Kipchoge the GOAT? No. No. No. With video.

Bekele without drugs is 12:59

A second or two after faster than Moorcroft.

He was the most doped distance runner of all time.

Haile Geb a close second.

Thoroughly filthy.

I've done some rough calculations based on the NY Times article which asserts that Kipchoge's mother taught Patrick Sang (age 54) in kindergarten. Assuming Kipchoge's mother was in her early-mid 20s when she taught Sang, and had Kipchoge shortly thereafter, Eliud is approximately 44 years old.

Lostbois wrote:

I’d be interested if you can find somewhere where people are calling him the GOAT distance runner. Pretty sure they are using GOAT in the context of the marathon.

Yes, that's what we mean.

It’s egun wrote:

Bekele without drugs is 12:59

A second or two after faster than Moorcroft.

He was the most doped distance runner of all time.

Haile Geb a close second.

Thoroughly filthy.

So you believe that but you do not believe Kipchoge is on PEDs?

....

You put alot of thought into this and I agree; however, I have no pronlem with the poster who listed Kipchoge ahead of Mo. Either is a great choice fir 3 in my opinion.

Looking at tge video of Kipchogetrying to break Bekele in X Championship and Bekele totally destroyed him to fade from 2d to 5th with less than 600m and walking 10 meters from the finish line. Kipchoge poor Kipchoge on that day, NEVER seen a super elite top runner BROKEN LIKE THAT.

Mo Farah doesn't belong in any list because he's never run fast except for the 1500m. Farah raced Kipchoge at indoors in 2012 btw. Went exactly as expected.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kzee0gPqcwE&t=629s

Querfeldein wrote:

let me explain for the kids wrote:

Guaranteed every runner in the conversation for GOAT has taken a good hard swing at the 'thon. Tergat did. Geb did. Tadese did. Farah did. Rupp did. Bekele did. And KIPCHOGE did, doing better than any of all those track/XC/turkeytrot SIDESHOW SPECIALISTS could sniff.

1) Bekele arguably didn't try the marathon at his prime. He still came within a few seconds of the WR. Had Bekele tried the marathon a few years earlier, it's very likely that he would have broken it.

2) Every long jumper has had a go at the hundred metres. It doesn't mean we rank jumpers by their sprint times.

3) What does Rupp have to do with this conversation?

1) He was damn near his prime. He ran the fastest marathon he was ever going to. Certainly didn't dominate the event at all.

2) Good point. As I said, Bekele is the 5,000/10,000 GOAT. But we don't call the long jump goat the track and field GOAT, do we now? Why? Because it is a SIDESHOW. Just like distance track and XC are SIDESHOWS to the BIG SHOW CALLED THE MARATHON.

3) Good catch. I just put Rupp in that list to see if people were paying attention. He doesn't deserve to be in the conversation.

Lol....and then in the races that mattered in 2012, The Olympics, Farah won double gold and Kipchoge finished 7th.....in his own team trials.

let me explain for the kids wrote:

Querfeldein wrote:

1) Bekele arguably didn't try the marathon at his prime. He still came within a few seconds of the WR. Had Bekele tried the marathon a few years earlier, it's very likely that he would have broken it.

1) He was damn near his prime. He ran the fastest marathon he was ever going to.

Not at all good sir. He was a shell of his form from 2004-2008 when he ran 2:03:03.

how can he be 18 in 2003 and not yet 20 in 2008??? that is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I lost brain cells reading this. please go back to kindergarten, maybe there they will teach you how to count. you the type of person to say LeBron the goat. Man can not be 18 in '03 and not yet 20 in '08. please delete yourself from the internet as I have violated your existence. good day to you sir @beating up kids

Is this the GOAT? wrote:

Please explain how Kipchoge was 18 in 2003 and still not yet 20 in 2008.

beating up kids wrote:

Um, Kipchoge wasn't even 20 years old then.. We actually never got to see them face off in their primes.

how can he be 18 in 2003 and not yet 20 in 2008??? that is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I lost brain cells reading this. please go back to kindergarten, maybe there they will teach you how to count. you the type of person to say LeBron the goat. Man can not be 18 in '03 and not yet 20 in '08. please delete yourself from the internet as I have violated your existence. good day to you sir

....

One persoon noone mentions that belong there is John Ngugi. 5 conservative long X titles when it was held every 2 years and no short course. Olympic Gold by running 60 secod 3 lap then sprinting straightways and recoverig on the curves. Noone every tired that and one person who pyrsued him to the end ran out gas with a 75m lead on 3rd in last 400m and got no medal. John "the beast" Ngugi

Yeah the guy behind Ngugi was Dieter Baumann and while that one race was very impressive, Ngugi was about as fast as Adam Goucher. #notmytop5

Sorry, VIPAM. I read your post wrong. Baumann was second, but not the same guy you mention in your post.

the man xctf wrote:

Is this the GOAT? wrote:

Please explain how Kipchoge was 18 in 2003 and still not yet 20 in 2008.

how can he be 18 in 2003 and not yet 20 in 2008??? that is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I lost brain cells reading this. please go back to kindergarten, maybe there they will teach you how to count. you the type of person to say LeBron the goat. Man can not be 18 in '03 and not yet 20 in '08. please delete yourself from the internet as I have violated your existence. good day to you sir

This was the funniest thing I've literally seen on letsrun. Please delete yourself from the internet.

the man xctf wrote:

how can he be 18 in 2003 and not yet 20 in 2008??? that is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I lost brain cells reading this. please go back to kindergarten, maybe there they will teach you how to count. you the type of person to say LeBron the goat. Man can not be 18 in '03 and not yet 20 in '08. please delete yourself from the internet as I have violated your existence. good day to you sir @beating up kids

You should have read the explanation first but those of limited intellect tend to skip to the back of the book.

Ngugi may not if ran fast but how can you discount 5 straight X titles when everyone (1500m - marathon ) ran the same race. Then the Olympic win was sub 13:15 when less than 5-6 people had broken 13:00. Now your history and Ngugi may not be GOAT but in any true distance fan top 5 he deserves mention!!!!

okay so to elaborate a little more on this topic because it's an awesome one

1) I know there are many differing opinions as to what constitutes a "distance" event and therefore runner. Some people think it starts at the metric mile (1500m) and other believe it starts at the 10000m. For me the 800/1500/3000 are middle distance events and true distance events start at 5000m. Everyone is fully entitled to their opinion but obviously, for the sake of my previous list, it discounts El Guerrojou and Komen as their resumes are boosted by their ability at 1500m/mile/3000m. Just one olympic title, one world title and one WR (as awesome as this is) at the shortest "distance" event can't get you in the top 5 unfortunately.

2) Drugs. Well sadly we can't just omit this white elephant but for the sake of the list I assume everyone is clean even though I agree with some posters that this simply isn't the case. Would I bet my house that even one of the guys I named in the top 5 had never touched a PED in their lives ever? Come on man.

3) Best performance? I don't disagree that the recent WR of Kipchoge might be the singular best performance from my top 5 but I am not 100% certain that I couldn't make a case for either of Bekeles 5 and 10 records being equally impressive and out of reach for the foreseeable future. Only Barega this season has offered any sort of hope that someone could even approach 12.37. Even if I would go along with 2.01.39 being the singular best, the package of 12.37.35 and 26.17.53 in my opinion is equal to it for this arguments sake

4) @commenter - again this was the most difficult decision on my list - Mo at 3 and Kipchoge at 4 or vice versa. Hard because of the above point about singular best performance or which Mo doesn't even get on the radar compared to anyone on the list (funnily enough apart from the 1500m which doesn't count for my ranking purposes - see 1)). But running is not just about the clock. The Olympic Games gold medal is not awarded to simply the fastest athlete in each event for the calendar year. Winning counts and Farah is a great a race winner as there has ever been over 5 and 10000m in any era of the sport. He is basically undeniably a greater winner over these distances than Bekele. Over the span of 8 years there are only two 5000m/10000m races he DIDN'T walk away with the gold medal. That is worth more than I think popular consensus gives him. I personally think it is astounding. I have no problem with seeing Kipchoge 3 and Mo 4 but in my opinion Mo gets the nod by a 100th

5) Finally, 5th spot was also tough. Vipam mentioned Ngugi and Ngugi could possibly have a case to rival Tergat in this spot. Both won 5 World Cross races when it just the long race and Ngugis olympic gold is a huge, huge factor. But lest we forget Paul Tergats bid for an Olympic Gold medal was part of still to this day the greatest 10000m finish of all time and was thwarted by 9/100ths of a second to the man 2nd on my list. He walked away with 5 silver medals over 10000m on the track - 4 of them again, thwarted by Gebrasalasie who many thought at the time would be difficult to supplant as the greatest the world ever saw. Throw in a 10000m WR (Ngugi never really threatened the WR in any event - I guess maybe the 10000m where he was 3 seconds out) and the 'thon WR and actually the more I think about it the clearer the gap is between Tergat and Ngugi + anyone else.

Fun debate though - wondering if anyone else has an opinion with some facts and figures to back it up!

seasoned ranker wrote:

Lol....and then in the races that mattered in 2012, The Olympics, Farah won double gold and Kipchoge finished 7th.....in his own team trials.

1. Kipchoge not yet in his prime in 2012.

2. 7th at Kenyan trials is harder than 7th in OG.