Women's 1500 Heats on Thursday are interesting. Heat 1 contains: Moser, Mackey, Cain, Schappert, Mecke. Heat 2 contains: G Anderson, Rowbury, Uceny, S Brown, Grace. 12 make the final (top 3 in each heat and 6 fastest others).
Missing: Simpson (5000), Martinez (800), Vaughn, Schmidt, Willard-Pierce, Hasay(5k,10k). Winning heat times in Olympic trials last year were 4:08.9 and 4:09.96. Slowest finals qualifier was 4:10.73. Not fast times, but possibly unexpectedly challenging for any of the names listed above on a hot, humid day in Iowa.
Women's 5000 has a really interesting mix of familiar names and competitors stepping over from another event: Huddle, Culley, Lucas, D'Agostino, Uhl, Simpson, Flanagan, Moser, Hasay, Cain. The last four seem to be using the 5K as a backup to their other event (5k is the last distance event on Sunday). Can Abbey D or Julia Lucas make a big breakthrough after just missing last year? Will Flanagan be so bold as to compete in two events? What will Jenny Simpson do if she makes the podium (her PB would have won last year)? She's looked like a running machine this year: in a slow race she will blow away the field in the last 800. As a result this could be a fast race with Huddle and/or Flanagan (if she runs) breaking 15 to win, and the runners up all threatening to make new personal records.