her interview she had no idea where other meets were ...

of course you line up your schedule in advance, and change according to pre set options.

team Mu is in shambles

anyway she should go in a 2.00 min type race, Europe would be a good thing to do.

and fit in a couple of 400s,

just give it a go.

it might even get fun.

Good post.

Terrible post.

Did Brandon Miller get custody of the dog??

This could explain a number of things.

TBH there has always been a certain group of runners who don't really know and just leave it to management.

Those of us who are deeply interested in the sport as fans may find this hard to relate to.

But Mu and a lot of other runners probably couldn't tell you the date of the Stockholm or Monaco Diamond League unless they are entered, and they definitely won't be streaming the broadcast.

1. Hard disagree. David Rudisha ran low-key 5ks and XC deep into his career, and he was a 400-800 man through and through. Symmonds and many others, too.

2. Agreed there should be no reason that Sydney and Athing can't race. Kersee seems tied up in decades-old ideas from drama between sprinters he coached.

She’s racing this weekend at the same meet as Sydney

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