Blowhard makes excuses at McKirdy Marathon

& Sifan Hassan

What if we have to bump this thread when he's the 3rd olympic qualifier

god knows how that happened

Because he’s not a mentally ill, dementiated LRC lunatic. He’s just another dude with ambition, trying to be the best he can. This is a good thing, and the community that’s out there actually doing s*** respects it

His IG is under the username "runnerhabs"

I get it dude…you’re probably either from Provo area or never made it quite to the top level because you let being a fan of the sport and/ or other people’s training get in the way of your headspace to compete and run faster. That’s why you support this guy and can bypass the cringey stuff he says and posts, because he inspires you, because you let being a fan bypass the reality of being a competitor. He will run fast in 2 years after he learns the distance. Especially with shoe tech.

But as someone who hears what MULTIPLE competitors of habtamu says (in person and not on this thread)…it’s not a surprise there are a lot of people on this thread expressing being annoyed. It was a matter of time. People complain about “influencers” on here probably every day.

I remember when I became an All-American in XC, I was so relieved…but then I realized right after I was still a nobody because a true freshman beat me. At the end of the day, fans will be fans. But others will see people for who they really are.

So...what's your goal here? What did you expect to accomplish by creating this post? Do you think Habtamu is going to change anything about himself because you were annoyed by his excuses, or did you just hop on here to vent to your fellow hobby joggers and keyboard tough guys? Here's my advice: next time, save it for your diary.

I ran with Habtamu at UVU for a few years, so admittedly, I'm biased; however, I also believe that makes me more qualified to speak on his capability and character than anyone else on here. Does Habtamu have some less-desirable traits? Sure, but who doesn't? Habtamu would frequently run 5-10 seconds faster than our prescribed pace in workouts and make us chase him; it was a little annoying, but I can't say I wouldn't have gone with him if I had his fitness. Does he make excuses following a sub-par performance? Yeah, so do a lot of people. Are his TikTok videos cringey? Well...maybe a bit (sorry, Habs). He's putting himself out there in a way no one else on this thread is willing to.

Habtamu is cocky. (He did the griddy over the finish line when he won the 10k at our conference championship.) But, he's a GREAT runner, he's a CLEAN competitor, and I had a lot of fun being teammates with him.

Having said all that, was his 2:12 goal a little over-ambitious? Perhaps. But take it from a skeptical realist and someone who's worked out with him a few times in the last couple months: I had no doubt that he could comfortably hit the OTQ; for him, 2:18 was relatively easy. Now a lot of people will see his 2:16 finish time and say, "Wait, if 2:18 is so easy, how did he only run a couple minutes faster than that?" Well, he was on pace for 2:13-mid for around two-thirds of the race. A debut marathon is rarely going to go as planned, and mistakes are going to be made. For someone with personal bests in the 5k and 10k that are 20-30 seconds faster than those of Sifan Hassan (who just ran 2:13-mid at Chicago and who he ran with on a few occasions while she trained in Utah), is it totally unreasonable to believe he could run somewhere in the 2:12-2:13 range?

If he really wants to, I think Habtamu will run 2:10 in the marathon. He might not do it at the trials in February, but I think he'll do it. Meanwhile, you'll be angrily typing up these bitter posts because you're annoyed that he doesn't act the way you think he should. Oh well, c'est la vie.