The race LIVED up the hype. 3-way blanket finish. HOCKER Wins, Nuguse 2nd, Young goes home DEVASTATED

In what universe does Nico Young "go home devastated"? Great race by Nico. Tough competition.

As when you're as successful as rojo, anything short of total victory is devastating

Rooting for Cole and Yared to repeat tomorrow, and Yared to focus on the 1500m, opening the door for Nico to worlds.

Yeah Nico is better off as he is done now playing any more reindoor games for now, and he can focus on training for the outdoor season.

Yared does not have qualifier or the world ranking in the 3K. Perhaps he can’t go?

Maybe today’s race gives him the points he needs to qualify

A universe where he had the ability to win that race but didn't because of his poor positioning early in the race.

Not sure if "devastated" is the right term (but it's a LRC classic so all good), but Young should be disappointed he didn't win that race because despite the tough competition (the best MD runner on the planet) he had the ability to win it and a lot of the stuff that needed to happen - like Hocker getting shuffled just enough backwards entering the final 200), did happen.

But you can't put yourself in a position where you need to make 10+ places on a guy of Hockers level in a race this short. This is very straight forwards - Hocker was never worse than 3rd on the track and never more than what, 6 feet behind Nico? At one point Young was in 12th position and 30+ feet behind Hocker. The one "price" Hocker paid for the ability to run even 200's from basically 200-2000m was a 29.9 opening 200m. That is gravy for him because even in the event that 29.9 hurts him, he had so much time to recover running even 32's in the middle of the race. While he was doing that Nico was having to run 31's at a much higher energy cost because he was having to pass the majority of the field.

I'd be disappointed too if I lost a race that close knowing that by just doing a few smaller things better I could have held on for the win. Like was nobody else a little surprised that he was so far back after the opening 12-1400m in a race that wasn't exactly flying by that fields standard?

Devastated no, disappointed yes.

This is not true. He is well within the rankings in the 3k.

maybe he's not devastated because nobody seems to care about indoor. but if this was for the final spot to make an outdoor world or Olympic squad, it's the definition of "goes home devastated"

This is the new normal for making US teams in the men's middle distance events. The competition is incredibly deep now and in the foreseeable future. Last summer, Nuguse and Hoey didn't finish in qualifying position despite running well and having excellent years. Today it was Nico.

We need to get used to seeing tremendous runners not making teams.

He lost by a tiny fraction of a second to two Olympic 1500m medalists at a race distance that is within their range and not his. He did just fine.

Yes I looked up road to Poland site and he’s on there. On the start list they had world rank in () and he wasn’t ranked but Nico was 3 and Hocker 4. Not sure what rankings those were…

Nuguse and Hoey had bad tactics and were a little cooked in my opinion. Their results were to be expected. Nico's was not imo

At least for him, the 10k - his best event imo - always comes first and he's the best kicker anyway

nobody says he didnt do fine. losing hurts. these guys want to win badly.

Nuguse and Hoey each won a Diamond League race after the US championships. Hoey's 1:43.06 and Nuguse's 3:31.34 in Eugene would have been good enough to make any US team before last year.

I guess that’s why Wolfe decided to do a 5000m TT instead of racing at the trials. I probably thought he had no chance

Only two people make the world team. I assume Yared will be qualified, and that he and Hocker will choose to go. If that's the case then maybe Nico is devastated that he isn't going to world's.

rojo's an idiot!

I appreciate the downgrade from devasted to disappointed. This an exercise in going from stupid to Captain Obvious. Apparently, thats what Letsrun folks need. What good runner is not disappointed when they dont win. But I'm sure Nico knew running an indoor race that was shorter than what his engine is specialized for might be a tough sell on top of it. I bet he gets over it in about an hour taking into account what he could have done better.

I always understood with perfect certainty that using the "DEVASTATED" in posts was for the weak-minded souls on this message 'bored'.

Sad indicator of why I had stopped coming here months ago.......
Came here to see what chatter followed USATF Champs.
Never again.