Deanouk wrote:
No one goes from 1:44.0 to 1:41.6 at 26 due to 'improved confidence!
Perhaps the track, which is clearly (from other results) super fast, and the shoes can get him to 1:43 flat/1:42 high in the right race, but with a 400m outing of 48.15 a few weeks ago, I don't buy that technology alone could be responsible for susch a seismic (2.4 secs) improvement. Even Sedjati only has a 400m pb of 47.2. You need 46 low at least to run 1:41.
CHEMININGWA, who is also 26 and came home 4th in 1:42.08, spent 2020, 21 and 22 languishing as a 1:49 runner. Last year he dropped to 1:46.2, and now he drops 4 secs this year, despite only having a 400m pb (from this year!) of 48.14 and a 1500m pb of 3:48.95. So he seemingly doesn't have much in 400 speed and mediocre endurance, yet can now run a 1:42! Unbelievable.
You become insufferable when talking about Kenyans. We have 800 results from 2 meets in 2021-22 (one in March ‘22). We have no idea the circumstances of whether he ran elsewhere, endured injuries etc. We do know in ‘23 he ran one paced 800 and in it he ran 1:46.2 going out in 1:16. Except I’m sure you didnt know that. Do you think athletes from any country would run super-fast if their 800 racing opportunities were all unpaced, typically with at least 2 rounds and the object being purely to win and gain attention to garner a contract/trip to Europe? Look at British heats without Max Burgin - slow as all hell. It is really not surprising that Kenyans might run 1:46-47 and then land that trip to Europe and drop large chunks of time. Kip Keino has added one opportunity and aside from that it comes down to someone taking out these Trials heats.