alicia johnson pacing - wtf ?

Apparently Ms. Johnson is represented by Ray Flynn who also happens to represent the Halls and Jen Rhines, three of Terrence Mahons prominent athletes.

Also interesting to note that in Willards post race interview she commented how she was expecting the pace to be slow, whereas Stephanie Twell commented that she was expecting a fast pace (a la "the pacer failed in her job")

Johnson SURELY knows the difference between a 2;17 pace versus a 2:08 pace. This smells fishy to me.

The flower is growing right out of her brain

Ooohhh! Conspiracy theory. This is getting interesting!

I have to admit that I have been racking my brain to figure out how in the world a sub 2 minute 800 meyer runner could do such a BAD job at pacing this race. Furthermore, why would meet management pay someone to pace a 1500 meter race through 800 meters at 2:17

This conspiracy is the best explanation that has come up so far

I wonder why, after hearing the split, somebody didn't come up on AJ's shoulder and tell her to pick it up (even put their hand on her back and push lightly).

the impression i got from the willard interview was that the rabbit had been hired but none of them wanted a fast pace (she seemed to say they didn't want a rabbit at all)

who gets to decide the rabbit's pace?

The only scenario that makes any sense is if the UKA peeps wanted to see a kicker's race for selection purposes (since that is typical of rounds in championships). They might have dictated a slower pace to Alysia. This obviously didn't sit well with Twell. Plus I thought someone mentioned a requested pace of 2:07 for 800.

The outcome seemed to favor Dobriskey; I guess we'll see soon when UKA makes their decision.

If what you are saying is true, the meet management blatantly deceived all but a select few of these ladies into thinking they were hiring a rabbit to run a much faster pace.

Does anyone know the people running the meet? Could this be true?

Well... there are other explanations...

1. She did a poor job and still collected her check. Bad rabbit!

2. Someone else who has shown a good kick of late also benefited from this.

I really don't care about the pacemaker going through in 2:17 at 800m

If anyone in the race had wanted to go out faster there is always the option to just pass the pacemaker and take off. Instead Twell et al. are making excuses and blaming the pacemaker for their slow time. This is not a racing attitude, what do they think good peformance comes from? Piggyback riding to a sub 4 on the pacemakers back?

Gimme a break

I am the walrus wrote:

I really don't care about the pacemaker going through in 2:17 at 800m

If anyone in the race had wanted to go out faster there is always the option to just pass the pacemaker and take off. Instead Twell et al. are making excuses and blaming the pacemaker for their slow time. This is not a racing attitude, what do they think good peformance comes from? Piggyback riding to a sub 4 on the pacemakers back?

Gimme a break

I thought a walrus could use more than it's limbic system to think. Not meaning to sound like my mom, but that has got to be the dumbest statement on a middle distance race I have ever heard.

Three and 3/4 a lap doesn't give any of these athletes time to adequately react to a MAJOR change in race plans. Pacers off by a second or two can throw a champion runner off a record pace, so what do you think happens when someone is off by 10 seconds? (I will get the hand puppets out to re-explain if needed). These atheletes go into these races with a reasonable plan on what to do after they hit the 800 at 2:07, no one wants a plan B that would involve them leading out their opponent when there is already a designated rabbit and planned 800m time.

Also, who in the world needs a pacer to hit a 2:17? She obviously failed in her responsibilities, and the pacer has a serious role to play in a major race like this.

This was a disaster, it had to involve a grassy knol (Kennedy conspiratory sub reference to you Brits). Still an exciting race, but I agree, WTF?

Very good points about not enough time to react to MAJOR changes in race plans when athletes were told and were expecting a planned time at 800.

And I don't buy the excuse that Johnson did a bad job because she didn't know any better. She's better than that (at least I THINK she is).

Were any other athletes in this race expecting a slow tactical pace besides Willard?

Flotrack only has interviews up from Willard and Dobriskey so it's hard to know what the others were expecting, however, it sounds like Twell was definitely expecting a much faster pace.

'UKA peeps wanted to see a kicker's race for selection purposes'

No, when Twell complained about the pace, she was complaining about the pace not being to the target set. All the athletes would or should have been aware of the pace time set

It would be interesting to know who employs the pacemaker but I doubt a conspiracy, its just bad pacemaking

The BMC (British Milers Club) organises hundreds of quality races. The elite ones of these have pacemakers, & they do a very reliable job.

There have been loads of races recently where the pacemaking has gone wrong.

An athletics agent, Tony Kellor who used to bring Kenyans to the UK had one of his runners entered in a 10 miles. There was a bonus for winning in under 50 so the agent told the Kenyan who's English was not the best, to go under 50. Anyway as the Kenyan is approaching the line the clock is ticking towards 50 mins. He started shouting 'sprint, sprint' to the Kenyan who didn't speed up at all, serenely crossing the line in 50:00

Turns out the Kenyan thought he said run 50 exactly! If a runner can do 50 minutes exactly around a 10 mile course he has never run before, a few laps of the track at the required pace should not be too difficult!

Egg-xactly

She did most of the damage in the first 200M with her slow start and actually picked it up after that, almost a perfect plan for the pacer to slow the race down and catching everybody not in the know off guard. By then, the damage is done and it becomes a kicker race.

Nothing wrong with a kicker's race, but obviously the meet director didn't pay for a pacer to make sure they ran 2:17 for 800M.

The way races w/ rabiits are usually handled is that there is a meeting with the athletes before the race and they discuss and agree on the pace. The race organizers then turn to the bunny and say something like "OK, so it's 2:06, even steven. Got it?" Then there would be some kind of acknowledgement from the designated rabbit, verbal, a head knod, somethin'.

I'm pretty sure, despite the winner's post race comments, that these ladies didn't agree on 2:17.

Grassy knoll indeed. And I'm calling shenanigans.

I'm with you walrus. Ignore the Excuse Brigade. I'm sure Twell knew by 200m the pace was too slow. If she wanted to run faster, then she should have run faster. There's no rule saying you can't pass the pacemaker.

Blowing Rock Master, your an idiot too then. Pacemakers have a responsibility, she was not even close to meeting that responsibility and she and Flynn still collect their check. I repeat, 2:17 for the 800, hell, you could even do that. No excuse for her performance, so no Excuse Brigade here.

The women should have regrouped, but again, this isn't a marathon where you have a lot of time to react here and you sure do not want to become the domestique for someone you were planning a minute earlier on beating. You race with alternate plans in any race for anything that may unfold, but none of these ladies would have expected to have been hosed this bad from a sub 2 minute 800 meter runner. Big meets have big pacers, this was a huge disapointment and nothing short of that. Still looking at the grassy knoll..

Why blame Johnson???? The field was experienced. If the pacer was slow then just take off. As it was, the race was set up for the kickers and Willard is one of the best.

Again, you blame the pacer when the pacer doesn't come close to doing the job. Nothing wrong with a kicker's race, but that wasn't the expectation when atheletes made the decision to do this race. Some of the brits were going to get a fast time and they were told the pacer would take it out.

I'm sure all the runners (ecept for maybe two) in the race were taken by surprise with the first 200 and by the time they could react it was now a different race. Really quite brilliant set up, but sure wasn't an honest one.

Kicker wrote:

As it was, the race was set up for the kickers and Willard is one of the best.

And what do you know, the pacer is represented by Ray Flynn who also happens to represent at least three of Terence Mahon's prominent athletes.

And take a guess at which American runner in that race is coached by Terence Mahon.

A coincidence? I think not.

There is nothing wrong with a kicker's race. The problem here is that almost all of the athletes were told that the first 800 meters were going out at 2:07 pace.

That pace would have evened the playing field for those with a lesser kick. Clearly, after a 40 second 200 meter opening pace (wow, was it really that slow?), it was pretty much too late to make the adjustment, thus, giving the edge to the kickers.

So the way I see it there are three possible explanation:

- Either the meet lied to the athletes and sprung a sucker punch surprise on all but a few of the runners

- Ray Flynn and his pacer athlete were in on a secret pacemaking plan to basically sabotage the race for those with a lesser kick

- The rabbit is a crappy pacemaker and hopefully will never be asked to perform such an important job in the future

Which is it? I will never know for sure, but I have my very strong suspicians.

Are two and two adding up to four yet?

Dumber than a walrus wrote:

Pacemakers have a responsibility, she was not even close to meeting that responsibility..

I don't believe I said anything about AJ except that Twell should have passed her. It's between AJ and meet management as to whether or not she gets paid if she didn't do the job. But I'm certain it was not part of AJ's job description to "babysit Stephanie Twell and make sure she has a good race". If Twell wants to run a fast time it's up to her to make sure she's going fast enough - not someone else. I was watching a blurry picture on the internet from 3,000 miles away and I could tell by 150 meters that they were crawling. I'm sure someone actually running in the race could have figured that out much sooner. To say that the 1500 is to short to recover from making a mistake is ridiculous. If you're 200 in and the pace is slow, GO FASTER!