With Usain Gone, Who's Currently the Sport's Biggest Ambassador? Dare I Say Eliud?

El Keniano wrote:

Vgxggcxvhb wrote:

Not even close.

My wife knew Bolt. My 8 and 12 Year old know who Bolt is.

If I asked who is Kipchoge, they’d probably say bless you.

Aww, how quaint domesticated men like you, whose entire existence and world view is informed by their wife kids, still exist. Sweet. So back to the question at hand. Since your wife and kids have never heard of Kipchoge, who do they know? Rupp? Centrowitz? Murphy? Maybe Jager? And does that make them the biggest name in the sport?

Since logic doesn't seem to be your strong suit, let me dumb it down for you.

They guy referenced what is in effect, a small sample of "regular" people. They would not have heard of Kipchoge. They also wouldn't know any of the names you mentioned. They wouldn't know anyone except Bolt. In other words, no one has taken his place.

Now you sit in your room alone with no wife or kids, and no prospects, and try to come up with a logical response.

It's Felix until she hands the responsibilities to Sydney.

Why hasn't Noah Lyles come up yet? Easily one of the most marketable. And he wins races. He's still young, but if his success continues, he might become widely recognizable.

Shalane is my bet as most notable. In part because of her time in the pro world, and the cookbooks.

El Keniano wrote:

Does anyone have a higher mainstream profile than Kipchoge right now? A first for a distance runner? Breaking2 and the NatGeo documentary as well as Nike's preferred athlete for their new campaigns. And Brits, don't even try with that Mo Farah is bigger tripe. Only true in the UK and its satellites.

Sad enough it is Mo Farah. Otherwise I still have friends who pretend to know track throw names out there like Allyson Felix, richards-Ross and Justin Gatlin. In general If I don't hear Mo it is one of those names.

aksjhgd wrote:

#metoo wrote:

Perhaps it would be a woman as the current face of T&F.

Shalane Flanagan?

The despised-by-LRC Kara Goucher?

Allyson Felix is still around.

Dafne Schipoers?

Back to men, can't forget Gatlin.

Perhaps Sydney McLaughlin will be the face of the sport in a few years?

I expect this will be true in the US at least

and I do think that as much as Eliud is revered in serious running circles, more Americans probably know who Shalane Flanagan is.

Meauxbaht wrote:

Mo Farah is the face of athletics

Dafne Schippers

Celebrity, in Europe and Asia.

Castor Seymenya is the face of Athletics, and the one to drag it's profile into the 21st Century...

Right now is Eliud's moment but Mo Farah has been a lot more well known over the last 6 years

Noah MF Lyles

John Clendon wrote:

Why hasn't Noah Lyles come up yet? Easily one of the most marketable. And he wins races. He's still young, but if his success continues, he might become widely recognizable.

The fact that he isn’t notable says a lot about how difficult it is to replace Bolt.

John Clendon wrote:

Shalane is my bet as most notable. In part because of her time in the pro world, and the cookbooks.

No. She was a news story for a week. Not in the same world as Bolt.

steve dildarian wrote:

It's Felix until she hands the responsibilities to Sydney.

Felix is AWOL.

Sydney isn’t good enough. Mondo, Lyles, and Ingebrigtsen are all already more accomplished than her and they aren’t nearly good enough to even consider replacing Bolt.

Not yet but in a few years it will be Noah Lyles and Sydney Mclaughlin, once 2020 rolls around and they each pick up a few medals and maybe some WRs. It will never be a marathoner, at least not to the degree Bolt was. Even if they break the WR by a ton like Bolt did (Eliud) people don't identify with them. Especially people who never ran distance or the marathon. High school kids may idolize him in a similar way we idolized Rudisha and Farah when I was in high school, but the average Joe will never care about anyone who runs more than 400m. They just arent relatable or even comprehensable to non-runners

huh69 wrote:

Not yet but in a few years it will be Noah Lyles and Sydney Mclaughlin, once 2020 rolls around and they each pick up a few medals and maybe some WRs. It will never be a marathoner, at least not to the degree Bolt was. Even if they break the WR by a ton like Bolt did (Eliud) people don't identify with them. Especially people who never ran distance or the marathon. High school kids may idolize him in a similar way we idolized Rudisha and Farah when I was in high school, but the average Joe will never care about anyone who runs more than 400m. They just arent relatable or even comprehensable to non-runners

Yes, finally someone here gets it. You clowns throwing out distance - or even middle distance - runners are dreaming. No one outside of this website and maybe a few hobbyjoggers at Runner's World care about anything beyond 400m........

But they’ll care about the women’s 400 hurdles?

Nobodies wrote:

HahaRiiiiiiight wrote:

Yes, finally someone here gets it. You clowns throwing out distance - or even middle distance - runners are dreaming. No one outside of this website and maybe a few hobbyjoggers at Runner's World care about anything beyond 400m........

But they’ll care about the women’s 400 hurdles?

Sydney will be running the 400/200 eventually, and I'm not even going to go into marketability. There's a reason she'll be signing (or maybe already has) one of the biggest contracts in the history of T&F.

The Scot wrote:

You'd have to ask non-runners. But most of the public 'get' the 100m sprint because it suits their short attention span so all things being equal, a personality in the 100m will trump anyone else.

As regards Eliud v Mo here are some stats for you:

Twitter followers

Mo = 1.58M

Eliud = 84k.

I'll wager you over 90% of Mo's social media followers are British. Kenya doesn't have the same online reach.

Nobodies wrote:

steve dildarian wrote:

It's Felix until she hands the responsibilities to Sydney.

Felix is AWOL.

Sydney isn’t good enough. Mondo, Lyles, and Ingebrigtsen are all already more accomplished than her and they aren’t nearly good enough to even consider replacing Bolt.

I didn't say anyone is replacing Bolt. I'm saying who the sport's biggest ambassador is/will be. Which is about more than being "good enough". Lyles will cover the gap from Felix until Sydney.

#metoo wrote:

Perhaps it would be a woman as the current face of T&F.

Shalane Flanagan?

The despised-by-LRC Kara Goucher?

Allyson Felix is still around.

Dafne Schipoers?

Back to men, can't forget Gatlin.

I'm seeing Americans aren't that different from the Brits thinking their athletes are household names worldwide. If it's a woman it's going to be Shaunae Miller-Uibo.

HahaRiiiiiiight wrote:

Nobodies wrote:

But they’ll care about the women’s 400 hurdles?

Sydney will be running the 400/200 eventually, and I'm not even going to go into marketability. There's a reason she'll be signing (or maybe already has) one of the biggest contracts in the history of T&F.

So you’re saying a 0-time world/DL (and IIRC even national) champion in the 400H is gonna move into the 200/400 and achieve Bolt-like dominance.

Ever heard of Miller-Uibo?