Lots of British athletes are not competing - Laura Muir isn’t but no threads about her.
They will have a specific race schedule designed to peak at the Olympics. We also have the British Champs in 2 weeks. Every athlete who wants to be selected for the Olympics needs to come top 2 in those trials and the 3rd space on the team down to many other factors.
It’s slightly more risky for Wightman as he is looking dodgy for selection - he needs to get a top 2 spot and a good time. But he’s coming back off injury and is probably being selective about where he races.
Kerr has nothing to prove. He’s going to the Olympics so you can understand why he is planning his schedule to peak then. Not at some random DL event and not at the Euros (like some others)…
Lots of British athletes are not competing - Laura Muir isn’t but no threads about her.
They will have a specific race schedule designed to peak at the Olympics. We also have the British Champs in 2 weeks. Every athlete who wants to be selected for the Olympics needs to come top 2 in those trials and the 3rd space on the team down to many other factors.
It’s slightly more risky for Wightman as he is looking dodgy for selection - he needs to get a top 2 spot and a good time. But he’s coming back off injury and is probably being selective about where he races.
Kerr has nothing to prove. He’s going to the Olympics so you can understand why he is planning his schedule to peak then. Not at some random DL event and not at the Euros (like some others)…
Fair enough. I’m a Norwegian -doesn’t mean one has to be critical to totally reasonable decisions from the Brits..!
So we only race when we have something to.prove? Insult to the fans and to the meet by not competing. It is like skipping high school staye meet because you just won a big invitational 2 weeks earlier against the best guys in favor of running a national meet a month after that. Cheating the fans.
Lots of British athletes are not competing - Laura Muir isn’t but no threads about her.
They will have a specific race schedule designed to peak at the Olympics. We also have the British Champs in 2 weeks. Every athlete who wants to be selected for the Olympics needs to come top 2 in those trials and the 3rd space on the team down to many other factors.
It’s slightly more risky for Wightman as he is looking dodgy for selection - he needs to get a top 2 spot and a good time. But he’s coming back off injury and is probably being selective about where he races.
Kerr has nothing to prove. He’s going to the Olympics so you can understand why he is planning his schedule to peak then. Not at some random DL event and not at the Euros (like some others)…
let's not forget the all important 5th avenue mile at the end of his season, evidently, that usurps the diamond league final.
For field eventers this is huge. Nobody ducks majors from field events. The stars of athletics do because all the money/career/legacy for them is in Olympics and Worlds.
Kerr will be judged on Olympics not Euros, he could get injured, lose confidence getting beat etc. Its close to trials as well.
Alekna and Stahl want glory and EUROS is glory for them because nobody on letsrun cares about them anyway. You have Perkovic/Elkasevic going for 7 euros in a row. But hardly be heard in normieville.
The british team for 1500m is very tough to make, racing European championships isn't how they qualify. They need to focus on making their olympic team and being ready for that.
In the past two seasons, 5 of the top 22 runners in the world are from G.B. and only 2 of the top 100 are from Norway.
Why aren't they competing? 🤔 Not a good look for them when Jakob is doing 1500 and 5000m.
Kerr is instead running the portland track festival 1500m on Saturday. He has always done this every season, run US meets until flying to Europe for maybe one race. He may run Monaco or London or neither.
The british team for 1500m is very tough to make, racing European championships isn't how they qualify. They need to focus on making their olympic team and being ready for that.
In the past two seasons, 5 of the top 22 runners in the world are from G.B. and only 2 of the top 100 are from Norway.
Well no, because Kerr doesn't need to do British Champs to make the OLY 15 team - he'll be put on as UKA has a rule to choose a defending medallist. Kerr is doing the 800m at Nationals as a tune-up. All of this has been covered in interviews already.
Wightman, yes, he will be focusing on trying to make the OLY 15 team and also said he will consider doing the 800 too (with the standard already hit) because of how competitive the British 15 is.
To OP's point: - Kerr doesnt race often anyway. He focuses on peaking for one single race. He's popped out recently to test himself over the mile and will go back to focussing on Paris, like Muir and many other medal threats do. - Wightman is also a global medallist, so whilst he is coming from a weaker place (injury), he too has a realistic chance of medalling again, so will be focusing on Paris.
Jakob on the other hand has barely raced, he's coming back to fitness (fitter in the Mile than I expected but who knows about the 5000 atm) so is likely 'needing' to use these as building blocks because of his more rushed timelines, either physically, or mentally for his own confidence/ego - getting turned over by Kerr and rushed at the line by Timmy C can't have left him feeling too over the moon atm.
I'm actually really happy to see Keely going - similar to Muir and Kerr I expected her to go back to focusing on training
I'd need to spend some time working out what other big names aren't going, but here are the entry lists by country:
Lots of British athletes are not competing - Laura Muir isn’t but no threads about her.
They will have a specific race schedule designed to peak at the Olympics. We also have the British Champs in 2 weeks. Every athlete who wants to be selected for the Olympics needs to come top 2 in those trials and the 3rd space on the team down to many other factors.
It’s slightly more risky for Wightman as he is looking dodgy for selection - he needs to get a top 2 spot and a good time. But he’s coming back off injury and is probably being selective about where he races.
Kerr has nothing to prove. He’s going to the Olympics so you can understand why he is planning his schedule to peak then. Not at some random DL event and not at the Euros (like some others)…
let's not forget the all important 5th avenue mile at the end of his season, evidently, that usurps the diamond league final.
Yes he does tend to favour the American meets as his training is based there. So like your team he needs to factor jet lag and travel in his race plans.
The Scots do seem to love the 5th Avenue mile. Jemma Reekie and Laura Muir often include it in their schedule.
I do agree that the British turn out for the Euros is disappointing this year. But I also trust there are good reasons behind this rather than ‘ducking’ people.
Wightman should get a pass because it’s going to be difficult to make the UK team this year. Kerr is already going to Paris so it’s kind of lame for him not to be in Rome.