I remember when Amber Trotter broke on the scene and it's amazing how we never thought what girls would do what she was able to do and now she'd be considered slow compared to this new crop of girls.
To be fair, I don't think Amber Trotter's Foot Locker race is considered slow by anyone, even compared to this new crop of girls...if she had gotten a healthy senior track season, we would have in all likelihood seen her run a 5K time in the 15:15-15:30 range. The biggest difference I see between her and Jane is that it would appear (can't know for sure) that Jane does not suffer from the same disorder as Amber, which is something that every fan should be happy to see.
She is already 18. That would be college freshmen age for many. A great time still but we have been here before with Cain and Tuohy. It's different with girls. It seems the timing of their physical maturity is a factor.
Lol the ‘24-‘25 school year is almost over, the significant majority in Hedengren’s grade are 18 now.
is this the greatest HS performance ever? how does this compare? 14:57 is so insanely fast I can't even mentally compare it.
Edit:
I guess not. Scoring tables comparison:
Kessler 3:34.36: 1184 points
Miller 9.93: 1231 points
Wilson 44.20: 1236 points
Hedengren 14:57: 1164 points
Lancaster 43.84 4x100: 1142 points
Jackson 10.89: 1224 points
Either way, 14:57 is F'ing nuts dude
Certainly, a great all-time performance, but to be fair, to an extent it tells us that we had been underperforming in that event. Below are a couple of performances I would put above Hedengren's 5K. I am not using a scoring table; I am going by the shock and awe when the performance took place and the fact that in some cases the performance would have medaled at a senior level global championships.
-800m 2:00.07 Kim Gallagher *1982* -200m 22.11 Allyson Felix 2003 -400h 53.82 Sydney McLaughlin 2017 (made the U.S. Olympic team at age 16) -400i 51.61 Sydney McLaughlin 2017 -600i 1:23.57 Athing Mu (age 16) 2019 (Is the U.S. national record & 3rd fastest in history) -HJ 6-6¼i Vashti Cunningham 2016 (That's close to her current PR) -100h 12.84 Tia Jones (Age 15) 2016 (HS hurdles are the same height as the senior level) -100m 10.89 Shawnti Jackson 2023 ...keep in mind that in 1972 Mary Decker had run faster in the 800m than all three of the ladies who made the Olympic team but at age 14 she was too young. Lynn Jennings while in HS ran the Boston Marathon unofficially, she finished 3rd in the open women's division and set an age group record that lasted record for 30 years.
Hear are a few I would say are about equal to Hedengren's 5K -10K 32:52.5 Mary Shea *1979* -2-mile 9:38.68 Mary Cain (indoors Age 16) 2013 -Hep 5847 Anna Hall 2019 -PV 15-3 Hana Moll 2023 -200i 22.33 Adaejah Hodge (Age 17) 2023
...it helps to have age, wisdom and not suffer from recency bias
The best part of the deletions is that if I ask a perfectly fair question about how another member of the training group suddenly developed the ability in the last four months to just miss the ncaa record, I can virtually hear a thousand alarm bells going off instantly.
Hedengren’s 14:57 in the 5K actually scores slightly lower than her 4:26 Mile time.
5k - 14:57 = 1167
1 mile - 4:26 = 1176
2 mile - 9:34 = 1145
When using the World Athletics scoring table to compare Hedengren to other great high school athletes. It’s appropriate to consider she scored 1167+ in 2 different events. 1145+ in 3 different events. Haven’t done the deep dive on other high scoring high school great performers but, how does their range compare to Hedengren’s 1167+ score in two different events? 1145+ in three different events? Hedengren’s high school distance running “GOAT” status stems from her record performances across the ENTIRE RANGE of distance events from 1mile to 5K.
