1:01:06 at Houston today. People been hyping Klecker’s potential in the half and full marathon for years. Clearly he’s too tall to be successful. Has no kick on the track to compete in championship races. Is it time for him to retire and start his next career?
1:01:06 at Houston today. People been hyping Klecker’s potential in the half and full marathon for years. Clearly he’s too tall to be successful. Has no kick on the track to compete in championship races. Is it time for him to retire and start his next career?
He was coming back from injury and this is his half marathon debut. Ritz got too cute with his training.
Klecked should have at least done some longer tempos (8-12 miles) on the roads at faster than marathon pace in order to prep his body and mind for such a race
also, Klecker was doing way too many threshold efforts and fartleks and very very little specific long grinding half marathon work (4 x 2 miles for example).
yes he did that 4 x 3 miles workout but again that was on the dirt (I think) and only two of those efforts were hard while the other 2 were at marathon pace
First race after being sidelined with injury since The TEN in 2024.
Also his first half marathon.
If anything I think it arguably shows how he does have marathon potential, was only about 12 seconds behind Young, one of the best American marathoners ATM.
First race after being sidelined with injury since The TEN in 2024.
Also his first half marathon.
If anything I think it arguably shows how he does have marathon potential, was only about 12 seconds behind Young, one of the best American marathoners ATM.
Mantz is just on a different level.
Oh really? Now the excuses are coming on. Yet those ridiculous interviews and stupid videos of the next Messiah Klecker were so prominent and in our face like it was a given! Sick of Ritz and all those arrogant people around him who think too highly of themselves
1:01:06 at Houston today. People been hyping Klecker’s potential in the half and full marathon for years. Clearly he’s too tall to be successful. Has no kick on the track to compete in championship races. Is it time for him to retire and start his next career?
He was coming back from injury and this is his half marathon debut. Ritz got too cute with his training.
Couldn’t the same be said about Morgan McDonald? His debut and he has had a slew of injuries for the past year, most recently during this build for Houston, has the same coach, was definitely not the OAC’s focus and isn’t looking to go to the roads as soon as Klecker. This is a bad result for Klecker. He wasn’t even first OAC in this race.
Based on what we’ve seen with other guys with his size and height, the 10k is about the max distance where he can be competitive on the national level. This race is of course his first back from injury, but his buildup was ideal, so i doubt this is a case where he has much more potential at the half than what we saw today. In the full he would only struggle more, he’s a 2:11 guy at best. On the track, he’s about reached his limit, he might have a 26:50 in him, but he is not fast enough to ever medal at global championships. He’s like Solinsky, Tegenkamp, and Goucher where he is stuck at 5k and 10k. Not enough speed to compete at mid distances, but just too big to be good on the roads.
Should he retire? Completely up to him, but he might have some success with the triathlon, or maybe just cycling.
How many coaches in the US are getting better results than Ritz? Not saying this was a good result from Klecker, because I expected better (as did Ritz), but Beamish won a gold medal indoors, Nuguse got a 3k silver and 1500 bronze last year + a 3:27. Monson and Klecker were injured, but they've been two of the best in the US since they turned pro. Hoare is a CWG champ (waiting to see how this season goes before deciding if he should go somewhere else).
Of course I'd like them to do better, but I'll always want athletes to be better, that's what the whole sport is about, and there's only a handful of coaches you could even argue might be better (Eyestone, Smith, Thomas, maybe Powell, maybe Schumacher, Brosnan ofc, maybe a couple others), and I doubt most of them are able/would want to switch to On.
This is the first time one of OAC has raced a half iirc (besides Obiri but she was already world class coming in). I think we can wait a bit longer before saying they should fire Dathan based on a January race coming off of their most successful year as a group.
This post was edited 43 seconds after it was posted.
Based on what we’ve seen with other guys with his size and height, the 10k is about the max distance where he can be competitive on the national level. This race is of course his first back from injury, but his buildup was ideal, so i doubt this is a case where he has much more potential at the half than what we saw today. In the full he would only struggle more, he’s a 2:11 guy at best. On the track, he’s about reached his limit, he might have a 26:50 in him, but he is not fast enough to ever medal at global championships. He’s like Solinsky, Tegenkamp, and Goucher where he is stuck at 5k and 10k. Not enough speed to compete at mid distances, but just too big to be good on the roads.
Should he retire? Completely up to him, but he might have some success with the triathlon, or maybe just cycling.
As a wise man once said, "If I had just ran a 61:06 half, I'd still be running victory laps" especially if a team is willing to pay me a bunch of money to keep running. I don't know why there's this obsession with wanting athletes to retire after a bad (61 isn't even that bad) race. Have you never worked a real job and have no idea what a 9-5 grind looks like? Why would you be telling someone to stop RUNNING for their job and go do that?
“Monson and Klecker were injured, but they've been two of the best in the US since they turned pro” THIS SAYS IT ALL. You’ve got two Olympians in the repair shop. Rookie coach.
Based on what we’ve seen with other guys with his size and height, the 10k is about the max distance where he can be competitive on the national level. This race is of course his first back from injury, but his buildup was ideal, so i doubt this is a case where he has much more potential at the half than what we saw today. In the full he would only struggle more, he’s a 2:11 guy at best. On the track, he’s about reached his limit, he might have a 26:50 in him, but he is not fast enough to ever medal at global championships. He’s like Solinsky, Tegenkamp, and Goucher where he is stuck at 5k and 10k. Not enough speed to compete at mid distances, but just too big to be good on the roads.
Should he retire? Completely up to him, but he might have some success with the triathlon, or maybe just cycling.
As a wise man once said, "If I had just ran a 61:06 half, I'd still be running victory laps" especially if a team is willing to pay me a bunch of money to keep running. I don't know why there's this obsession with wanting athletes to retire after a bad (61 isn't even that bad) race. Have you never worked a real job and have no idea what a 9-5 grind looks like? Why would you be telling someone to stop RUNNING for their job and go do that?
You need to work on your reading comprehension. My last sentence was literally that it’s completely up to Joe if he wants to retire. So I didn’t tell him to stop running. Learn how to read. You can sign up for a local adult education course for free.
I was responding to the thread title, which posed the question if Joes should retire. Such a question would invite responders to cite any number of reasons for retiring from pro racing. I just simply provided a few examples of reasons for Joe or anyone in his position to retire. Sometimes if the outlook for improvement or success is bleak, some individuals may seek other jobs or other opportunities elsewhere. My post had nothing to do with demanding Joe to retire. I was simply citing objective observations about his skillset and performances.
It isn’t just one bad race. If you look at Joe Klecker’s career, it’s everything I described in my earlier post. He’s stuck at 5k and 10k but seems to have maxed out and it’s doubtful he has the speed to win at those distances. You can’t disagree with facts. Every guy as big as Joe has never been successful at the half or full marathon.
Now in terms of your baseless accusation that I’m unemployed and can’t relate to having a job, I actually have a great career and I work normally 60 hours per week. So nice try.
Dathan has done well with the talent he has to work with. Klecker is not Grant Fisher. God didn't give that to him.
Klecker should keep running as long as he enjoys it, it pays the bills and gives him the lifestyle he wants. He'll never be a great marathoner or half guy, but I'm pretty optimistic he can work to get under 60 and eventually break what used to be the US record held by Ryan Hall.
How meaningful is that, and how will it transfer to the full M? Idk. I suspect, like someone else said, he would be something like a 2:11 guy. Maybe a little faster or slower.
up to him what he wants to do. The road seems almost random enough that you can believe in your ability to make a national team at some point. maybe he doesn't think he has it on the track against Fisher, Nico and the up and comers like blanks, strand, and wolfe.
“Monson and Klecker were injured, but they've been two of the best in the US since they turned pro” THIS SAYS IT ALL. You’ve got two Olympians in the repair shop. Rookie coach.
Look at Monson and Klecker from 20ft back. They are the most awkwardly built athletes I have seen.
Klecker is fighting his physiology trying to stay uber-light for running. He's wide and has a frame for muscle. Stop fighting it or injuries will remain.
Monson has wide hips with low gluteal density- let the hip injuries abound.
Those two are outliers for ON and injury. Ritz's training is...odd at times, but their builds probably have more to do with it than the training. Genetics suck