It was a great performance by Sisson but says more about the state of pro running in America more than anything. The top pros and those just the next level down have little incentive to target the USATF road championships because there's little to no chance of winning enough to even cover the trip and sponsors may not be fronting the travel expenses. Some of the local Indiana runners even could have placed in the top 10, especially in the women's race, but they didn't enter for whatever reason, whether by personal choice or lack of knowledge about their eligibility for the race.
Yes, her performance was legendary. However, the field she competed against was super weak in part due to the late announcement of the event and also in part to the upcoming World Championships. She ran against sub-elites.
Why are people downvoting this? USATF made a bad move picking this race and announcing it about a month in advance, they basically gave away free money to people who typically wouldn't be top 10. Athletes plan their races months in advance, most people already know what they're going to be racing, you can't just announce a USATF championship a month before it happens and expect a bunch of good runners to fit it into their schedule. The USATF championship half marathon from December was way more competitive because people had more time to know about it, and it was also at a good time of year. Next week is the USATF 25k championships, so obviously the people who were planning to run that for months weren't going to suddenly run the half marathon the week before. It was also the same weekend as the Sound Running 10k, a race people were planning to do for months. So if you have a huge 5k and 10k track race, and a USATF 25k race a week later, how many other people are not already running anything and can show up for the half marathon race? The answer is not many and that's why it was not a deep race in Indianapolis.
Yes, her performance was legendary. However, the field she competed against was super weak in part due to the late announcement of the event and also in part to the upcoming World Championships. She ran against sub-elites.
Why are people downvoting this? USATF made a bad move picking this race and announcing it about a month in advance, they basically gave away free money to people who typically wouldn't be top 10. Athletes plan their races months in advance, most people already know what they're going to be racing, you can't just announce a USATF championship a month before it happens and expect a bunch of good runners to fit it into their schedule. The USATF championship half marathon from December was way more competitive because people had more time to know about it, and it was also at a good time of year. Next week is the USATF 25k championships, so obviously the people who were planning to run that for months weren't going to suddenly run the half marathon the week before. It was also the same weekend as the Sound Running 10k, a race people were planning to do for months. So if you have a huge 5k and 10k track race, and a USATF 25k race a week later, how many other people are not already running anything and can show up for the half marathon race? The answer is not many and that's why it was not a deep race in Indianapolis.