Mark Coogan tells LRC he's"75% sure" Elle Purrier will do the 1500 at the Trials - The event is going to be insane

Maybe but I am not sure why anyone would think they Houlihan is so special that she should be treated any differently than anyone else. If so they should be up front about it. The Olympics do not need Houlihan in order to go on.

Falls can happen, but they are generally pretty rare. I think Purrier and Houlihan are good enough that they should get out of trouble in the last lap or lap and a half and drive for home. Save something for the last 100 definitely, but use the few-second advantage (and even greater at 5K) they have on the Sinclaire Johnsons, Osikas, Efraimsons, McLeans and others of the field as opposed to rolling the dice and having 9 women in it with 200 to go.

Are you STILL picking against Simpson?

Better be a splash page and a public apology for the steeplechase suggestions🤓

Find a new and better adjective, Harvard.

I can see Efraimson causing a crash if she's in bad position with a lap to go and panics. She's done it before.

So now the jinx is in. Houlihan, the greatest US middle distance talent of this generation, is doomed to suffer the same fate as the greatest talents of the last two generations, Decker and Ryun...the fall...g-d let’s hope not!

So, would that apply to every event final?

A trip or fall on lap 3 of the 5000 or 10,000 causes the final to be re-run?

A fall and subsequent trip in the water jump of the steeplechase?

A fall and subsequent trip in a hurdle final?

as in incompetence

Completely agree with your second point.

USATF screws it up again.

Seems like they're going out of their way to disadvantage one of our strongest event areas -- middle distance.

Purrier racing the Trials 1500 is not current news anymore -- the Flotrack guys broke that story a couple weeks back.

The potential of having a race rerun is an interesting proposition but, as pointed out above, is relatively rare and not likely to happen specifically to Houlihan or Purrier. So, sort of a non-story.

Rather, the real new story -- which has yet to be reported -- is: what event is Jenny Simpson racing?

Paging Jonathan Gault -- please put on your investigative reporter shoes and gumshoe this one out!!.

Houlihan, Purrier, Simpson, in that order. Should be fun.

Will anyone take it out? If someone takes it out then there shouldn't be any issue.

If we get a final like the recent Euro Indoors mess - then anything could happen.

E word wrote:

as in incompetence

Completely agree with your second point.

USATF screws it up again.

Seems like they're going out of their way to disadvantage one of our strongest event areas -- middle distance.

LOL!

The US sprinters are the best in the world, year after year.

Our jumpers and throwers, near the same

Mid D?? Pretty decent but not the best in the world and most certainly not our "strongest event area" (sprints!)

Distance? Decent, nowhere near "best"

USATF isn't going out of there way to disadvantage MD.

USATF has a job to do and like it or not, sprints are king.

On Rojo's point yes the 1500-5000 double is easier at the Olympics than at USAs, but more importantly is anyone actually considering doing it? Maybe a Hassan type?

You have to run the 1500m first round on the morning of the 5,000 final. Yes, the first round isn't usually all-out for top competitors but it's probably still a 4:10 type race with a 62-3 last lap. Certainly less ideal than resting that day. If Shelby/Purrier wouldn't seriously considering that and would just race both at USAs because they could then I'm happy USATF has not accommodated that. It is frankly frustrating when sprinters run both the 100 and 200 rounds or qualifiers with no intent to run the 200. Often happens at championships. Same logic applies to Trials. So, unless we hear from the coaches that the athletes wanted to do this tricky Olympic double, I'm glad USAFT prevented them from doing it for kicks and giggles.

Just weighing in my guess is

1) Purrier

2) Houlihan

3) Maclean

I think Maclean will edge in as a darkhorse pick, in anyway this should be an amazing race!

Fasterer wrote:

E word wrote:

as in incompetence

Completely agree with your second point.

USATF screws it up again.

Seems like they're going out of their way to disadvantage one of our strongest event areas -- middle distance.

LOL!

The US sprinters are the best in the world, year after year.

Our jumpers and throwers, near the same

Mid D?? Pretty decent but not the best in the world and most certainly not our "strongest event area" (sprints!)

Distance? Decent, nowhere near "best"

USATF isn't going out of there way to disadvantage MD.

USATF has a job to do and like it or not, sprints are king.

Please read my post. I didn't say middle distance was our strongest event area. I said it was "one of our strongest." That would be hard to argue given recent results and trends on both sides. Of course we're stronger in sprints. That's always been the case, Bolt notwithstanding. I never said anything about long distance.

The larger point here is that USATF should be taking one of two approaches to scheduling the trials. Either be a completely neutral administrator and develop a schedule that is equally fair to all event groups, or do the best they can to give our best athletes the best and most chances possible to be successful at the OG. They have done neither in this case.