How do you rank Wilson Kipketer among the greatest men's 800m runners?

JW Harding has it right.

Rudisha #1. Then Kip. Then Cruz, Coe, Snell.

In that order.

Easily

Rudisha is number one without any question. Coe and Kipketer are 2 and 3, and one can argue who is 2 and who is 3, but not one else is a good candidate to be in the top 3.

Critical Thinking wrote:

Rudisha is number one without any question. Coe and Kipketer are 2 and 3, and one can argue who is 2 and who is 3, but not one else is a good candidate to be in the top 3.

Why are so many of you ignoring Borzakovsky??? He was arguably better than Kipketer and they competed in the same period.

Critical Thinking wrote:

Rudisha is number one without any question. Coe and Kipketer are 2 and 3, and one can argue who is 2 and who is 3, but not one else is a good candidate to be in the top 3.

I'm curious why you feel Cruz is not in the top 3. Here are some of Cruz's laurels:

Gold medal, Men's 800m at 1984 Olympic Games (vs. Coe's Silver)

Silver medal, Men's 800m at 1988 Olympic Games

PB 1:41.77 (vs. Coe's 1:41.73)

Perhaps Coe should rank higher than Cruz but it is not clear to me and I'm very slightly inclined to put Cruz higher than Coe for the 800m.

1. Rudisha (2 World Records, Olympic Gold, World Championship Gold, 1:40.91 PR)

2. Snell (World record, 2x Olympic Gold)

3. Kipeter (3 World Records, Indoor World Record/World championships, Olympic Silver, Bronze, 3x world championships)

4. Coe (2 World Records, 2x Olympic Silver)

5. Cruz (Olympic Gold, Olympic silver, 1:41.77 PR)

Depends if you value World records more than Olympic Golds, and how much you value world championships, how much silvers and bronzes are worth, etc.

If you value amount of time holding the world record, or how much the record was lowered by...

COE wins.

If you value Olympic Golds most...

SNELL wins.

If you value # of times breaking the world record, or world championships, or indoor at all...

KIPKETER wins.

If you value simply who covered 800m the fastest of all time...

RUDISHA wins.

Cruz could be anywhere from #2-5 depending on what matters most, if he had ran .05 faster he would have Oly Gold, Silver, and World record for 10+ years, and there is some doubt about the florence time from Coe anyway.

Maybe the best ever. I see arguments for him to be behind Rudisha, maybe Coe and Cruz. But i would rank him first.

Yes, Rudisha has the WR - but only because of this Kenyan pace maker:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOS3RQU92Z4

This is still the best 800m performance to date. 1:41:24 after a low 48 first lap.

Had the pace maker gone one second slower, Kipketer would have run 1:40:50 this day (maybe low 1:40)

Rudisha actually lowered the 800 record 3 times, twice in 2010 and then at the Olympics

Good Point. 1:41.09, 1:41.01, 1:40.91 I think.

So not much in total but a WR is a WR, I suppose.

I realize that you cannot give athletes credit for something that they did not do, but it is also worth noting that Kipketer was unable to compete in the '96 Olympics when he was at his best. He very likely would have won gold. Alas...

RomanceNovelCoverModel wrote:

I'm curious why you feel Cruz is not in the top 3. Here are some of Cruz's laurels:

.

Despite trying, he could not break Coe's record.

He supplanted Paul Ereng as the easiest moving 800 meter runner of all time. And has yet to be surpassed in that department

RomanceNovelCoverModel wrote:

Perhaps I've introduced significant bias in singling out one runner, but, how do you rank Wilson Kipketer among the greatest men's 800m runners?

1. Rudisha

2. Coe

3. Snell

4. Juantorena

5. Wottle

6. Kipketer(even trouble putting him here... no Gold)

Hayduke wrote:

6. Kipketer(even trouble putting him here... no Gold)

So how does Coe make #2 on your list?

Btw, is your name a reference to The Monkey Wrench Gang?

Critical Thinking wrote:

Hayduke wrote:

6. Kipketer(even trouble putting him here... no Gold)

So how does Coe make #2 on your list?

Btw, is your name a reference to The Monkey Wrench Gang?

Gold is keeping Coe from #1. However he gets credit over Kipketer because of how long his record stood. Yes Hayduke is taken from TMWG.

He's before my time, but somewhere on the all-time list has to be Rudolph Harbig (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudolf_Harbig). The guy held the WR for 16 years!

I''d probably put Coe & Rudisha !&2, and Kipketer in top 5, along with maybe Harbig & Snell.

Hayduke wrote:

RomanceNovelCoverModel wrote:

Perhaps I've introduced significant bias in singling out one runner, but, how do you rank Wilson Kipketer among the greatest men's 800m runners?

1. Rudisha

2. Coe

3. Snell

4. Juantorena

5. Wottle

6. Kipketer(even trouble putting him here... no Gold)

Significant bias is correct. Seriously, why is Wottle even on this list if someone like Borzakovsky isn't?? All he did was win a single gold and wear a hat during races, no?

Hayduke wrote:

5. Wottle

6. Kipketer(even trouble putting him here... no Gold)

That's a rather jarring juxtaposition. Wottle had one of the all-time great TV moments, but Kipketer dominated an era, and with much faster times. (I wonder where you would rank Olympic medalless Paula Radcliffe among female marathoners. And how do you justify your second-place ranking of Coe, who also never won an Olympic 800m gold?)

I agree with those who feel very comfortable with Rudisha, Kipketer, and Coe at the top. After that, things get murky. If I were picking a five-person inaugural 800m Hall of Fame class (as opposed to a collection of the five fastest or something), I think that I might add Snell and Mal Whitfield (who, as far as I know, has not been mentioned heretofore). In my second class of inductees, Cruz and Juantorena seem like pretty easy choices, along with Borzakovskiy, Mike Boit, and perhaps the seemingly unheralded Wilfred Bungei. Among my candidates for the top twenty-five would be Ovett; Ereng; Billy Konchellah; Arzhanov; Rick Wohlhuter; William Tanui; Nixon Koprotich, the briefly brilliant Wottle, Doubell, and Ryun; a few perennial workhorses like Johnny Gray; and eventually at least two or three of the recent guys nipping at (and occasionally going by) Radisha's heels, including Kaki, Aman, and Amos.

Wottle. WR and Olympic Gold looks pretty good for all time list. Borzakovskiy has gold but no WR.