Great read: Jonathan Gault's 20 Final Thoughts on the 2024 US Olympic Marathon Trials

Really well-written article that’s useful for those who didn’t follow the race closely and haven’t been discussing it the past few days on this board. As someone who’s been active on the board both during the race and since then, the article reads like a nice summary of the board discussions that we’ve had. Nearly all those thoughts have already been expressed and discussed. I do appreciate the place chart in #9. That’s a great addition.

In all honesty, I do not find gault any more insightful than anyone who has run and followed the sport for twenty years.

Very good article but I think Young (who is coming off of knee surgery just a year ago) has way more upside potential in Paris than Mantz.

The charts in the article showing mile splits (from 20 miles to the finish) and overall places for the top male and female runners are great.

That sort of place movement (where some runners fade, some maintain, some accelerate) over the final miles happens in every marathon throughout the pack. But its really difficult to notice that while watching a race. Especially while watching a race in person or when dependent on poor TV coverage.

Those charts well illustrate the drama that was unfolding out on the course over those final miles in both races.

Thanks to Gault for looking up the splits and places and assembling it all in the charts.

Excellent article. One thing I just thought about, when reading this:

The Olympic Trials are a championship race that are not the be all end all- they lead to an even bigger race.

Analyzing, say, the Super Bowl 3 days later is a waste. It's over and next season the champion gets nothing, they start over, too.

But we're looking forward to a bigger race that comes from this race.

I, too, think that Young has more potential for Paris- he just looked more in control to me.

I can't wait to see O'Keefe- her first marathon and in warm conditions with pressure and she had to guts to go when she did.

Did you just say "Great read:" for your own article?

(Editor’s note: Or hold the Trials races at different times. If both Trials races go to the same city in 2028, we’d love to see one sex run on Saturday and one run on Sunday. We’ve long said it’s near impossible to broadcast two sporting events properly at the same time on the same channel).

This sounds all well and good and yes more people watched on TV than were there on the course. But as someone who was there, the two races and the start times were ideal. By the time both the men's and women's field were in the 3rd and 4th loop its was only a few minutes after one group went by that the next one came. It made watching a marathon in-person very exciting.

I actually do find him "more insightful than anyone who has run and followed the sport for twenty years", but even if you don't, you're comparing him to an extremely knowledgable and insightful group of people.

Overall good read but that idea in the editor's note about charging $5 to use the live tracker is idiotic. Most people can barely be arsed to pay $5 for a high quality Sound Running meet stream, nobody is going to pay to use the live tracker lol.

Agree. Young seems quite a bit better than Mantz if you just look at this race. But let me throw in the caveat that I don't closely follow or much care about NCAA results. If you DO put a lot of weight in that, then you may feel Ches is one of the greats - perhaps just below Jakob on the totem pole. Maybe they're pretty close, but I wouldn't say Mantz is in another, higher category. Young may not be either. They could be very close in potential.

Good god you guys post stupid stuff sometimes. No, Panning cannot run 2:06. Mantz and Young ran only 2:07:47 and 2:08:00 under perfect conditions and they jogged away from Panning. If you think Panning can run 2:06, then Mantz and Young are worth, what, 2:03-2:04?

Running a 16 mile time fast deep in training means almost nothing. I've run 18 miles at 11 seconds per mile faster than marathon pr pace deep in training the morning after having a couple beers. It's the end of a marathon that gets you, not mile 16, and some of us just have the tendency to do our workouts too hard. If workouts were all that mattered, Young wouldn't have been so obviously superior to Mantz at the trials.

Precisely mr. Insightful.

gault gives us NOTHING that couldn’t be heard on the race broadcast,

or seen on citius.

or any other outlet.

gault provides no insight,

the man, like the website is/are simple gleaners.

Yeah, this was hilarious to me. Here’s a good way to raise maybe $10,000, maximum, while pissing absolutely everyone off!

dear benevolent dictator,

this click bait post and feckless article is,

an epic fail.

I agree, that might be one of the dumbest things Gault has ever said. No way Panning is in 2:06 shape.

Panning basically ran a half marathon time trial in the middle of the race and DIED HARD the last few miles. This was after the first 5 miles at nearly 2:12 pace.

Unless Brooks comes out with a $3,000 pair of supershoes, Panning is not running 2:06

Hey Rojo

What did you mean by this bro? " Great post "

"My thought exactly. Hate is more powerful than any drug out there today!"

Rojo replies - "Good post. I think I'll merge this with the other thread or should I let there be two threads?"

so cringe

Better not be the last Trials. Dakotah was the 10th fastest qualifying time with 2:24, by the time the race started she was 8th after Bates and Seidel scratching. Bates has had injury for 4 months, and Seidel is constantly dealing with something. So no guarantee they'll be ready to go this summer either. On top of that, Dakotah just ran 2:25 on a warmer than ideal day. It's reasonable that type of performance would have been a 2:23 if run earlier in the morning. A 2:23 puts her in the top 5. And some of the people faster are getting older, and may simply be declining. D'Amato and Hall likely have their fastest times behind them the past few years and will keep slipping. We just selected our top 3 runners for right now and likely the next handful of months. Same for the men, Mantz and Young were already top 2, Korir was a favorite last time and was still a likely person to make the team. There's no problem with the team we have going to Paris. I'd much rather have a race rather than play politics and say "This person ran well a year ago, I know they had some bad races recently, but they really ran fast at Boston last year", or "The weather was really warm here and this course was hard, so I think they actually ran the better performance than this person did over in this marathon"... All of that would be terrible, let's keep the trials.

“That’s the only strategy for any of the four guys we have to make the team,” Simmons said. “…There’s only two ways to make this team. Run under 2:08:10 and finish top 3. Or 2:11:30 and shoot for 1st or 2nd. But I don’t think [the second one] is a good strategy.”

^^^ And what the heck is Simmons talking about? Korir finished 3rd, NOT in 2:08:10, and he is still likely going to the olympics. He's 68th on the Road To Paris selection at the moment out of 80 people, so 13 people from countries that don't already have 3 qualifiers would need to pass him (Kenya, Ethiopia, Israel, Eritrea, Japan, France, Morocco, Germany, Uganda, Spain, Italy, China, Belgium, Australia). I do not see 13 people from countries outside of that list passing him for the first time in the final 11 weeks of the qualification window.