Got me thinking after his historic recent sub 4 performance. I guess he would have had to compete with Webb and Centro in their primes, but without doing too deep a dive into this, I can't think of any other big roadblocks for him in the U.S. over the last 15 years or so (okay MAYBE Leo too).
I say 8-9 USA Championships he could have won; if Galen and Nick Symmonds could each have won 8(i think) Willis could have done it too
Yeah, interesting question but I think you already nailed how difficult it would be for him to find consistent success in taking 1st on the track. Webb, Centro, Leo, all span his career. I'd be surprised if he racked up as many as 8. Maybe 4-6 range. Some in between Webb/Centro. Right there's a few years there? A couple in the 2010s & a lot of epic duels with Centro.
0. He gets owned by Lagat/Webb from 2004-2010. Then by Lomong/ Leo from 2010-2013. Then Centro from 2014-2017 and then he isn't fastest enough to beat anyone.
Ok realistically he probably wins a couple of them in there but he doesn't have remotley enough of an advantage over webb, lagat, lomong, leo and centro to expect to win like 50% of them. Rupp could get 8 wins because in the 10k he was like 20s+ faster than the next guy.
none. he's successful due to NZ
How do you mean? he's trained in Michigan for a long time
Lads, did you consider that the power of the land was a unique condition? all those natural surfaces! frequented by compatriots who preceded him, that respected and believed in the same? He wouldn’t be the same athlete growing up in the states where it’s beginning to resemble land enclosure in mind behavior architecture etc
He is a much better tactical racer than everyone but Centro but was better in Diamond League races than all of them combined
Maybe so but the Diamond League isn't the arena in question
i think i misread your response actually; i think i got you now
The genius of Nick Willis is his focus on championship racing. He doesn't chase records or win totals. He structures his work and his seasons around medals. This is so different than the majority of runners going after times, money, and DL points and ending up with mediocre results.
It seems he was at his best between 2008-2016, being able to run 3:51 for the mile or better most of these years, including a couple world medals. But then you have to look at the Americans, where Leo and Centro were finishing ahead of him more than a couple times during this span. I'd say Nick Willis would have won about five U.S. outdoor 1500 titles, taking one or two from Lopez around 2009, taking one or two from Centro or Leo between 2013-2015, and taking Robby Andrews in 2017.
OP. I LOVED this thread. So much so that I spent about half the day yesterday doing the research. I just published the article for our SC members.
https://twitter.com/letsrundotcom/status/1352667505052037123
In the article, I decided to go year-by-year and see if I thought Willis would have won the outdoor US 1500 title in a given year, starting in 2003 when Willis first dipped under 3:40 for 1500. But before I looked at their yearly results, I started by looking at the head-to-head career standings between Willis and the leading US guys at 1500/mile.
Nick Willis vs Leo Manzano
Nick Willis vs Lopez Lomong
Nick Willis vs Robby Andrews
Nick Willis vs. Alan Webb
Nick Willis vs. Matthew Centrowitz
Nick Willis vs Bernard Lagat
Then I looked at how he was doing each year and compared it to the US studs. The yearly results were interesting. There is only one year over the last 18 seasons where I'm 100% certain Willis would have won the US 1500 title. However, there are seven other years where he would have had a decent chance of doing it. And of those seven years, he would have been the betting favorite in five or six of them if we retroactively gave out odds for the US champs after the fact based on their seasonal results.
If the OP is not an SC member, is he now since you 'stole' his concept?
Juice Springsteen wrote:
Got me thinking after his historic recent sub 4 performance. I guess he would have had to compete with Webb and Centro in their primes, but without doing too deep a dive into this, I can't think of any other big roadblocks for him in the U.S. over the last 15 years or so (okay MAYBE Leo too).
I say 8-9 USA Championships he could have won; if Galen and Nick Symmonds could each have won 8(i think) Willis could have done it too
Galen and Nick Symmonds didn’t have global medalists to frequently deal with in their primary events.
Much appreciation that you took the time to do the research and put this together!
While I am not a subscriber, I don't really see it that way. I just posted a hypothetical thread and as I said, I didn't go ALL IN on the research because I don't have the time, attention span, and probably not all the resources that Rojo does. He took it and ran with it which I think is pretty cool. Like it was my idea, yea, but he ran with it and made it a reality (zing).
There were probably people in the olden days who said stuff like 'wouldn't it be neat if there was a mode of transportation that didn't need the power provided by a human or animal?' But they didn't go out and invent the automobile.
plus the TLDR version above does the job for me
How many US titles would Mo Farah have won?
David Brent wrote:
How many US titles would Mo Farah have won?
All of them
Juice Springsteen wrote:
Got me thinking after his historic recent sub 4 performance. I guess he would have had to compete with Webb and Centro in their primes, but without doing too deep a dive into this, I can't think of any other big roadblocks for him in the U.S. over the last 15 years or so (okay MAYBE Leo too).
I say 8-9 USA Championships he could have won; if Galen and Nick Symmonds could each have won 8(i think) Willis could have done it too
Would've
Could've
Should've
You can't compare or speculate. Too many variables at play here to make any sort of educated guess. One of my favorite sayings....."If my aunt had balls, she'd be my uncle". :0