Jake Wightman on Jakob: "He is very good at time trialling, but probably not as good in championships as he thought.”

Rent free.

They just don't get him. Jakob talked about this multiple times - he doesn't want a chance to win, he wants to dominate from the front. For him it's either gold or last place, nothing in between. He's very explicit that he in fact DOESN'T want to be in their situation.

Here’s a less bizarre bet I made up: if your athlete doesn’t win the 1500 gold, you will have to do community service by performing 1500 felchings.

Whoever I pick is going to have very poor coaching leading up to the Olympics, so I'm probably executed no matter what. They'd all self coach better than I'd coach them. I think my best bet to win self coached is Jakob, but I'm not confident at all.

hey jake, how many olympic/world golds do you have again?

Well, what do you think he'll do? Hang back and sandbag in a 3:31-3:32 race and outkick Nuguse or Wightman? Of course not. He'll have to go from the front and act as the pacer.

Same amount as Jakob for the 1500m

For Jakob, it’s either Gold or Silver, and that’s just when he’s running the 1500m. In no universe, is he finishing last.

rojo, it is time to redirect. There's a big story that just broke today, enough of this Kerr/Wightman vs. Jakob nonsense. Get to work.

So it’s tough for Jakob. You’d rather be in our situation

I'd rather be Jakob than either Josh or Jake. The field has a decent chance of beating Jakob in a championship race, but there is not one other runner with as good odds to win or medal.

At the end of the day Jakob is younger and has better PRs and more medals. He will finish his career with more medals than either of these guys (who are both great runners). Being able to front run fast times doesn't make you a shoe in to win, but he has been the top performer at the past four championship 1500s. No one else comes particularly close.

“In theory, if he goes as hard as he can, he might run 3:26 or 3:27 from the front and we wouldn’t be able to live with that. But the chances of it going wrong are far higher than Josh and I getting burnt off..."

- I don't necessarily agree with that. I think in this scenario, his greater problem may be Yared Nuguse than either Josh or Jake. But either way, Jakob should not be aiming to win a 3:29 race, he should be aiming for the 3:26-28. If he can't win that way, then he knows. I tend to believe that he was sick last year and that prevented him from going full-out. In 2022, he was more concerned with "controlling it" and wasn't in 3:27 fitness like 2023. This year, if he's healthy and fit it's time to try the Tim Cheruiyot tactic from 2019 except 2 seconds faster.

2x WC silver, 2x WC gold, Olympic gold = not good at championships. Cool cool.

The phrase "not good" wasn't used anywhere in the article, mr. Quixote.

It’s so weird how posters get riled up by what any given athlete says.

Wightman is flat out admitting that Jakob is faster, but that his approach gives other runners a slight chance.

And yet people take offence?

Also, Sean Ingle should worry more about his wife’s latest antics!

Jakob if 100% healthy will just pull another Herb Elliott type win. Championship this and that is BS, why sit and kick if you can put it in the bag before the final bell? I hate how people automatically assume running slow and sprinting the last 400 is championship racing, that's just the cowards way to do it. People need to grow a pair and take the bull by the horns.

you can't be 100% running from the front. Not even ElG could do it. but when you put yourself in the pack, it is anybody's race. Wightman and Kerr want to think they are the best at this, but in reality, they were just the next guy like Jakob said. There are other guys like Katir, Nuguse, Nordas, etc. who can all pull off what they did. If everybody tries to sit and kick, you are just dividing the odds up among even more people.

Wightman is 30 years old and has one world medal. Jakob is better at sitting and kicking than wightman is even. I'll give it to kerr. He at least has multiple medals.

where he gets it wrong is saying "you would rather be in wightman and kerr's situation than Jakob's" No. Just no. Jakob could be in their situation if he wanted and he would be better than them in that situation.

Wightman is just not good enough, and Kerr is not the speedy guy he is made out to be. Probably very similar to Jakob's ability in the 800. 1:45 mid PR with many more attempts at it

I get what you’re saying, but I honestly don’t think he means it as a criticism or statement of superiority. He’s already said that Jakob is faster.

Rather, that in a championship setting, where the pressure is at its most intense, it’s harder to front run and aim for a time.

El G tried to have a pacer to replicate the Golden League. It worked in ‘99 beautifully (easily beating a fit Ngeny) and failed in ‘00 (outkicked by Ngeny). He won from the pack in ‘01, ‘03 and ‘04. Ngeny’s car accident taking him out helped quite a bit for the first two as far as his gap in ability to everyone else once he began his kick 2 laps out.
The actual straight frontrun attempt was never actually tried by El Guerrouj. It was by Tim Cheruiyot in 2019 and successful. He went out hard and ran within 1-1.5 seconds of his maximal 1500 against a field that was 2-2.5 seconds slower than him. Right now, Jakob has found himself in 3:29 championship races and has to try to run much faster to see if his gap over Wightman and Kerr (1-2 seconds?) is sufficient. It clearly isn’t if he lets it slow down or tries to squeeze it from the front. I think Nuguse is only a .5-1 second gap so thats a further problem, lessened a little by Nuguse’s imperfect tactics.