Boston Marathon US Elites Announced

Anyone else doubts Ritz makes it to the starting line?

Lol at Ritz on the list of elite competitors. Hope he can stay healthy to actually make the start line of this race.

Mr. Glass is going to become Mr. Gorilla Glass and prove all of you haters wrong.

Kara Goucher has announced that she will stay on the track in the Spring/Summer and might run WC on the track. She will run a fall marathon and go to the US marathon trials in Feb. I think she is keeping up with her track running in recognition of the fact that she may not get a marathon spot, but could get a spot in the 10k against a fairly weak US field.

Ritz was the fastest American marathoner in 2012 and 2013. He won a cross country race in Italy yesterday and is racing again on Saturday in Scotland. He'll show up in Boston.

A lot can be said for focusing on speed for a while too, then bumping back up. If she still does high volume and lots of speed, she may re-kindle the flame with a fast marathon. she mentioned in a recent video she has developed a really bad "marathon shuffle" type form from a lack of faster stuff.

Maybe Ryan Hall, like all of the LRC coaching staff has been saying, should do the same thing torevitalize his marathon career. Both Goucher and Hall are in a similar plateau type spot in their careers. I think the answer could be SPEED!!!!!

demethedream wrote:

I think the answer could be SPEED!!!!!

I don't know much about this stuff yet, but isn't speed a PED?

Here are our 4 thoughts on today's announcement:

http://www.letsrun.com/news/2015/01/four-thoughts-2015-boston-marathon-u-s-elite-fields/

London is not going to shell out big-time dough to a guy with a 2:08 pb, even if he won Boston last year.

I'm pretty sure they'd pay more for Meb than they would for Kipsang or Mutai. Dude speaks English and has charisma. Of course he's worth more to Boston than to London, that's clear.

The way I see it is that if Meb ran Boston there would be a very low chance he could win but a rather high chance he'd run 2:07 or something like this and finish 10th. I wouldn't go so far to say that this would tarnish his legacy, but there is not much to win, either. Now in Boston, he can run aggressively and even if he fails and comes in run/walking the last few miles, people are still going to cheer for him.

Going into the 2016 trials, I still think the favorites are:

Meb, Ritz (if he can make it to the line in shape) and Hall.

None of the others have even hinted that they possess the sub 2:10 speed.

We'll see what happens.

the top three are ... wrote:

Going into the 2016 trials, I still think the favorites are:

Meb, Ritz (if he can make it to the line in shape) and Hall.

Well, d'oh. Hall is the only WORLD CLASS (sub 2:05) Marathoner that the US has right now.

So Meb winning Boston (plus taking 4th at NYC) doesn't qualify him as world class?

Nutella1 wrote:

London is not going to shell out big-time dough to a guy with a 2:08 pb, even if he won Boston last year.

I'm pretty sure they'd pay more for Meb than they would for Kipsang or Mutai. Dude speaks English and has charisma. Of course he's worth more to Boston than to London, that's clear.

The way I see it is that if Meb ran Boston there would be a very low chance he could win but a rather high chance he'd run 2:07 or something like this and finish 10th. I wouldn't go so far to say that this would tarnish his legacy, but there is not much to win, either. Now in Boston, he can run aggressively and even if he fails and comes in run/walking the last few miles, people are still going to cheer for him.

I would be SHOCKED if they paid more for Meb than Kipsang. Meb is a great guy and charismatic, but Kipsang is in the middle of a historically great stretch of marathons. Plus he's the defending champ and course record holder. And Kipsang speaks English too (not as well as Meb admittedly).

I agree with your second point, but I think you're overrating what Meb is worth internationally. To expand on my original point in the article, it makes no sense for them to pay a more money for a guy that will never be in the lead pack (Meb) as opposed to someone like Kipsang that they know is looking to run fast.

There's no way American races pay more for Africans (and same goes for sponsorship deals). Americans are a hot commodity.

Meb's public relations value is 100 times more than Kipsang's in Boston

There is absolutely NO WAY Hall makes the 2016 marathon team. He has been DONE since the 2012 trials. He has not run a SINGLE good race since the 2012 trials. He has barely FINISHED a race since the 2012 trials.

The team will be: Meb (a lock), Eggleston, and Arciniaga as of right now.

Disappointed to not see Josphat Boit's name on the list. He made a gutsy move last year and retained top 5 until the last 3 miles. He is due to pop a good one.

Regardless, Boit should be on the 2016 trials radar.

Remember John Hancock is the Boston bankroll and an american company , the want to build the american field. They do multi year deals with athletes locking them up. Athletes have flexibility to run another spring marathon but have to fill the contracted number of races in a set period of years.

Remember,its only the select few of us who read and write on these boards that look at the detail of the fields racing. The hype build up and PR efforts will make the headlines for weeks preceding the event that makes the press and yes americans will get the lions share. If an american wins its news non american not so much.