Mark my words: Chelenga will NOT win XC Nationals.

He took 13th in the Olympics... If Kenya and Ethiopia were allowed more entrants he wouldn't have taken 13th. Rupp is a very good runner to be certain. However, I'm not sure he is the odds on favorite. Chelanga is dominating like McDougal did last year, only a little bit more, and McDougal beat Rupp with Rupp taking a similar approach last year... not racing until the end of the season. Everyone is taking for granted that Chelanga is peaking now but that may not be the case... Maybe he IS that good. Chelanga is the favorite until Rupp steps up THIS xc season and proves otherwise... Or maybe someone else will step up.

False, Rupp is still the favorite, despite the fact that he hasn't raced yet this fall.

Boughs and Kirwa could beat both of them

If odds were taken, rupp would not be favored.

Rupp is simply not driven to win.

Great running talent, yes.

Champion, no.

Unitard 2nd to Liberty again. Bank it.

Not driven to win? What the hell.

“That was unbelievable. To see somebody go out in a field like this and make it look like a high school senior running against a junior high team, that’s just unbelievable. That’s the national champion we were looking at. No guarantees obviously, but we sure haven’t seen anyone else in the country that looks like that.”

- John McNichols

........"we sure haven't seen anyone else in the country that looks like that"

This quote says it all.

too bad he wont race boughs or kirwa, hes obviously scared

BAUHS

Hmm....I believe Rupp raced Bauhs at this litte event this year.

http://www.usatf.org/events/2008/OlympicTrials-TF/results/F13.asp

thats not fair and you know it, rupp took off a 3/4 of a year to get ready for that and baughs had peaked before for world xc and d2 nationals, baughs is a better cross runner and has a faster 10k pr i believe

gern blanston wrote:

If odds were taken, rupp would not be favored.

Rupp is simply not driven to win.

Great running talent, yes.

Champion, no.

Yeah, we all know what Rupp thinks when he´s at the starting line: "I don´t think I want to win today".

d to the 2 wrote:

thats not fair and you know it, rupp took off a 3/4 of a year to get ready for that and baughs had peaked before for world xc and d2 nationals, baughs is a better cross runner and has a faster 10k pr i believe

Spell his name right. B-A-U-H-S. His 10K PR is about 15 seconds slower than Rupp's.

I'm not a Rupp fan at all, but I do think he's still the favorite...UNTIL/IF...Chelanga beats him head-up at nationals.

To put things in perspective, Torres is probably (aside from Dathan Ritz) the best cross country runner in the country right now. Rupp made him look silly this past summer, easily beating him every time they raced and even being the first (I believe) person of European descent at the Olympics. To compete with the best runners in the world on the most important day when it counts says a lot to me. While Chelanga may be setting records and looking like Tergat vs. Kids trying out for JV team, Rupp is still the favorite right now.

I guarantee you he's hitting tempo runs in Eugene right now that would compete with Chelanga's race efforts (which are also tempo runs). We'll know when they all toe the line and race. Period.

Here are some things that I don't think people are fully comprehending about Chelanga at Pre-Nats:

1) The course was much slower this year than last year. Times were on average 20 seconds slower. The likely reason for this is the ground was a little more damp than last year.

2) Chelanga went out in 2:30 through 1000 meters (downhill, yes) and 4:16 at the mile. He ran alone the entire way.

3) He broke McDougal's record (on a slow day). McDougal beat Rupp at Nationals, and Rupp is coming off another long track season.

Chelanga's race was out of this world. He has to be the favorite.

One reason I could see Rupp not winning is because his team is going for another title. If Chelenga takes it out so fast Rupp might not go with him in order to run a team race. I would guess with all the individual success Rupp has had he might put the team first before himself.

Again just an opinion though.

rupps a selfish bastard, if he cared at all about the team he would go to practice with the team like every other D1 runner, like josh and sammy. O yea and he hasnt raced once with he team yet. Real team player.

Some things none of you know:

-Chelanga would have beaten McDougal last year, had he been eligible. They would have finished 1-2 at nat's.

-This is Chelanga's third (?) year running

-After running 70 mpw last year, Chelanga is now running 90-110 mpw (I think he might have lowered it recently)

-Chelanga's brother has run 2:07 in the marathon

chelanga trained with Paul tergat for a whole year prior to coming to the US .personally i believe this kid will do something special this season