Who has a brighter future: Nico or Drew Bosley?

Nico is 2 years younger than Bosley and faster so ill go with him. In 2 years, Nico could very well be Sub 13

Decent point I suppose. But look how much better Drew has gotten in the past 2-years compared to Nico. He definitely seems to have more untapped potential

It's not really an equal comparison though, the better you are the harder it is to improve so of course the person who started off better won't improve by as much

I’m not sure who will be better, but it’s crazy that Grijalva, Nur, Young, and Bosley could all potentially be sub 13 guys in three years who were all on the same team together.

I'm going Nico. Performance/talent-wise, as you say they're really similar and Drew has improved immensely. Because of Nico's clout (high school phenom, generally more well-known than Drew, possible residual attention from L&L fans....), I think he'll end up with more opportunities, a higher salary, and access to more advanced tech/training/competition as a pro, hence putting him a little ahead of Bosley. That said, both have very bright futures for sure and they never stop delivering.

Untrue. You view it that way because the faster guy was almost always doing more mileage which makes it true. But the factor is mileage and intensity, not the time they are at. If 2 guys do the same training for a few years and one runs 15 minutes and the other runs 14:30, it is no more likely that the slower one will improve more. Bosley trained less which is why he had improved more now that they are at the same volume but the 2 year age difference is gone at this age and same volume. I think it is a toss up but I will choose Bosley because he made big jumps this fall.

Time wise, I don't think anyone can predict who will be better. Bosley just had a massive leap forward, but you can't exactly predict he'll keep moving. Nico has been steadily improving but eventually he should hit a wall.

I think Nico will have the best opportunities to improve due to his fame and years of college times. IE he could get into top invite meets and then get dragged along to top times. Eventually he'll get enough experience to start making waves.

Bosley really only has this year as a notable individual achievement. Every other year he was just a cog in a bigger machine to the media (although he still has impressive track times). He doesn't have name recognition to pull him along either. I don't think he'll get into the biggest races once he leaves NAU unless his times get just a bit faster, like he might be forced to run and win a few "heat 2's" for a bit to prove himself as a "heat 1" kind of guy.

Nico has been known for 5 years. Bosley's dad was an All American 30 years ago.

Nico. I worship Nico. He's so courageous. Hero.

His mom was also a D2 All-American. So it's in his DNA. Were the Young's parents runners as well? Genes make a difference. Either way, they're both already very successful regardless of what happens after college.

It seems there's a large group of people on this forum that think being undertrained in high school points to a higher potential ceiling. Showing massive improvement in college is great, but it doesn't mean you made the right decision, it just means you made the right decision later.

Obviously there are exceptions and I'm not advocating for everyone to train like pros in high school as injury and burnout are real things.

My main point is Bosley doesn't necessarily have a brighter future because he didn't run much in high school and improved later. He may end up better, but it's not because he was undertrained in high school.

If a large group of people believe one thing while you believe another, why would you claim your belief is correct?

Those two years are a huge difference because you just don't get Americans running low 13:10s at 20, whereas you get more at 22. To compare them at the same age, Nico's been way ahead at every age, of course, so if you see him running 12:58 in two years, then that's about 15 seconds better than Drew just ran at the same age. They've also been doing virtually the same training for around three years and on that training Nico's been ahead of Drew but recently they've been very close, between xc nationals (2nd and 3rd) and BU (Drew ahead this time). If they go to BTC afterward, you could see either one or both becoming great. Still, Drew has a degree of heart that is rare, and which you can see already in a long run in the corn in Indiana that there is a video of from soon after he came to NAU. He had limited pedigree (very good on limited training), yet he was out there working hard to win the long run and Mike Smith noticed how good a prospect he was, even though he was missing the point of the run entirely, because he showed from the beginning that he was afraid of no one and willing to push his body to the wall. I would posit that he was doing that at xc nationals, that Nico was in better shape but that Drew pushed himself more--and hence, dropped off near the end because he was in territory he'd never been in before, metaphorically speaking. So, Nico arguably has more natural running-specific ability but Drew has that heart that allows him to go out beyond the ability to swim back in, to make a Gattaca analogy. I also like the stride better, not on his heels like Nico, and hence, more efficient and quicker to change gears and kick.

Bosley has a better pedigree than Young

Nonsense. They both train and race hard and it will come down to talent and avoiding injuries. That is some crazy stuff you just typed.

I find it interesting how many people are overlooking how impressive Bosley was even as a freshman. He won the Big Sky Championships, and at NCAAs he was the top freshman in the nation and was the first NAU finisher (ahead of Nur, Grijalva, and Beamish, all successful pros now)

Very true, and also impressive he ran so well on a day where most of his teammates did not.

The eye test says Bosley to me has the higher upside on the track, but who really knows. Smith has a good track record of 5k pros recently with Beamish, Nur and Grijalva. What if they decide to stay in Flagstaff like the last 2? All the sudden you’d have a training group there to rival Bowerman and OAC.