Say it with me: Cole Hocker's kick is overrated.

Meh. One race at the very beginning of the indoor season when he hasn't been doing hardly any speed work, is not indicative of his kicking ability.

Beginning for him, that is.

His kick is fine. It's not as good as Kerr's or Ingebrigtsen's, but it's enough to do some damage against second tier elites.

His form must be a worry for his coach. He runs like a 6 year-old when he starts to kick, I haven't seen an elite runner look that out of control. You compare it to Jakob's forward lean and smooth form and you can see the seconds that Hocker is giving up

This is what I thought when I was watching his NCAA races last year ... People thought he was a 3:35 runner who just magically close really fast. In reality, he was a 3:31 guy who was just running in "slow" races, so of course he could close quickly. The people saying he could win the olympics because he had some insane kick were too focused on US running, anyone can kick fast if they're running a 1500m 4s slower than what they can actually run.

Agreed and said it many times.

He's a second level racer and always will be.

Wasn't this his opener? Or close to it? Jeez, talk about overreactions. Are you even a runner? If so you should know how this works.

say it again. wrote:

Agreed and said it many times.

He's a second level racer and always will be.

Olympic finalist. Always will be.

That being said, he is still a 3:31 runner at 20, so I wouldn't be surprised to see him get down to 3:29 low in a few years, and be a true contender for medals on the world stage.

the macdaddy og yoo wrote:

say it again. wrote:

Agreed and said it many times.

He's a second level racer and always will be.

Olympic finalist. Always will be.

Indeed he was,but the way you all went on about he was the next Jacob.

Remember the Cole MF Hocker headline 😅

Last year in the NCAA indoor mile, Hocker ran the last 200 in 25 seconds for a 3:53. Come on now...he has world elite speed. Why do people always want to tear down others, especially RUNNERS on a running message board?

cool cool wrote:

Wasn't this his opener? Or close to it? Jeez, talk about overreactions. Are you even a runner? If so you should know how this works.

A season opener in one of his off events, no less. People must really be thirsting for some attention off of their "hot takes" I guess.

Even after Hocker proved the haters wrong - he wouldn't win NCAA's, he wouldn't break 3:35 he wouldn't make the Olympic team, he wouldn't make the final blah blah blah - they are still chirping! Bizarre to watch tbh, but it's part of why I love this site.

High hopes wrote:

His kick is fine. It's not as good as Kerr's or Ingebrigtsen's, but it's enough to do some damage against second tier elites.

His form must be a worry for his coach. He runs like a 6 year-old when he starts to kick, I haven't seen an elite runner look that out of control. You compare it to Jakob's forward lean and smooth form and you can see the seconds that Hocker is giving up

He looks more like a girl to me. And Im not talking about his hair. I mean that his sprinting form is the stereotypical "girly run". He moves surprisingly fast despite the egregiously bad mechanics, I'll give him that. Hassan is one runner that comes to mind who at one point has been characterized as having wonky mechanics. But even when her form was at its worst, she still looked more under control than Hocker.

And his kick is fine, it's just not outstanding. The widely held belief among casuals is that Hocker has the best kick, period. But in terms of absolutes it is not the absolute best. It is only relative to the tier of athlete he is (i.e., second tier) that it is pretty good.

Flagpole wrote:

Last year in the NCAA indoor mile, Hocker ran the last 200 in 25 seconds for a 3:53. Come on now...he has world elite speed. Why do people always want to tear down others, especially RUNNERS on a running message board?

I'm not tearing Hocker down - I was just putting his very fast finishes into context. Hocker was a 3:50 miler back then, so naturally he can close a 3:53 race very quickly ...

That being said, I remember American running fans overrating Hocker's finishing ability (saying he could outkick Jakob, Tim etc...) when they saw him kicking hard to win domestic 3:35 races, which simply doesn't translate to world class racing.

Hocker definitely has a great finish, but those crazy finishes we all saw last summer were more due to the fact that he was racing slower 1500m races relative to his level, so he had a lot left in the tank. As we saw in Tokyo, he doesn't have the same kick in faster races, which is perfectly normal. It just seems like people on this board believe that Hocker can close the last 100m of a 1500m in 12s no matter what!

haters gonna hate

Exactly. The people who thought Hocker could contend with the half dozen sub 3:30 guys at the olympics last year were delusional, operating under the wrong assumption that Hocker's kick was more impressive than it actually is.

OozmaKabba is a G-League troll.

#1 Beamish has jumped to another level. Look for him to compete with Katir this year. Wouldn't be surprised is he runs a 7:28 this year.

#2 Hocker is no way worried about any of this. Come summer no one is keeping up with his kick. Watch as Timmy is looking at Hockers rear end in the 1500 final in Eugene.

Lollys Master wrote:

OozmaKabba is a G-League troll.

Is "G League" and "Yakob" part of the Letsrun jargon now thanks to me?

You guys are looking into these January meet results way too much. You call ncaa the g league, we'll guess what buddy indoors is the preseason.