One undernoticed reason for Hobbes Kessler's success in the 800 meters

Salvitore Stitchmo wrote:

Because he can wrote:

These splits represent perfection. Does anyone recognize who they belonged to?:

23.4,26.3,26.4,26.1

Almost all of the 800 WRs have been the result of negative splits.

How do you know that's perfection? The answer is you don't. And if you were attempting to reference Rudisha you got that wrong too.

Rudisha in London was 23.4, 25.9 (49.3), 26.0 (1.14.30), 26.6 (1.40.91)

How about if Rudisha even ran his first 400m without a 2.5 second differential (!!!) between the first and second 200's? That is considerable. What about if he runs 24.4, 24.9? I would guess that in a hypothetical redo if had been able to execute this he runs even faster in the final 200m (maybe in the 26.2/3 range) and our WR is 1.40.5

Of course we know why he runs so fast in the opening 200m - it's the Olympic final, he's nervous as hell with so much adrenaline, as was the entire field. That doesn't mean his splits represent perfection.

xzzxcvzxcv wrote:

When you consider Hobbs Kessler's potential in the 800/1500 vs. Hoppel in the 800m and Nuguse in the 1500, you have to look and see what the other guys did at the same age.

Hoppel is 26 and turns 27 at the beginning of September. He has more speed than Hobbs right now and sports a 47.68 pr from 2021, at 23 1/2 years old. However, in high school, his pr was 50.54, run at 16 1/2 in 2014, as a sophomore. He then ran a bit slower indoors as a college freshman, 50.67 in 2017. He didn't break 50 until he was a sophomore in college, 49.55 outdoors in 2018. Hobbs ran a 50 at the end of the Michigan in high school before U.S. champs, I think. Hoppel's pr, prior to Trials, was 1:43.23 from 2020 when he was about to turn 23. He was 22 when he ran 1:44.25 in 2019 in Qatar. His pr at 20 3/4 the previous year was 1:45.67.

At 18, Kessler ran 1:49.67/3:34.36. At 19, he ran 1:46.87! with 3:36.63. At 20, 1:45.80/3:32.61, both big drops. At 21 now, he's run 1:43.64/3:31.53, after rounds. Hoppel didn't run faster at 800m until he was about to turn 23. Nuguse ran 3:34.68 CR just before turning 22, then two years later at 24, he ran 3:29.02/3:43.97, which was the first year in which he beat Hobbs' current 1500m pr. So, there's no reason not to think that he could be as good as Hoppel at 800m eventually and as good as Nuguse at 1500m as well, just not yet.

jongjacksss wrote:

Armstronglivs wrote:

The proportion of aerobic v anaerobic elements of the two distances are very different. The 800 has a far higher anaerobic component in proportion to the distance run. It is thus more about speed than endurance compared with the longer distance and is why the greatest exponents over the 800 - Rudisha and Kipketer - were specialists. Kessler isn't that kind of runner and doesn't have their core speed.

have to agree, except the coaches assumed early that kessler did not have a great speed component.

however, it looks like the speed/weight/technique work kind of upsets the apple cart.

there is such a thing as a hybrid, which was coe, ovett, cram, ryun, van damme, peter elliot, all of whom could run 142 or better, in a half decent race on a half decent track, and were good for 46 to 47 quarter.

and with that said, these guys did not focus on the 800, and a good portion of their training was mileage, and non-800 speed work.

the point is, a hybrid can knock off a second or two in the 8, with focus on 400 to 800 distance.

who is to say that Hobbs speed isn't much greater than assumed? recent events indicate this is so.

coe himself as an early teen was doing cross country and 3000m, and somewhere in training, dad worked out that the 800 was in the cards, maybe for mile prep later on, and the 800 itself after he ran 144 real young.

with that said, i would not change anything hobbs is doing, his coach is doing super, he can figure out what to do, based on the new 800 findings, where its not a stretch that hobbs can run a 142.

king999 wrote:

jongjacksss wrote:

have to agree, except the coaches assumed early that kessler did not have a great speed component.

however, it looks like the speed/weight/technique work kind of upsets the apple cart.

there is such a thing as a hybrid, which was coe, ovett, cram, ryun, van damme, peter elliot, all of whom could run 142 or better, in a half decent race on a half decent track, and were good for 46 to 47 quarter.

and with that said, these guys did not focus on the 800, and a good portion of their training was mileage, and non-800 speed work.

the point is, a hybrid can knock off a second or two in the 8, with focus on 400 to 800 distance.

who is to say that Hobbs speed isn't much greater than assumed? recent events indicate this is so.

coe himself as an early teen was doing cross country and 3000m, and somewhere in training, dad worked out that the 800 was in the cards, maybe for mile prep later on, and the 800 itself after he ran 144 real young.

with that said, i would not change anything hobbs is doing, his coach is doing super, he can figure out what to do, based on the new 800 findings, where its not a stretch that hobbs can run a 142.

Again, people should talk about what they know. I was told how flat fast Kessler could look years ago. He showed amazing abilities in the mile /1500M at 3:57.xx and that one off 3:34.x which was outrageous. Ron saw him every day during that, I think he knew what event to steer him to(based on that stuff). I call these recent 800's a luxury, he is pretty fast, but I happen to think that 1:43.64 will not get you much at this Olympics, he will have to run another 5 races to get to a final with 1:41.x and 1:42 guys. I am not expecting that, his PR already dropped 2 seconds from a year ago, 1.4 from 6 weeks ago? Not so sure how much more is getting squeezed out of this event this particular year. Could I now see him running sub 1:43.00 in future? Yes, I never saw that coming ever, to be honest.

Armstronglivs wrote:

king999 wrote:

Again, people should talk about what they know. I was told how flat fast Kessler could look years ago. He showed amazing abilities in the mile /1500M at 3:57.xx and that one off 3:34.x which was outrageous. Ron saw him every day during that, I think he knew what event to steer him to(based on that stuff). I call these recent 800's a luxury, he is pretty fast, but I happen to think that 1:43.64 will not get you much at this Olympics, he will have to run another 5 races to get to a final with 1:41.x and 1:42 guys. I am not expecting that, his PR already dropped 2 seconds from a year ago, 1.4 from 6 weeks ago? Not so sure how much more is getting squeezed out of this event this particular year. Could I now see him running sub 1:43.00 in future? Yes, I never saw that coming ever, to be honest.

To put it simply, there's no way Kessler could compete against the best over the 800 if he can't run 46x for the 400 and at least 22 for the 200. What has he done that shows that kind of speed?