It’s gotta be Nico at Nats

I agree he is one of a few guys that could win it all, but hard for me to say nobody in the NCAA is running better right now when Ky Robinson beat him at Pre-Nats and 4 guys beat him at OK St.

The battle for the individual title this NCAA’s is going to be one of the toughest in years. Rooting for him and I still think he’s the favorite, but unless he’s at 100 percent and runs a perfect race, one of Hicks, Robinson, or Maier will probably get him.

I’d love to see him win and I agree that he’s running really, really well. It’s so hard to predict (as you note). I feel like I learn a lot from race footage, so I’d love to see more videos from the regionals. For example, Alex Maier looked relaxed at the Midwest regional. The results won’t tell you, but the video footage suggests that he ran very, very controlled. Of course, Nico finishing with Drew suggests that he was running well within himself as well. Does anyone have thoughts about how Charles Hicks looked at the West regional? I haven’t seen footage from that race.

It’s also likely that Nico will recover quickly this week, so he’ll be fresh next weekend—he seems supremely fit (of course, the same is probably true for the other top contenders as well).

As I was typing this, a question occurred to me that the smart folks here can probably answer (a cursory google search didn’t give me what I was looking for). Could a big dog who sat out regionals win nationals? Cole Sprout probably isn’t going to win, but let’s say he had run regionals and Ky or Charles sat out. Then you’d have a major contender showing up without that 10,000m in their legs from eight days earlier. What if that person ended up winning the individual title against guys who had all raced regionals? Is that permitted? I’d imagine that it would have to be, but I also imagine a lot of us on letsrun might decry the result.

Robinson placed 5th at regions…was he tempoing?

And for the record, I’m agnostic about a non-regional runner winning nats. I’m more curious what the rules are and how diehard fans would perceive such a result.

That’s the nice thing about what armchair coaches and half-informed statisticians say on letsrun; it doesn’t matter at all.

Oh absolutely. If my hypothetical scenario came to pass, any anger on the message board would just be the usual impotent rage from anonymous trolls. Nevertheless, I wonder if runners and coaches think about such things when strategizing about how to get through regionals. You could imagine some complex calculations from a top team like Stanford: “The two low sticks could win it all AND they recover fast AND maybe it’s somewhat important for none of the sport’s small, diehard fan base to perceive a victory as being in any way illegitimate.” I dunno if a coach would ever think like this, but the psychology of the thing is at least mildly interesting.

I’m far from a fan boy of Stanford or Hicks, but I was there and he was definitively not going all out. He clearly wasn’t going for the win (which was the right call imo).

Meant “or Robinson” but the comment applies to both Hicks and Robinson. They weren’t going all out at all.

This is actually a really exciting year because there’s no clear cut favorite. I feel like Nico, Charles Hicks, Ky Robinson, and Alex Maier are the four most likely to win but I’m skeptical that this actually ends up being the top four in the race. I think there’s a lot of other guys like Victor Kiprop, Dylan Jacobs, Carter Solomon, Isai Rodriguez, Casey Clinger, or Brian Fay that could surprise by placing in the top 3 or 5.

I think out of all of these runners Charles Hicks is the most consistent and the only one I’d say is actually a lock to finish top three. I want to pick Hicks to win but I can’t shake the feeling that he gets 2nd and either Young, Maier, or Robinson out-kick him down the homestretch. But out of those four guys I think Hicks is the least likely to finish outside of the top 5.

Overall, a really exciting year for cross country running.

I think the school can run anyone on the team at nationals. I am not sure how many schools have the depth to do it but you see 6/7th guys who run poorly at regionals replaced all the time.

Of course someone could sit out regionals and win nationals. I don’t know if it’s been done. Maybe someone from Stanford or UTEP or Arkansas back in the day?

It carries some risk if the team blows up and runs like crap and the individual title contender doesn’t make it to the race.

Usually it’s a safer move to have the top guys hold back but still run the race. That way they help the team score and they’ll probably qualify individually if the team doesn’t. I was thinking that NC State could have done that with Tuohy this year, but given the volatility of the back of their lineup it was probably best not to.

Nah

I am not sure if he would be my favorite but he is definitely one of the half dozen guys in the group where I expect the winner to come from. You don't want to read to much into the early meets where guys could be training through/slightly different levels of prep.

I don't know the physiology of how long it would take to recover from a hard 10k, but I imagine it's short enough to not make a significant enough difference whether or not an athlete raced yesterday or not. That assuming coaches are smart and allow their athletes who did race to recover before next weekend.

I can’t shake the thought that there are about 10 guys who could win and armchair LR posters just don’t have enough information.

I’m excited to see who makes the first move to up the pace and break up the lead pack.

It would be interesting to know what they and their coaches think about the kick. Does Nico think he can out kick Hicks? If not, but much of a lead does he think he needs and when does he need it by? Who thinks they will definitely win if they haven’t been dropped with 400m to go?

They say a day per mile raced. 8 days is enough to recover. And those boys now know what it's like to run the 10k this season. However, it's an advantage to skip regionals, so it should be a rule that to run nationals, they have to run regionals, just as in outdoor track, they have to run regionals to run nationals, as in Olympics and World's they have to run the heats to run the finals. It's not an issue, though, because Sprout isn't going to win.

Not one mention about Drew Bosley finishing with the top guys, what a shame. I think this is finally his year to get top 5

Robinson finishing way back at conference and regionals might not be a good sign.

are we positive that Sprout isn’t hurt? Why did they sit him?