Armstronglivs wrote:
Well ...... wrote:
You're not factoring in the fact this is his first season focusing on the 1500. It would be like if you ran a marathon in high school just to do it, barely go under 3 hours. Not run another marathon till after college and taking 40+ minutes from your marathon PB.
So why would at age 32 this be his first season focussing on the 1500? Is he losing it over the 800? I don't think so. He is no Rudisha or Kipketer - he had every reason to move up long before now if it was in him. Simply not a credible argument to add the 1500 as a career after-thought for an 800 specialist.
To be fair to Lewandowski, he's actually been an 800/1500m guy for a few seasons now; it is misleading imo to suggest that he has only focused on the 1500m this year.
He's actually improved from 3:34.04 in 2017 to 3:31.95, so more like 2 secs than 3.
He also ran 3:34.50 & 3:34.60 in 2017, and 3:35.06 in 2018.
As far back as 2014 he ran 3:37.37 indoors.
So he's shown 3:34/3:35 ability for a few years now. Interestungly, he has been very consistent with his 800m performances for the past 10 seasons, which obviously goes back to when he was an 800 specialist. From 2009 (1:43.84) to 2019 (1:43.74) he has run, EVERY YEAR, between 1:43.72 (2015) and 1:44.77 (2017 - the first year he ran as often over 1500 as 800m). It seems clear that the extra mileage he's probably included the last 3 years in training has actually complimented his 800m running, keeping him around that 1:44 area, but is now reaping improvements over 1500m.
I don't see anything suspicious about his 800 and 1500m progression.