Underrated NCAAs Performances

Ethiopian MAN wrote:

Can’t believe Haftu Strintzos in 9th hasn’t been mentioned yet. Dude didn’t win a single race this year I think, but he had the race of his life and beat a ton of studs.

Agreed, great performance. Don't think anybody would have pegged him for a top 10 national finish.

Bit of a different take on the OP’s question, and lifted from my earlier post which got zero replies:

Tallahassee Men: Who Ran a Smart Race? (Spoiler alert: scroll down to Abdirizak Ibrahim of New Mexico)

One way to answer this question is to look at the progressions from 3K to 5K to 10K. Who gained and who didn’t blow out? We don’t consider the first two splits at 1170 meters and 2K because the first 50 (at 1170m) and first 30 (at 2K) were within 2 seconds of each other. So once the field begins to spread out, which teams made the most impressive moves?

Iowa State: 7th at 3K, 3rd at 5K, 2nd at 10K

Tulsa: 12th, 10th, 6th

Stanford: 9th, 8th, 5th

Wake Forest: 25th, 15th, 10th

All commendable performances against such a strong field.

Which individuals ran smart? Yes, those that started out in the lead pack and ended up there after 10,000 meters. That was “smart” because they were capable of it. But there were also some impressive performances by runners coming far up through the field to place well. Places at 3, 5 and 10K:

Haftu Strintzos of Villanova, 24 – 17 - 9th

Parker Wolfe of UNC, a freshman: 98 – 81 - 28th

Cormac Dalton of Tulsa: 91 – 76 - 34th

James Mwara of Gonzaga: 100 – 62 – 36th

Gable Sieperda of Iowa State, a freshman: 128 – 84 – 41st

And Zach Facioni of Wake Forest ran 114 – 56 – 19th. Very impressive against this field.

But the winner of the smart pace award is Abdirizak Ibrahim of New Mexico. Ran for himself. Didn’t have to pace teammates. Didn’t have to inspire the spectators. Ran his own race, as he understood it. Look at this progression:

1170 meters 205th place

2K 209th

3K 193rd

4k 151st

5K 106th

6K 86th

7K 78th

8K 60th

9K 46th

10K 33rd, having gained 13 places in the final kilometer

Good info here. It is interesting but unfortunately the winner of the race is not the guy that ran the “smartest”. Lots of different running styles and ability levels that factor here. But I did enjoy your research.

biser12 wrote:

Good info here. It is interesting but unfortunately the winner of the race is not the guy that ran the “smartest”. Lots of different running styles and ability levels that factor here. But I did enjoy your research.

Please explain how the guy that won didn't run the smartest race. I just want to understand your viewpoint.

From my observation, he (the defending champion) cleared himself of traffic and joined the leaders where he belonged, continued a strong pace with several others taking turns leading, pareed the field to 3, bided his time up the last hill, hung onto a strong challenge by a very good runner in the last 2 minutes when he went all in and then dropped the hammer because he was still fearful that Kiptoo was still capable of a comeback. Overall, it wasnt easy, he made the right decision at the moment of truth and couldnt be denied. It looked pretty darn smart to me.

I thought the fellow that challenged him played his cards wrong by being impatient and making his move too soon. I wonder if he would have had a better chance if he waited another 45 seconds on the downhill side. Instead, he shot his opportunity early and couldnt respond when Mantz dropped the hammer. Kiptoo couldnt respond either and needed time to recover after the hill. IF the 3rd place finisher had waited, I think they all would have been together with 60 seconds to go and maybe the order would have been different but the fact is, Mantz covered the move with guts and had fuel in the tank to burn. He did not fold, fade or falter. He responded to the situation like a defending champion should. It was his day. Different day, different race...maybe. But on that day, in my opinion, he was thebmost capable AND the smartest.

Morgan Beadlescomb

He had a great track season. 13:29 indoors. 13:21 outdoors. 6th at the Olympic trials. However, his cross season was up and down. 8th at Wisco. 4th at Big Tens. Then 5th at Nationals. Similar season to Haftu. Good, but not great. The potential was there. But Haftu had a bigger jump at nationals.

I would say an underrated performance was Tuohy geting 15th after falling a mile into the race and having to chase down the fast moving front pack for the next kilometer. How many top 20 finishers at the NCAA Championships ever had to deal with a fall, especially at 19? NC State did good enough as a team that she could have come in in the 50s and they would still have won, but it is very easy to panic after a fall and to burn yourself out trying to sprint back. Even if you keep your composure it requires a significant extra exertion to catch up again in a fast race. Even so she still managed to finish on the lower end of the range that was being originally predicted assuming a normal race. I thought that was a gritty performance.

25th at the 1170 split and 1 second out of 25th at the 2k. What did she lose a second or two?

The other thread had a discussion of it. Running in the front pack with her teammates around the 1K mark. Fell around the 1.3-1.4 K mark. We next see her at the 1.7K mark as the race comes out of the woods making her way back up on the right side passing runners, probably about 80 runners ahead of her. At the 2K mark is still at 47th. Gets back to front back by 2.5. The race was moving quite fast and she had to work pretty hard to catch up again. 15th after suffering a fall. Seems impressive to me.

I know. I let it go there but now you brought false information into a thread about under rated performances.

25th at 1170. Then 47th at 2k. If she fell before 1170, she went backward from 1170 to 2k without a fall.

Same here. I was really shocked by Haftu Strintzos.

Go watch the race video. Not hard.

Why would anyone do that when we have official results? Are you saying that we shouldn't trust the results and have to watch the race to see who really won? I know you aren't so how can you claim that the splits are wrong?

If the timing is as messed up as Astro claims, the company should not be paid because every fan and coach and athlete has used it to go back and analyze the race. To claim that one runner is so far off in a split, nothing can be trusted including the final results.

Not a crybaby wrote:

Why would anyone do that when we have official results? Are you saying that we shouldn't trust the results and have to watch the race to see who really won? I know you aren't so how can you claim that the splits are wrong?

or perhaps trust your ears, at around 2:05 of the interview, unless you are assuming the coach is not telling the truth, or is misinformed.

BC the race video gives you a much better perspective. Not sure what's controversial about that. The entire race at that point was within a four second gap. The splits are fine, but the splits are about a kilometer apart. Here the race video fills in the gap.

That's called a non sequitur. This arguing style seems very familiar. Nostalgia.

Don’t believe he is saying the splits are wrong…instead he is saying that she fell around 1.1k, likely fell back to around 100th spot (since it was a very tight pack at that time), and then made her way back to 47th by 2k. So her split is correct, but it included her falling and then working her way back up the pack. How much that played into her finish is unknown…maybe could have been too 10, but that is hard to say. Biggest thing is she got back into the lead group to help minimize the damage tot he team.

Jedsdead wrote:

Don’t believe he is saying the splits are wrong…instead he is saying that she fell around 1.1k, likely fell back to around 100th spot (since it was a very tight pack at that time), and then made her way back to 47th by 2k. So her split is correct, but it included her falling and then working her way back up the pack. How much that played into her finish is unknown…maybe could have been too 10, but that is hard to say. Biggest thing is she got back into the lead group to help minimize the damage tot he team.

By the splits, at 1170 m Bush, Chmiel, Tuohy were 23, 24, 25 and I don't think there is any evidence before that showing she fell. At 2000 m Chmiel was 25 and Bush was 29, and Tuohy (with video showing she was moving up before 2000 m) was 47. Something happened after 1170 m and before roughly 1650 or 1700 m.

Yes that makes sense. But she is only 2 steps behind 25th at 2k so she was already back to her pre fall position at that point. It seems that the fall was worth only a few seconds.