Hocker 13:09 in Sweden - should he just stick to 1500?

My dad asked me to clean his car and I spent the whole day doing it. After some time my dad asked me how the car was looking. "cole hocker" I replied. He just smiled and nodded. He knew that is was washed.

Cracks were showing way before the end. Even halfway through or so, he wasn't maintaining contact with the leaders.

That was so stupid…

It’s a straight final at USAs right? So he might be thinking why not? I’d agree it feels unlikely at this point that he’d a) make the team b) would be better than place 8 in a Worlds 5000m final if he got through the (grueling) prelims.

Obviously, he failed to develop a world class kick for today’s race.

There’s no harm at all in giving the 5000m a shot at the USA championships. Maybe it was just a bad day that he can shake off and be competitive in August.

HOcker isn't what he thinks he is and what the fans all want. he's not an american ingebrigtsen. He's a pure 1500 meter runner on the world stage. 3000, sure. these aerobically strong 1500 runners can go strong for 7.5 minutes. not 12.5. big difference. Hocker and Kerr are different sides of the same coin.

He can try it if it's after the 1500 but I don't see anyway he is a factor. He is not a 5000m runner.

Mods, it's not your job to delete jokes you think aren't funny. I've restored it. We have a down vote option.

If the guy never ran another step again, he’d retire with a us championship, an ncaa championship, a 3:27 1500m, and Olympic gold.

And he’s 24.

No his 3000 indicated he could go low 12:50s at the very least, he must have peaked to hard indoors or have another issue going on since he was much fitter earlier this year.

many thanks getting the rookie ref out of the way

re Hocker,

the 5000 m strength is where his kick "comes from".

the guy that is least in oxygen debt can deliver closest to his 400m flat time, or whatever turbo stretch the race demands.

sure Hocker has that 50m adrenalin dump he can conjure up as somewhat unique.

delivering that in a 327 race, is only possible with the 3k 5k strength

a 1309 is a solid prep effort, so long as it is not a burning out type effort, rather a building effort.

Hocker may be ramping up, its not going perfect though obviously, none the less if he is still in a training blok, then I would no panic.

anyway, that is why Hocker is doing 5ks,

Cole is proving to be super shoes Centro.

+1

He is obviously not in good shape at the moment.

A bit strange that he is so inconsistent

He lost to Kerr by just a whisker two weeks ago and beat Kessler, Arop, Hoey and Nuguse. The dude is in shape.

It's his first Diamond League 5,000. His first race against world class competition, not just national class and he wasn't up to it. He can run the 5,000 at nationals for the national championship bonus but perhaps not run the 5,000 at the World Championships. Unlike the 1,500, Hocker has very little experience running the 5,000 against top competition.

Can't entirely disagree here. There are enough similarities. Centro performed big on the biggest stage but had trouble competing with the best during the regular season. Cole actually has more work to do to catch Centro because in addition to Centro winning Gold in Rio, remember he also won gold indoors once and medalled at world outdoors twice. He was the consummate championship racer.

Where I would disagree is that Cole has beaten stronger competition at the Olympics, and has the Olympic 1500m record, and stands at number 2 all time for indoor 3k at 7:23. Centro couldn't run that fast if his life depended on it, even with the enhanced shoes. As others have said, even if Cole never wins anything again, it would be difficult to make the case he hasn't somehow massively achieved.

Now to finally answer the thread question, the evidence we've seen is that Cole just is not strong enough at 5k to hang with the best in this insanely competitive era. Just like last season in his 5ks, in Stockholm he lost contact with the leaders and was never a factor. He's similar to his training partner Cooper Teare; good but not great at 5k.

If he's serious about ever making the US 5k team, he may need to actually focus just on 5k training and throw all his chips in. Trying to double the 15 and 5 looks impossible these days and you can't use Jakob as an example because he's gotten smoked in the 15 at major championships the last few years. It doesn't seem reachable for Cole to medal at both events. He probably will need to pick one. You would think he would just focus on the 1500 considering his far superior success at that distance. Maybe try to get his 800 pb down a little bit when he starts sharpening before Tokyo.

What experience does he need to run the 5000m? If he wants to make the WC team, he needs run with the top 3 and hang on. There’s no other possible strategy for him.

Pretty solid joke too