Its hard to race fast when you spend all year building up mileage towards a huge aerobic capacity/blood volume/hemoglobin, as opposed to blood doping, taking EPO, or relying on a huge natural capacity of those factors. Maybe this is why the Bowerman bros didn't hit their quals.
Also, how many 1500s and 5k's in this hemisphere went under the standards? Not many...
I don't think Thompson ran, the finals were on a Sunday
mooonshot wrote:
Not sure what to think of this and why we feel the Marathon should be held to a different standard?
Kincaid sort've went for it, then the race became tactical. If he would have kept the gas down when Chelimo started playing games he might be going. Thompson I really feel for as I think he's hit the standard the last 2 years, just not this window.
The marathon should be held to a different standard because you can only run 2 a year and the level of notice the standard was rolled out with did not allow the US guys to properly chase the standard and compete in the trials. It would have forced guys to change marathon schedules which could affect endorsements or deals already signed to run marathons. Also, it could have led to a situation where guys had to jeopardize their trials performance to chase the standard.
That being said the new track standards suck the way they were rolled and you combine the incompetence of the IAAF with the incompetence of USATF and you get this mess. The timing of the trials sucks with timing your peaking and all the fast races on the circuit in Europe. At the very least people should get some time post US champs to chase on the track. I think the Brojos are right when they say if a country has 3 with the A standard they should be able to send their top 3 at a trials even if those 3 don't have the standard. The IAAF wants to limit the field. If the US is going to send 3 anyways why should IAAF care who it is. Or maybe set a lesser B standard that you can send a person with if your country has 3 with the A. That way if a country has 1 superstar and then a bunch of average Joe's, if the star gets injures they can't send a guy who runs a 2:45 marathon.
strykerd wrote:
Didn't he go through the mile in around 4:08? That's certainly sub PR pace.
Probably around that, but that was off the hot pace in the first 600. Chelimo backed off of that. I don’t think that anyone is suggesting he should have thrown in some 57s while in the lead. 65-66 seems to be in his wheelhouse.
Let's be real here. The field and the weather could've produced several sub 13:22's if the field had gone out together controlled in 64-65 and been steady until the last 600-800m. But Chelimo did what he did and went out like a madman in 57. Say what you want about Kincaid, but where was the guy going to go after an opening 1k of 2:30 (that's well under world record-pace). I was surprised he was still there at the mile in 4:07 (his PR is like 4:01). Of course he wasn't going to lead, where would he go from there? No way he would've been there in the end if he'd kept up hammering from 1600m - 3k. Honestly, I was surprised Kincaid hung on and responded so well over the last lap. Even the announcer's had written him off with 600m to go.
Bottom line - you rarely can attempt a qualifying time and race to be in the top 3 at a US Championship. Too many tactical and weather factors involved in both objectives. It was an exciting race and the finish times were what they are.
Really the travesty is the for some unknown reason the USATF unlike the rest of the world has chosen not to use the entire qualifying window for the World Championships which goes until Sept. 6, that's six weeks away. Worlds isn't even until 9 weeks ago.
Sorry the last word was supposed to be "away", not "ago". Tired and old, sorry.
It was a very good race for him and a huge accomplishment, so props to him first of all. Second, they had a 70 and I think a couple of 68 or 69 laps, and the three of them killed their shot at a qualifier, so I'm sure that he would like to have those back. Jerry should really take moments like this and rethink his idea that he can only peak his athletes for championships if they barely race the remainder of the year. Race-sharpened athletes do better. Look back at nearly every world and American record and you will see athletes who raced a number of times leading up to that race. Jager's Paris 8 flat where he fell was a classic example. He had just run two heats of the steeple in very hot weather at USATF the previous week and he goes to Paris and is on pace for 7:57-58 before the fall, in hot weather (low humidity).
Give it a rest wrote:
Let's be real here. The field and the weather could've produced several sub 13:22's if the field had gone out together controlled in 64-65 and been steady until the last 600-800m. But Chelimo did what he did and went out like a madman in 57. Say what you want about Kincaid, but where was the guy going to go after an opening 1k of 2:30 (that's well under world record-pace). I was surprised he was still there at the mile in 4:07 (his PR is like 4:01). Of course he wasn't going to lead, where would he go from there? No way he would've been there in the end if he'd kept up hammering from 1600m - 3k. Honestly, I was surprised Kincaid hung on and responded so well over the last lap. Even the announcer's had written him off with 600m to go.
Bottom line - you rarely can attempt a qualifying time and race to be in the top 3 at a US Championship. Too many tactical and weather factors involved in both objectives. It was an exciting race and the finish times were what they are.
Really the travesty is the for some unknown reason the USATF unlike the rest of the world has chosen not to use the entire qualifying window for the World Championships which goes until Sept. 6, that's six weeks away. Worlds isn't even until 9 weeks ago.
WR pace is 2:31.4/km, so they weren't that far below WR pace.