Eric Holt wins the West Chester Mile in 3:54.93

Eric Holt is and has been one of my favorite guys to follow, No one, NO ONE has gotten more out of their running style and God Given abilities than he, many , many guys could take a lesson. Not meaning to be critical, of others , but what a story, really.

What happened to Holt?

In 2017, his PB was 3:44.81. He did not improve on that until 2021, when he ran 3:36.62 ( his 2018 and 2919 bests were actually 3:45 and 3:46 respectively although he did have a 3:59.85 indoor mile in 2020)

Big jump.

He has further improved this year (a little) to 3:35.80 this year.

What caused this big improvement in 2021? New coach?

Hard work and never giving up?? I think and hope, LOL. I think the mixed Mile winner was Gary Martin's Coach in HS?

He is a truly great story of what IS possible out there.

Empire Elite and Tom Nohilly happened to him.

”Hard” work is meaninglessness, unless you are saying that he was not training very hard until 2021.

So why did he decide to start training hard in 2021? New coach?

BTW: I am not implying anything.

Persistence is everything......

He started running with Empire Elite and being coached by Trautman and Nohilly

And there ya go..what I meant , was not that he was NOT working hard, only that he continued on with it ..persistence and apparently expert Coaching..we all should know those names. Many many guys quit well before they get to his level now, it was hardly an easy or predictable road!!

HOLTAMANIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wow, good for him! A PB?

How did he get the opportunity to join Empire Elite with a 3:44.8 PB (from 2017) and a 3:46.6 best in 2019?

Oops, looked a little closer at the tweet; INDEED a PB!

His mile PB needs to be updated here:

worldathletics.org

Eric HOLT | Profile | World Athletics

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He now is 27. I’m curious if he has a job for income. I’m thinking of The Athlete Special as a similar type of sub-elite that may still want to get after it.

He had a fairly normal progression up until 2018. 4:08 high school miler, 3:48 as a college frosh, then 3:46, 3:45, and 3:44 (plus a 4:00 mile, so really 3:42). Then he regressed for a couple years in 2018/2019 before breaking out in a couple of sub-4:00 performances and wins in the fall of 2019/winter 2020. Then picked up by Empire Elite and came out of the pandemic a new runner.

The tagline from this article pretty much sums it up: "He’s put his life on hold to see how good he can be, and he hopes that will land him among the world’s best."

He was working odd jobs (including the night shift at a psychiatric hospital), but he quit and moved back home so he can focus on training.

He will be racing NACAC next week along with Gregorek and Thompson.

My "somewhat informed" guess is that Tom saw enough raw talent there in the four years he coached against him in the same league in high school to warrant giving him a shot later on.

I don't know what role John Trautmann played in the process, but I know Tom and Eric and it seemed like a really good fit to me when I heard about it. I wouldn't be surprised a bit to see Holt keep stepping it up and improving even further in this paradigm.

A nice writeup in RW last week

runnersworld.com

Miler Eric Holt Doesn’t Want to Have Any Regrets

He’s put his life on hold to see how good he can be, and he hopes that will land him among the world’s best.

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