I agree in everything you are saying in this post, except how you estimate Jakob’s half marathon capacity…
Just for the records: Me being a fan of the Ingebrigtsens / the Norwegian means only that I’m a fan of their training / racing project, and some of their views on training and racing. I (like you I suppose) want to see how their philosophy manifests it self in times and achievements throughout the years -I really think they have found something revolutionary, and I think it’s the training more than talent. And as a Norwegian it’s especially interesting to watch how a awkwardly small country all of a sudden has two candidates to the price “athlete of the year” (Warholm / Ingebrigtsen) year after year…
I like outliers and special features in athletics, and therefore both Ingebrigtsen and Nordås. But I also really liked what Hassan has been doing -how she fell from a medal, and just smiled. And took the blame her self (didn’t run straight). And how Gidey supported her afterwards. And that Tsegay stood (ran) on her rights. And how Cheptegei and Gidey and even Bekele (once) dared to hit the wall in xc. And that Kipyegon said she was a little embarrassed that Gidey had to do all the work in the former’s 5000m WR race. And that Tsegay eventually got her WR (5000m) after years of tough openings in the 1500m.. And so on and so on.. And I would love to have McSweyn winning a championship with the fastest home stretch, just to show it’s all about the strength!
I agree in your estimate of Jakob sub 12.40 -there’s so many races and indications for this. And I think such an estimate aligns with parameters from testing and training and lactate readings. But to extend this to predict 10000m and half marathon times seems too much of a stretch. Because there are some strong indications that Jakob may be a really (of course relatively) poor both 10000m and half marathon runner:
1. Jakob has never raced any really good distance runners over 6, 8 or 10k (xc, road or track) or above!
2. In 2019 Jakob probably could have run 12.55 or faster (did 13.02 twice). But in his two longer runs he flopped grossly: 27.54 road 10 k, and 8 km WC U20: placed 12th against totally unmerited runners (47 sec behind guys with 13.30 and 28-+ pr’s that season, or f.ex 61+ half marathon). He was totally destroyed by guys 2 min away from the WR in the 10000m; athletes who weren’t good enough for the senior ranks…!
3. I think Jakob has a vision about how training and racing and progression should be when it comes to himself. And when this vision seems to collide with reality he seems to think he can fix the whole thing with small adjustments (f.ex admitting that a marathon WR is something he isn’t sure of; only that he is going to try to break it… But no admission about the rest of the events)…
Maybe an athlete theoretically can have the WR in both the 1500m and the (half) marathon. But maybe this is more determined by genes than by training than Jakob thinks..?
4. Jakob reminds me of Cheptegei -a playfulness and (maybe) an overestimation of own abilities: The latter runs nearly 2 min behind the WR in the half, and in the full marathon he hits the wall, and can’t even walk afterwards without assistance (Pretty much like Jakob after some of his races!).
5. You mentioned his 8k childhood race -good of course, but no reason to think he was better here than in the 5k’s at the same time (that he ran fast in courses of 200m + elevation)…
Jakob has surprised me a lot of times. And I hope he does this again in the longer runs. In some surroundings he can be extremely strong - you mentioned the Nationals in 2017 (Jakob 16). In the 5000m he toyed with 13.20 runner Moen. And this despite he the day before pr’ed in the 800m (somewhere in central Europe -nearly won the race)…
I don’t know if the ability to recover super fast says something about 10k / half marathon capacity. And even Jakob is human -in the 2023 Bowerman 3000m he clearly wasn’t fully recovered… But I really hope he dusts all my predictions opposed to yours here. -Personally I think there’s a stronger possibility for Jakob to really crush some WR’s 1500-5000m, than to even run decent in the 10k and +…