Team GB has 7 men below 3:32.00 over 1500m. How?

The first '3:33' Kenyan is Brian Komen, who ran 3:33.84 in Poznan. He and George Mills both raced in Ostrava, and Mills came 3rd in 3:33.85 and Komen came 12th in 3:38.78. But sure, with his natural born runner genes he could probably have broken 3:30 and beaten Kerr and Nuguse if he had been drafted in to Zurich at 24 hours notice

good

You are ridiculous.

What is your problem in life?

Says the psychopath who is pathologically obsessed with me. ThoughtlessLeader implied that George Mills was lucky to have been drafted into Zurich at 24 hours notice, and any number of Kenyans could have done the same. Pointing something out as clearly ridiculous is not ridiculous. Unless you actually have some financial incentive for the Kenyan natural born runner myth, you really do need psychiatric help. Get a life.

How did they suddenly have multiple GC contenders in cycling after decades of futility? If we could only guess. :)

The money is in Europe, Kenyans are in Africa. For sure this is an disadvantage to produce fast times. Yet Kenya has the most fast middle distance runners, even when historically they are at a low at the moment and GB is at an high.

Thoughsleader is right. You just can't accept facts.

Its because of a very sophisticated full on doping regime.

I don´t know BUT..............

I know for sure that ARMSTRONGLIVS would be here drawing the doping card if any other nation had that number of sub 3:32 runners.

I know that Americans accusing Brits of being dopers because they are better milers than them is even more ridiculous at this stage than El Kenny claiming Britain has a worse doping problem than Kenya.

Part of it as somebody else mentioned is this ingrained belief in East African genetics. British athletes are recovering their self-belief over middle-distance, because of their great history in that, which is easily discoverable on YouTube, and now success of GB and European athletes further feeding belief, but it will take longer for 5000m and above. Back in the 80's, and almost as soon as Coe and Ovett appeared and then Cram, you had guys like Moorcroft and Buckner moving up to 5000m, which was weak internationally back then. All the 3:30 and 3:31 guys today are thinking if they just improve by one or two percent they will be in the Wightman/Kerr level and not only in the team but challenging for medals. George Mills flirted with the 5000 this season, but I'm sure he will remain focused on the 1500 and try to make the team for Paris.

Team GB seems to train the most specifically for the 1500. How many of those guys have ever been in a WC final for a distance above the mile?

0.

Countries like Kenya, Norway, the US, and even Spain have a bunch of guys who are mostly doing 5000m training, and as a by product they can run a fast 1500. It’s the reason for why you would see a big difference if you compared the number of UK sub-13:00 5000 runners to the Ethiopian squad.

There's something to this but it's not just about the races in Europe being fast, it's that they're hard and physical. The US college and domestic circuit is extremely clean racing to the point where a fair few top Americans have expressed surprise when they got to global championships. Getting used to that physicality while remaining composed enough to race well is a big advantage of the European circuit

Mills should hedge his bets a little and see what he can in the 5k. It's so weak in the UK right now, he wouldn't have to work hard to make the team. He debuted at 13:18 with little 5k specific training, maybe he could get to the standard with a little more direct effort. It would certainly be good to have a back-up option given how hard the 1500 team is going to be next year, possibly 8 guys going for three spots if everyone is fit

7 Brits have run between 3:29.05 and 3:31.30 this or last season. There are 15 non-british european-born runners who ever have run sub 3:31.30 (Chouki was doped):

J. Ingebrigtsen
Cacho
Garcia
Nordas
F. Ingebrigtsen
Silva
Heshko
Lewandowski
Coscoran
Estevez
Gonzalez
Viciosa
Abascal
Redolat
Laros

6 of these 15 have done it in the last 3 seasons.

nationalities:
Norway: 3 (2 brothers)
Spain: 7
Portugal: 1
Poland: 1
Ukrain: 1
Irland: 1
Netherlands: 1
France, Germany, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Romania, Bulgaria, Russia, Belarus, Italy, Greece, Serbia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Slowakia: 0

letsrun consens seems to be that the Spaniards are dopers? At least from the 90/00s? Silva? Who finished the 2004 OG final faster than El G and Lagat? This would reduce the list to 10.

It seems the Brits share some running gene which seperates them from continental Europe.

If a doper ran sub-3:31.3, they should be included on the list. Doping or not, you run the time, then the time counts.

There’s no such thing as a British gene.

You mean the big hole of Cross Country in the last 43 years?

How could a country claim itself the "gene" of the mile while they have bad results in distance races for decades?

Because 'super shoes' and faster Mondo tracks have made 1500m times about 2 - 3 secs faster. So a 3:32 now is probably worth a 3:34 at best prior to 2019 when the new shoes came in. There is no way that the likes of Gourley, Mills and Giles are in the same league as Ovett, yet they've all run within 0.2 secs of him.

UK also had similar number of guys running sub 3:34 in the early 80's. They have a great history in the middle distances compared to long distance.

The emergence of club academies shut out private schools just when football became so well paid private school kids got interested. So if you went to private school you couldn't get into pro football until 16 or 18, which was usually too late. But, things are changing. There are football scholarships and some schools have ties with club academies. Quite a few current England players went to private or grammar (selective) schools.

British Milers Club specifically supports 800 & 1500. Imagine such a series of races in the u.s. , easily accessible within 4 hours by car or train., weeknights, weekends, prize money, pace setters. They have had that in place for 60 years. 2023 program had 51 meets and over 600 races.