To the people saying the USA 10k team was weak

Perhaps weak isn't the correct term. Maybe not competitive with the world leaders would be better.

As far as losing a year due to Covid-19, well, the rest of the world had to deal with that too, not just the Americans.

Grant overachieved absolutely. The others were about where I thought they would be. I thought it was a solid team we'd sent, but we didn't have a Rupp-like competitor who could cut it in the first pack. I was wrong in that it looks like Grant is 26:5x capable (if not a touch faster).

Good, but not World Class wrote:

Perhaps weak isn't the correct term. Maybe not competitive with the world leaders would be better.

As far as losing a year due to Covid-19, well, the rest of the world had to deal with that too, not just the Americans.

I'm saying they lost a year due to Covid, so as younger than normal 10,000 meter runners they had less time to build up their resume and appear to be better on paper. None had made world teams before, because for two of them they were only 22 years of age and in college the last time they could have made a world team, and obviously college guys rarely make world teams in distance events. Now they are at the age of competing, and there's a good chance we'll see two of the three on the olympic team again in three years, and likely with even better PRs, as well as being able to say they were 5th, 15th, or 16th at Tokyo in their last olympics.

So you're argument basically is compared to all those others teams that accomplished nothing, this team is merely bad, as opposed to horrendous. Good point.

The USA 10k team WAS weak. But it always is. The US is not really competitive at anything longer than 1500 (and even that has been a recent development). The biggest thing this team was missing was a Rupp-type star that could actually contend for a medal. Fisher had the best day anybody could’ve hoped he would and he was a well-beaten 5th. 2012 Rupp might’ve won that race.

For the US, this was a solid team, but our 5k squad is definitely stronger (12:57 double medalist, 12:58, 13:02). Klecker ran a solid race, Fisher ran great, and Kincaid performed poorly but he has always been inconsistent so it’s not a surprise. I’m excited to see Fisher back in the 5k, and these young guys show promise to possibly score some medals in Paris in 2024.

You say that 2 were only 24 and 1 was 28 and you seem to think this is young for 1000 Olympians. It is not. Not at all.

It is not young for 10000m Olympians. Do you think the medalists thought they were too young?

Now you can take the official age of the medalists with a grain of salt if you choose but they average under 22 years so they are officially younger than these so called too young Americans.

It's a combination of American athletes finally "catching on" and the field not dominated by the likes of legends like Bekele, Keb, Sihine, Tergat, Komen, Tadese, Kipchoge, Hissou, Skah, and a bunch others (yeah, I purposely left out Mo). I wouldn't list anyone in that field a legend - not even Cheptegei.

Todd W. was just as talented as any of the 3 in the field and worked as hard as anyone in the world and was only10th in '92 and didn't even make the final in Atlanta. Also keep in mind they ran semi-finals up until '96.

I do think it's odd that Fisher was only a few seconds behind a guy who's pb is a minute faster than his. Weird.

The United States of America had more finishers in the top five than Kenya, who had a man cross in 20th place behind the entire American field. It was a great performance by Fisher, a slightly disappointing performance by Kincaid, and about on par with expectations for Klecker. Solid result for the U.S.

Americans who actively downplay (or worse, discourage) the country’s success are boring and pathetic.

fxhjb wrote:

It's a combination of American athletes finally "catching on" and the field not dominated by the likes of legends like Bekele, Keb, Sihine, Tergat, Komen, Tadese, Kipchoge, Hissou, Skah, and a bunch others (yeah, I purposely left out Mo). I wouldn't list anyone in that field a legend - not even Cheptegei.

Todd W. was just as talented as any of the 3 in the field and worked as hard as anyone in the world and was only10th in '92 and didn't even make the final in Atlanta. Also keep in mind they ran semi-finals up until '96.

I do think it's odd that Fisher was only a few seconds behind a guy who's pb is a minute faster than his. Weird.

That's just a combination of Fisher being in better shape than this spring and Cheptegei not being in his 2020 form.

The three medalists are ages 24, 21, & 20. They also "lost a year due to Covid".

It was about as good or bad as they usually do, even though 2 of those Olympics were Rupp outliers. Most of the guys are anywhere from 10th to 25th.

I expect a bare minimum of one medal in every track and field event. Anything less is a failure

hsishwidb wrote:

I expect a bare minimum of one medal in every track and field event. Anything less is a failure

lol a feat not even China could accomplish while doping their athletes to the gills for the ‘08 Games

Fisher's 5th is a big deal. He beat the entire Kenyan squad, Ahmed (who is fast and consistently race sharp-- the only BTC athlete to be able to claim as much because he actually races), and Kejelcha. Looks like only Mills and Rupp are better, if '64 may be taken into consideration as Africa hadn't really broken onto the scene.

We aren't Ethiopia. We're (probably) never going to have a "squad" where everyone is remotely capable of medaling.

hsishwidb wrote:

I expect a bare minimum of one medal in every track and field event. Anything less is a failure

+1

The US had the third best 10,000 m results in the world behind Ethiopia and Uganda and ahead of Kenya and the rest of the world.

2 of Kenya's best racers were missing in Kamworor and Kandie. Kipruto had short notice as he did not think he was going to the Olympics. The conditions also ensure a slow race which means a lot of decent to average runners can place well. If 10000m is raced anywhere with good conditions, none of these Americans will come close to a medal. This was a golden chance to medal and they blew it. Eugene 2022 and Paris won't have such suffocating conditions which means the fastest people are the ones likely to medal and they are not American.