Official 2015 Prefontaine Classic Live Discussion Thread

Also Rupp was pretty boneheaded to go as early as he did, you could see with 200m left that he was doomed. And good on Maggie Vessey, shaming NIke by winning the B race so easily. She should have been racing tomorrow.

LM wrote:

Still, medaling at 5000 will be a BIG ask for Rupp, as this field lacked in form Alamirew, Ndiku, and Farah. Barring injury I feel confident saying Rupp will win silver at 10,000 in worlds.

I think Rupp would do better to bail on the 5000m, and focus on the 10. If he was in the shape he in last year, he'd have the 10 000m tonight, imo.

LM wrote:

All this announcer support is funny. They are the same guys that have been calling it at some of the major marathons, namely London for a while, as well as on many of the Diamond league broadcasts. I agree there good, but it's nothing new

Hutchings is always there for DL, and Cram I think is on occassions. Different guys for the sprint/field events though

It's that we're used to the commentating on the U.S. marathons coverage, that's why it's so good when we get to enjoy these seasoned professionals.

Man, you guys are brutal. I'm no Rupp fan, but the guy was sick over the Winter. Wasn't this his first outdoor race? 13:14 is a pretty good opener. The others already had some races this season.

Kejelcha is all upside. Great to watch a natural racer. Those instincts aren't taught in a laboratory.

Lagat's 13:14 has got to be a world age group record.

c'mon now, it's not like she's every won anything big before, especially anything as big as the Pre meet.....oh wait, hey pre meet director, WAKE UP! as ventolin would say, morons.

Bad Wigins wrote:

Also Rupp was pretty boneheaded to go as early as he did, you could see with 200m left that he was doomed. And good on Maggie Vessey, shaming NIke by winning the B race so easily. She should have been racing tomorrow.

LM wrote:

Still, medaling at 5000 will be a BIG ask for Rupp, as this field lacked in form Alamirew, Ndiku, and Farah. Barring injury I feel confident saying Rupp will win silver at 10,000 in worlds.

I think Rupp even has a slim chance for the gold! It would require two things:

1) That Rupp doesn't double. If there's 5000m coming (two starts), it'll effect the 10000m in that he subconsciously either saves something for it, or the subconscious uses 5000m as a backdoor : "well never mind if I don't win the 10000m - there's always 5000m to make it up in." - that line of thought is the real killer since he has no realistic chance in 5000m.

2) The starting pace needs to be suicidal: the doublers then would need to decide whether to go with them and risk destroying themselves with the 5000m still to come, or let them go and trust to reel them in later. If Rupp lays it all on the line there and goes with it, he has the credentials to make it.

I don't want to name any names but there's only one doubler of real concern to Rupp (remember we're considering his gold chances now), and there's only one, maybe two guys who could try to pull the suicidal starting pace.

Didn't matter what Rupp did tonight, he wasn't in shape to beat Kejelcha.

The "B" race was just where Vessey needed to be. They're bringing her along nice and gradually. The only race she cares about right now is on June 28. Too bad about the timing screw up, she ran at least 4 tenths faster. Steve Cram had her at 1:59.77.

For your first comment, all the pacers had dropped out by 4k so how did they get him through 5k in 13:20 pace? Once again, showing yourself to be totally clueless.

Your 2nd comment. Cam Levins was the winner tonight!? Ahhmmm, he came 4th. Great run from him and all but this isn't field of dreams.

crawl back under whatever bridge you came from.

Bet they "adjusted" the time so the the B race wouldn't be under 2 minutes. Did you see how long it took before they announced the results? That didn't happen to any of the other races.

Not really wrote:

Didn't matter what Rupp did tonight, he wasn't in shape to beat Kejelcha.

The "B" race was just where Vessey needed to be. They're bringing her along nice and gradually. The only race she cares about right now is on June 28. Too bad about the timing screw up, she ran at least 4 tenths faster. Steve Cram had her at 1:59.77.

I had her at 1:59.63 and I could have been a little off but between that and Cram's 1:59.77 that 2:00.07 is way off. A Diamond League should have the glitches worked out before racing begins. Stuff happens tho, she ran a great race and is clearly ready for 1:59 and under. Nice to see her out front lately.

Blitzplay wrote:

For your first comment, all the pacers had dropped out by 4k so how did they get him through 5k in 13:20 pace?

If you weren't blind, you might have noticed they got to 4000 around 10:40, at which point Farah passed the rabbit and practically pushed him off the track. The rabbit dropping early was his own fault.

However, instead of speeding up, he quickly allowed Tanui to pass him and tow him along at exactly the same pace as before for all but 200m of the 5th kilometer. So your lame nitpick is moot anyhow - Farah was led to a fine 5000 split and shouldn't complain.

Cam Levins was the winner tonight!? Ahhmmm, he came 4th. Great run from him and all but this isn't field of dreams.

Nobody cares who placed 1st, 2nd or 4th, it was a time trial. You must be new to the sport.

The pacers didn't pan out at all. They said AJ Acosta was supposed to go through 3000m in just under 8:00 and I think he was out before the mile. Second pacer dropped way early too. It was just the Kenyan pacer and the field and Mo kept coming up on the pacer trying to get him to speed up. Thankfully Mo was able to trade off leading with Tanui for the second half of the race, but they slowed quite a bit. They came through 5k in 13:21 and 13:15-13:20 was asked.

Mo was outwardly pissed about the pacing in the post-race interview and wanted someone to go longer like Rupp got last year. Not a lot of chances to run a fast 10k anymore.

Zane Robertson just died tonight. He was running with Levins for the first 5k and you could see the effort level on his face, it was just way too high. Robertson just kept dropping back more and more.

Cam Levins looked freakin amazing tonight. 2k to go and he still looked effortless. It looked like a workout. It's no wonder he was able to move up so much.

rupp was 2 seconds off the win.

and beat guys like Jeilan , Ibrahim by 8 seconds.

now the task is fo drop a 54 second last lap rather than 57 and bob's your uncle.

If Mo really is upset about the pacing, he should just retire. A truly great runner doesn't need it handed to him on a silver platter. Grow a pair. How ironic - a Nike sponsored distance runner complaining about the rabbits at the Prefontaine classic. If Pre were still alive he would sneer at Mo.

pacers.

if you're going to have rabbits you might as well do it right.

for a 10k record attempt you need world class guys to rabbit.

if your PR is 13:10 in a hoover race, at peak you can rabbit 13:20-25 at best.

do you need those sub 13 5k guys to be in shape to do the job.

if farah wants to run fast, have a couple of decent guys rabbit to 3 K, then have rupp and levins take it to 5-7 K, then farah can go to the line. go ahead and invite a handful of the top 10k guys along for the ride.

if you're lucky there will be a record and a hell of a race that last 3 K.

Why would Rupp ever agree to pace Mo for a world record?

Mo should pace Rupp to a 5k PR & Rupp should pace Mo to a 10k PR

haha, i laugh at all of you immoral letsrunners who do nothing with your lives.

you're bald, fat, and out-of-shape while Yomif Kejelcha, a prodigy, was able to win the prefontaine classic at only age 17. he works hard and tries to lift his family out of poverty in Ethiopia.