Cole Hocker is officially the #1 distance runner in the world right now

By 2024 Kiplimo had already long-ago moved to longer distances on the roads. He won his first two international half marathons in 2020, in 58:xx and 57:xx.

In 2024 Kiplimo was a verteran half marathoner, preparing for the marathon.

And he still ran 26:49 in the Paris 2024 games. Three seconds from gold.

Talking about his Kiplimo's track 10,000 in 2024 is like talking about Hocker's 800. It's his third-best event. And anyone who know the sport would take would take Kiplimo's 10,000 over Hocker's 800 any day. (1:45 lol.)

1:45 lol. Kiplimo probably can’t even run under 1:49. He couldn’t run a 1:45 800 if he was being chased by a pack of jaguars. I love how your jealosy of Hocker has you believing that 1:45 is somehow bad even though your idol Kiplimo couldn’t run that time in a million years. So pathetic.

Yes, he ducks the Wannamaker Mile every single year. It is by far he most prestigious event in the meet. He is the defending Olympic gold medalist, and instead of saying 'come at me' he races in an oddball distance like the indoor two-mile, with bespoke WR pacing to chase a soft WR.

(You can tell the indoor two-mile WR is soft, because (1) Josh Kerr has it, and (2) it's 6 seconds slower than the outdoor WR.)

Kerr, Beamish, and Wightman were clearly not up for it. What someone did 4 years ago isn't relevant to the strength of the field when he's running 8:20.

2:02:23 marathon win >> 8:07 two-mile win

World XC >> Hokie Invitational

12 losses in one year. That's a lot of losses for "your boy."

"He won a heat of the 1500!" LOLOLOLOL this is getting sad. You've got it, tiger, he won a heat in 3:41.

I already placed his entire losing record for 2025 in this thread.

Again:

Indoor: DNF, W, L, W (Wins at the Hokie Invitational and BU DMR Challenge)

Outdoor:
GST: L, L, L, L, L, L (Never placed higher than 3rd)
Diamond League: L, L (4th and 7th)
USATF: L, W (3rd and 1st)
WC: DQ, W

12 losses. 4 event wins (not 5), only one of them international.

"World #1!" 😂

Why does the Olympic 1500m gold medalist need to run the Wanamaker mile? What does he have to prove? He can run whatever race he wants.

Go ahead and knock him for his 12 losses. He still has won the most important races that actually matter while your boy has two inferior bronzes and three meaningless XC golds. He’s a second rate version of Kelvin Kiptum. He’s diet Kelvin Kiptum. Just one calorie, not Kiptum enough.

Exactly my point.

In the field of "distance running," Kiplimo has a range: 3000-5000-10,000-HM-Marathon.
(Kiplimo has no adult marks in the 1500, which he hasn't raced since 2016; he was only a 7:52/13:20/27:26 guy that year.)

Hocker has a range, albeit somewhat smaller: 1500-3000-5000.
(Hocker has no official marks in the 10,000, HM, or marathon.

[If you are still confused, the 800 is trivial to the comparison, since neither of them have an ability in the event that is remotely relevant to a conversation about the "world #1" distance runner. Maybe Hocker is better in the 800 or 400 - irrelevant. Maybe Kiplimo is better at cricket.]

They have both shown elite ability in the 5000, and a race could have been close, if they raced it while 12:40 Kiplimo still cared about the event and wasn't training to running 2:00:30 marathon pace for 22 miles in his second try at the event.

Kiplimo is better than Hocker and elite in everything from 5000 up: the 10,000, HM, and marathon.

Hocker is elite in the 1500, and better than Kiplimo in the event (which Kiplimo never pursued). And Hocker loses the 1500/mile more often than he wins, every. single. year.

It’s five wins. Why should we dismiss his heat win? It’s a freaking race isn’t it? It’s a footrace against other competitors. Why wouldn’t it count as a victory? What do want him to do; slow down at the end, lose on purpose, and possibly lose the chance to advance to semis just because it’s a qualifying round? He won that race. It doesn’t matter that it was a heat or not. He crossed the finish line first in a distance of 1500m. How is that not winning an international 1500m race? You’re just looking for any reason you can to hate on Hocker and tarnish his win record.

How many Olympic gold medals does Kiplimo have? He sucks.

HAHAHAHA.

Now you are invoking a DEAD RUNNER to make your case? 🤡 You know you have lost the argument when it gets this weak.

If we're going to play that game...
Jakob was better than Hocker and DID dominate him.

In the 5 championships since they first raced each other in a WC/Oly (2021), 2021-2025, Jakob won 6 Oly/WC medals (4 global gold, 2 Oly gold) while Hocker won... 2. 🥹

Medals: 6-2
Olympic gold: 2-1
WC gold: 2-1

Jakob is 5-1 against Hocker in lifetime 1500m meetings.

Jakob is 3-0 against in the mile, coming 1st/1st/2nd at Pre 22-23-24 "against" Hocker who came 5th/6th/7th.

.

But let's talk about active runners, which Jakob and Kelvin are not.

Great post.

I genuinely hope that Hocker:

- Wins his first Diamond League race this year
- Wins more than one international race this year
- Wins at least 20% of his international finals this year

This would all be good "firsts" for him!

If we're still talking about world #1, he has a LOT to prove, for a guy who races two events and even five championship summers 2021-2025 has only medaled...twice. (Two wins, very nice.🥹) Ten chances, two wins... starts to feel a bit less than "world #1" level.

While his main rival contesting the same meets medaled 6 times, and won 4 golds.

You're right about one thing: Hocker can race whatever he wants. He can race GST (6/6 losses in 2025), Diamond Leagues (2/2 losses in 2025), truly whatever he wants!

Agreed.

I also hope that Kiplimo will:

-learn English so he can do at least one interview

-win more than two races that fans actually care about

-run a WR that doesn’t get invalidated because he cheated from illegally drafting off the pace car

🤣🤣🤣

🤣🤣🤣

🤣🤣🤣

The event has ONE winner. The heats are part of that event.

Do you think the Olympic 100m has 14 winners because there are 8 heats and 3 semi-finals? No.

🤣🤣🤣

But you know what? For you, superfan, let's call that a "win." (Even if he failed to actually win the event.)

Go ahead and say that in 2025 Hocker won 2 outdoor races (1 heat, 1 final), and lost 10.

"World #1!" 😂

You are having an imaginary argument now. I never contested that Jakob was indeed better than Cole overall before his injury, though he did lose to Cole fair and square in Paris. You are just diverting to Jakob now because you have lost the case of Kiplimo being better than Cole. Nice try.

Dahl, has it been you posting as even handed evaluation this whole time?

Kiplimo has much to prove, too. It has already been proven he was NOT a winner on the track. Now Kipchoge only won 1 global title, though he was a little better on the circuit in terms of winning than Kiplimo. He became a great marathoner who always won. Perhaps Kiplimo gets there. So far he looks mostly like a time-trialer and he can crush the last 3K of XC races. All well and good. To be the best in the world, he needs to win Olympic Gold and show he’s better than Sawe.

1. Why should he learn English? He speaks English, and two other languages. (More lanuages than you could be interviewed in, that's obvious.)

Now you're making up random challenges to put him down.😂😂😂

What are Hocker's 2nd and 3rd languages?

🤡🤡🤡

2. Fans definitely care about world XC. Have you been on this site in the past month?

😂😂😂

3. Right, Kiplimo "needs to prove himself" in the half marathon. 56:42, 57:31, 57:37, 57:56, with a total of two losses and >12 wins in 7 years running the event.

🤡🤡🤡

In summary...

I am saying it would be nice for Hocker to win more than one international race all year, and if he can't win more than he loses at least avoid an abject losing record.

Your response is to say that you think Kiplimo should...run another 56:xx HM, race for peanuts on the track instead of much bigger marathon paydays, and...um...improve in his third language. (I'm embarrassed for you, hick.)

Keeping it to running, if the assignments are another 56:xx for Kiplimo and winning two major races all year for Hocker... it looks pretty clear who is the better distance runner.
😂😂😂