Lyles pulls out of Monaco showdown vs Tebogo in 200

Ducking the competition. Pathetic.

What's wrong with this?

Seems like a totally reasonable thing to do.

I think we can forgive him for this one. Lyles has probably the lowest pull out rate of any current sprinter.

Nothing wrong with it but it may denote that not everything has gone according to plan. The original plan was we will train, go get a payday and race in and Monaco, and then Olympics. Now they have decided to change the plan.

Nothing wrong with hit but worth analyzing.

It may not mean more than traveling to Monaco and back isn't easy two weeks before the Olympics. His future paydays will be a lot bigger if he wins a gold or three in Paris.

Smart and agree with him not competing in Monaco, but if he was scheduled to run in Michael Johnson's new track league, MJ and fans would not be happy.

I've got a guess that maybe the thing that didn't go according to plan was the emergence of Kishane Thompson.

Made Noah go from being the favorite in the 100, to being way behind the favorite.

How so??

I see what you did there.... :D

He’s set to race in London. Probably the double took a lot out of him and he saw Kenny B is getting close. I don’t mind him locking in a little longer.

I haven't seen Noah get injured in a very, very long time. He is quite lucky in that regard. The last time he pulled something like this was in 2022 after Knighton ran 19.49. We all know what happened afterwards.

Kishane Thompson ran 9,91 in Hungary (destroying Tebogo) jet lagged, after a subpar start (0.161), -0,6 headwind, and jogging the last 20 meters.
Probably Noah panicked because his central nervous system isn't still prepared for a 9.7. But with 3 weeks more, who knows.

I agree with what you're saying, but isn't he already on the "biggest contract since Bolt"?

With that being said he's probably got enough per year now (and maybe bonuses from the trials) that he can relax and prepare better for Paris.

The "Kenny B" moniker belongs to Bekele. Please use Kung Fu Kenny like everyone else. Thank you in advance.

This is less about Lyles, who has been pretty good about competing.

This is why I mostly quit going to track meets. Too many people don't show up and its a real, real problem for us as fans. Outside of the oly trials and worlds and olympics, no one is guaranteed to show up anywhere. Its so different from team sports, and yes, if I buy a ticket to see a 49ers game, I'm not guaranteed that my favorite player will show up if they're injured, but its more likely that they'll play unless they are on IR. Track folks regularly skip meets they're advertised to be in because, "I'm just not sharp," "I wanted a little more rest/training/microdosing."

And it sucks for fans, period. The whole industry has made it so that, at least for track events, its only the trials, Olympics and Worlds. The DL final even gets skipped. Its kinda bullsh!t.

I hear you, but this problem is not unique to track and field. “Load management” has become such a problem in the NBA that they had to change the rules for awards eligibility to incentivize players to stop taking games off.

It’s also very common in Major League Baseball for players to take games off to rest.

What I see is Tebogo easing up in the last portion of the few 200m races he's run this season (even when he finishes second). Presumably, he's using the races as training for Paris. Then you have Lyles who doesn't want to show his cards in a race unless he's absolutely dialed in.

As a reminder, Tebogo ran
9.88, 19.50,30.69 (300m),44.29 in the last 12 months. The 300m time beats out Michael Johnson and Van Niekerk. He is the real deal at only 21 years of age.

I am sorry but Lyles is nervous about this guy and doesn't want to give him an inch of extra confidence going into Paris. Watch the Netflix 'Sprint' series to understand how important the mental game is in their events.

Yes, I watched the entire series and shared my thoughts on each episode on that thread.

My impression from watching Sprint is Lyles has the utmost confidence in his 200m abilities. He might get nervous about the 100, but I don’t think anyone can make him nervous about the 200. Remember, this is someone who has openly talked about going after Bolt’s record.

My guess is he probably just needed more time to recover from doubling at the US Olympic Trials.