How has the NOP (UAC) fallen so badly from success? They should disband. Worst year ever?

Agree. It’s bad. Rogers got throttled in London this last weekend. What happened to the Kenyan 800m guy?

Charlie Hunter only a shade of his former self. Ribich doing his best, but nowhere near teams. Bartelsmeyer made the German 1500 team for Budapest, so guess there’s that.

Yeah, the team gets a little better when you go outside of the US athletes.

However, even Jessica Hull left. She was their brightest spot in the group. Why did all of these athletes leave? If this were BTC people would be going nuts on here.

The answer is real easy -Pete Julian is a horrible coach. The best thing for US middle distance running would be for Nike to dump Pete

Now everyone is seeing the level of coaching Julian was doing at the collegiate level. That’s who he is and it was a mystery that he was brought in by Nike. Maybe the main criterion was staying out of AlSal’s way. Any success is really down to athlete talent level and motivation level. Rupp used to train with Osako and he saw good reason to look for greener pastures.

It kind of seems like he was brought in mostly to be an assistant. So the expectations were low. They were, "listen to Al." Then he slowly started catching Alberto's "damaged goods" or people he didn't view as the right fit for him. When Alberto was removed, it seemed logical to keep Pete to maintain continuity and retain top level talent. It's not surprise, in hindsight, that people like Rupp left after seeing what they were left with.

Also worth noting that David Ribbich has had a terrible year since joining them. He's attempted to make the transition to steeple and it has not been pretty. He's been racing alot (he's run 7 steeples this year) so it doesn't appear that he's injured, but he has yet to go under 8:43. He also got 10th in his prelim heat at USAs. Tough go for him.

Like the BTC, I want to give people who are in their first year the benefit of doubt as they adjust to the new lifestyle/training system. However, you're right.

I think it is pretty obvious that this group will not survive this current Olympic cycle. Paris 2024 is over and Nike starts looking at who to cut, this group and most of its athletes will be on the chopping block.

Julian seems to have some success in the 1500. Ribich should have stayed in that event, may have finished better at USAs.

Ben Thomas’s men’s group is way better lol. Jackson Mestler, Aidan Tooker, and Matt Wisner all ran Pr’s in their respective events. Hocker made a team with essentially 2 months of training and ran an 800m PR.

Let's not get crazy here.

I have always found it funny how in the heyday of NOP everyone spoke about Alberto as their coach. Once he got in trouble seems all of a sudden everyone was saying oh no they have been being coached by Pete all along. It was obvious to see the athletes were trying to distance themselves from Alberto.

Save American middle distance running DUMP PETE JULIAN

No the real answer is the one you hate to admit, that Salazar was a great coach

You'll all hate on me for pointing out your internal dilemma, but your hate only reveals it.

Uh.... Yeah doping any athletes will make you look like a great coach lol

The contrast between Ribich’s first year in the steeple vs Geordie Beamish’s has been really stark. While Geordie’s an overall better runner than Ribich, I think they’re similar-ish runners who moved to the steeple for the same reason. They even both have (or had maybe for Ribich) a podcast but only one do them has worn a national team kit and races at the diamond league level. I actually saw Ribich live at sound running take a tumble in the steeple and pretty much pop right back up but then he just faded badly out of the pack.

I’d feel some sympathy for David but I’ve always gotten a weird vibe from him. Never was sure why some 3:37 college guy felt the need to write a book and start a podcast before actually making waves in the pro level. Also heard he was disparaging of Spencer Brown when he had the trial with the Beasts (kind of hypocritical for the dude who wrote a book about chasing your dreams to then think some YouTuber trying to do the same is beneath you, no?). I’m one of the biggest critics nowadays on Spencer’s threads but to have a teammate look down on him when he was legit trying to make it as a pro is really bad. Funny to see that now Ribich has been dropped by Brooks and may need to ring Spencer and Ari up for some LT2 training soon!

okay but Geordie actually has a coach who knows what he is doing, he is not a total headcase, and he is just more talented than Ribich

despite all this he's still ahead of Spencer in terms of actually having a contract, taking his training seriously (sometimes maybe too much so), and refraining from engaging in childish gimmicks.

honestly I think the shade on Spencer was Ribich's effort to match fellow podcast host and co-love of his life (with Olivia his wife) Josh Kerr's blunt no nonsense disdain for the situation. as a world class 1500 meter runner Kerr could legitimately question what Brooks was thinking in terms of Spencer's deal (they were thinking of free exposure) & Ribich, as always, followed his lead in his awkward bumbling way

Agree that Ribich running the steeple is a failed experiment. He’s a 3:35 1500 guy. He has a much better chance of improving to 3:32-3:33 and being competitive on a national level than he does knocking 30 seconds off of his steeplechase time. He has a better shot of running a competitive 5k than a steeple as well.

Yikes man, Alberto tried to bang her. Imagine how effed up that would make things. Why are you blaming the victim here? What a mess of a training group.

All good points. I think it’s interesting though that in basically the same time Ritz established himself as a coach, Julian has seen his reputation crumble. It wasn’t that long ago that Julian was the coach of a world champion who could do no wrong, and several of the strongest runners in the US. Post NOP has been a total nightmare for Julian, while Ritz has taken a group of top NCAA runners and turned them into world beaters (or at least US beaters).

As for Spencer, I think if it had been the 2023 version who joined the Beast they’d be justified in ragging on him but at the time it was a pretty cool opportunity. It’s not like Spencer was totally unproven at the time and if covid hadn’t cancelled his season, he probably could’ve had a 1500 PR dangerously close to Ribich. Just seemed lame at the time to look down on someone trying to make it and I wonder if that contributed to Spencer not making the most of the opportunity.