This is not directly related to this, but I still don’t understand why there hasn’t been more fanfare around Jakob’s 7:53. There should still be active threads going to this day about that run. He ran seven. fifty. three…. for two miles. It’s completely ridiculous. If anyone had predicted that on January 1, 2023, they would have been laughed out of the room. It’s better than the 3000m record, the same one many consider the best distance track record. Conditions for running fast are better now, yes, but it was one of the best runs on the track of all time, and there may even be an argument for it being the best run ever. That is part of the context here, we are talking about one of a very small handful of GOATs.
7:54, rather.
I think most people realize that this is just Jakob´s level in 2023. Nothing to write home about.
I think his 2000m WR was even slightly better.
But also remember: This is an American message board. Many people are more interested in the Sahlmans, the Youngs, Tuohy and Parker Valby even though none of these runners are on the world level yet.
Yesterday a talented Danish runner outsprinted Niels Laros in the European U20 cross country championships. It got almost no attention here.
Imagine if it had been Lex or Leo who had done something similar.
Lets be honest, Kerr is right. Jakob is never going to win another world championship 1500m final if he leads the majority of it. He is always going to end up leading it early in the race because he prefers fast paced races. It gives him the BEST chance for a medal which is reasonable because his fitness is so good he can front run 3:29 even on a bad day. This guarantees any medal as it is a fast time. However, theres always going to be someone who sits behind him who is in similar fitness, maybe with a -1 or -2 seconds in 1500m PB. In Belgrade it was tefera who sat on him for 1100 meters until beating him in the last 50. In Eugene he was overtaken by Wightman because he had no energy for a response after wasting it by leading and defending attacks by the Kenyans. In Budapest, in what seemed like the perfect race for him because he had no attacks on the outside, he was outkicked due to either not having enough at the end because he lead it for so long, or simply does not have a good kick. I don't know, frankly it doesn't matter because in every scenario he lead majority of the race and could not win.
Take El Guerrouj's world championship wins, a guy who people said could only win in unpaced races. It's true that in half of his wins (99 and 01) he had a pacemaker in his fellow countryman that allowed him to then lead at 900 and wind up the pace. Basically just like a diamond league race for Jakob that he could win. What about the other two? in 97 and 03 the pace through 700 was pretty slow but after 800 he would wind up the pace and with 400 to go he would be flat out sprinting and hoping nobody could catch him in the last 100. Jakob does not know how to do this, at the bell everyone is still sitting behind him and he leaves the final kick until the last 150-200 meters where he can be overtaken. The sad truth is that Jakob won't have a pacemaker in these finals (Nordas most likely won't) and he does not have the instantaneous gear change that el guerrouj had. He just can't win. This year it can be Nuguse who overtakes him, Kipsang, Kerr again, Wightman, Nordas. He is still a tremendous runner and in a paced race I think he can take the 1500 and mile record, but the world championship gold seems to be unlikely for the runner.
You obviously didn’t watch Jakob’s pb run in Silesia -3.27.14 with almost no help from the pacers (and on a bad day, according to himself). So I go for your logic if Kerr or others can hang to 3.27 flat -if not Jakob wins easy even in a solo run…
And just for the record: Jakob would have run seconds faster both indoors WC and outdoors if he hadn’t been sick. And we don’t even need his words for this -just look at the context (f.ex beat Tefera with 3 sec only weeks before WC, and then Jakob suddenly ran more than 3 sec slower -in a very similar run, only the positive covid test making a difference). So your reasoning could have been right, but it isn’t, because of your lack of context in everything you are writing here…
Lets be honest, Kerr is right. Jakob is never going to win another world championship 1500m final if he leads the majority of it. He is always going to end up leading it early in the race because he prefers fast paced races. It gives him the BEST chance for a medal which is reasonable because his fitness is so good he can front run 3:29 even on a bad day. This guarantees any medal as it is a fast time. However, theres always going to be someone who sits behind him who is in similar fitness, maybe with a -1 or -2 seconds in 1500m PB. In Belgrade it was tefera who sat on him for 1100 meters until beating him in the last 50. In Eugene he was overtaken by Wightman because he had no energy for a response after wasting it by leading and defending attacks by the Kenyans. In Budapest, in what seemed like the perfect race for him because he had no attacks on the outside, he was outkicked due to either not having enough at the end because he lead it for so long, or simply does not have a good kick. I don't know, frankly it doesn't matter because in every scenario he lead majority of the race and could not win.
Take El Guerrouj's world championship wins, a guy who people said could only win in unpaced races. It's true that in half of his wins (99 and 01) he had a pacemaker in his fellow countryman that allowed him to then lead at 900 and wind up the pace. Basically just like a diamond league race for Jakob that he could win. What about the other two? in 97 and 03 the pace through 700 was pretty slow but after 800 he would wind up the pace and with 400 to go he would be flat out sprinting and hoping nobody could catch him in the last 100. Jakob does not know how to do this, at the bell everyone is still sitting behind him and he leaves the final kick until the last 150-200 meters where he can be overtaken. The sad truth is that Jakob won't have a pacemaker in these finals (Nordas most likely won't) and he does not have the instantaneous gear change that el guerrouj had. He just can't win. This year it can be Nuguse who overtakes him, Kipsang, Kerr again, Wightman, Nordas. He is still a tremendous runner and in a paced race I think he can take the 1500 and mile record, but the world championship gold seems to be unlikely for the runner.
You obviously didn’t watch Jakob’s pb run in Silesia -3.27.14 with almost no help from the pacers (and on a bad day, according to himself). So I go for your logic if Kerr or others can hang to 3.27 flat -if not Jakob wins easy even in a solo run…
And just for the record: Jakob would have run seconds faster both indoors WC and outdoors if he hadn’t been sick. And we don’t even need his words for this -just look at the context (f.ex beat Tefera with 3 sec only weeks before WC, and then Jakob suddenly ran more than 3 sec slower -in a very similar run, only the positive covid test making a difference). So your reasoning could have been right, but it isn’t, because of your lack of context in everything you are writing here…
Jakob's 2023 season was one of the greatest ever in running from 1500m thru 5000m.
His 2 3:27 1500m runs, his 3:43 mile, his WRs in the 2k and 2 mile, his 7:23 3k coming one day after his 3:43 mile, his WC gold in the 5k.
Arrogance is the problem. He is the distance darling on the track all season long in paced races and doesn't appreciate how fast and fit his competition is. We know this to be true because he makes excuses. It doesn't seem he's learned from this championship final losses yet, so for the 1500 he'll continue to be very vulnerable in those finals. I see the same arrogance growing in the 5k... he's been lucky that the competition hasn't had the will to push the pace hard enough.
Finally, until the next championship final, Josh can continue to talk trash. No one in their right mind would prefer winning a bunch of diamond league races over a championship final. Josh knows Jakob is sore and is trying to stay in his head.
I don’t think Jakob is sore at all! Because you (and a bunch of others) didn’t understand his “just the next guy” comment -he really meant that. And it isn’t unfounded arrogance: Jakob knows very well that he also could have been beaten by Nordås (who with a little better tactic also could have beaten Kerr) and Nuguse (who missed his peak or tactics). So Kerr is “just the next guy” because Jakob was sick, meaning he was the next in line that day (if something goes wrong with Jakob, and it must really go wrong, because Jakob out runs Josh by approximately 2 sec even in a solo run, and Jakob clearly knows that. And “tactics” isn’t a word in Jakob’s mind, he knows he need to be the best, and that at his best he wins with huge margins).
If Jakob hit the scene 20 years ago he never would have called El Guerrouj, Morceli, Lagat or Ngeny “the next guy” -he knows these guys probably were of another standard than the Scotch men. Only thing is that after Nuguse’s mile run we all (even Jakob) must acknowledge the possibility that some athletes (even Wightman and Kerr) may have some resources we didn’t knew about…!
Arrogance is the problem. He is the distance darling on the track all season long in paced races and doesn't appreciate how fast and fit his competition is. We know this to be true because he makes excuses. It doesn't seem he's learned from this championship final losses yet, so for the 1500 he'll continue to be very vulnerable in those finals. I see the same arrogance growing in the 5k... he's been lucky that the competition hasn't had the will to push the pace hard enough.
Finally, until the next championship final, Josh can continue to talk trash. No one in their right mind would prefer winning a bunch of diamond league races over a championship final. Josh knows Jakob is sore and is trying to stay in his head.
I don’t think Jakob is sore at all! Because you (and a bunch of others) didn’t understand his “just the next guy” comment -he really meant that. And it isn’t unfounded arrogance: Jakob knows very well that he also could have been beaten by Nordås (who with a little better tactic also could have beaten Kerr) and Nuguse (who missed his peak or tactics). So Kerr is “just the next guy” because Jakob was sick, meaning he was the next in line that day (if something goes wrong with Jakob, and it must really go wrong, because Jakob out runs Josh by approximately 2 sec even in a solo run, and Jakob clearly knows that. And “tactics” isn’t a word in Jakob’s mind, he knows he need to be the best, and that at his best he wins with huge margins).
If Jakob hit the scene 20 years ago he never would have called El Guerrouj, Morceli, Lagat or Ngeny “the next guy” -he knows these guys probably were of another standard than the Scotch men. Only thing is that after Nuguse’s mile run we all (even Jakob) must acknowledge the possibility that some athletes (even Wightman and Kerr) may have some resources we didn’t knew about…!
I disagree for a couple reasons. First, I think Jakob is good enough to win leading after 400 like he has tried the last couple times. When I watched his PB race in Silesia, I was blown away by how little drafting he actually got. I’m sure there was some psychological benefit to having guys in front of him, and it’s always going to be easier to front run in a Diamond League than a global championship (no rounds), but 3:27.14 with very limited help from the pacers is an underrated performance. I can’t watch that race and convince myself this is a guy who is going to be vulnerable front running 3:29. It makes me think he could have run 3:27 high in Budapest with his Silesia fitness.
I understand some people will think it’s dumb to believe this, but if you look at the last couple championships, Jakob didn’t lose because he chose to front run. In Eugene he made a lot of unnecessary surges, and in Budapest he was sick and still ran a strong race, just not good enough on the day. If he were healthy I don’t see how he would’ve lost based on the way the rest of the season went. Maybe he wasn’t good enough in 2022 and would’ve lost even without battling the Kenyans for lead, but he was on another level in 2023.
In every Diamond league meet, he gets less pacing than the rest of the field (they still get to draft off him once the rabbits drop) and is crushing everyone regardless, even when they are near him in the final stages (Oslo, Lausanne). I don’t think all of that comes from getting 1000m of pacing vs 400 (Kipsang has taken the first lap in the last two finals), and Silesia proves it (to me at least). There wasn’t a 1500m race on the circuit this year where he drafted less, yet he still ran a huge PB with a strong finish.
The other thing is that although he is one of the slower guys in terms of 400 speed, he’s not slow. This gets harped on a lot as this huge weakness he has, but the way he ran the Budapest semis tells me his speed is underrated. Closing a 3:35 in 51 high while waving to the crowd and really only kicking in the last 200 is pretty impressive, and not something that indicates a guy who can’t even break 50 for 400 (like many here have speculated), or is so lacking in acceleration or finish that he could never win a tactical race. In a 3:35-3:40 championship scenario I think he has about as good a chance as anyone else.
He likes to front run (and not just for tactical reasons, see his Eugene interview) so I’m assuming we will get a repeat of the last couple years, but if he’s healthy I think he will bury the field. His biggest regret in Eugene was not going harder the 3rd lap, and I assume he would have tried it this year if not for being sick and realizing it wasn’t going to happen on the day. I’d personally rather see him sit behind the leader for 600-700 and then start cranking but that’s not how he likes to do it.
Looking forward to the Olympics in any case, and a little drama leading up to the season never hurts.
tldr; Jakob can win Worlds/Olympics from the front. His best time of the year came in a race with minimal drafting (not much more than he got in the last two World finals).
I liked your wall -you are spot on because you use context!
Imagine if Jakob avoided racing Tim after Tokyo and then went on a podcast 3 months later to attack his character. That’s basically what this.
Pull up the video on YouTube and go to the “Yakob” timestamp if you want to listen to Josh criticize Jakob for doing something that he himself has also done. All of the defects he finds in Jakob (huge ego, lack of self awareness, need for attention) are more evident in himself during this interview.
Lets be honest, Kerr is right. Jakob is never going to win another world championship 1500m final if he leads the majority of it. He is always going to end up leading it early in the race because he prefers fast paced races. It gives him the BEST chance for a medal which is reasonable because his fitness is so good he can front run 3:29 even on a bad day. This guarantees any medal as it is a fast time. However, theres always going to be someone who sits behind him who is in similar fitness, maybe with a -1 or -2 seconds in 1500m PB. In Belgrade it was tefera who sat on him for 1100 meters until beating him in the last 50. In Eugene he was overtaken by Wightman because he had no energy for a response after wasting it by leading and defending attacks by the Kenyans. In Budapest, in what seemed like the perfect race for him because he had no attacks on the outside, he was outkicked due to either not having enough at the end because he lead it for so long, or simply does not have a good kick. I don't know, frankly it doesn't matter because in every scenario he lead majority of the race and could not win.
Take El Guerrouj's world championship wins, a guy who people said could only win in unpaced races. It's true that in half of his wins (99 and 01) he had a pacemaker in his fellow countryman that allowed him to then lead at 900 and wind up the pace. Basically just like a diamond league race for Jakob that he could win. What about the other two? in 97 and 03 the pace through 700 was pretty slow but after 800 he would wind up the pace and with 400 to go he would be flat out sprinting and hoping nobody could catch him in the last 100. Jakob does not know how to do this, at the bell everyone is still sitting behind him and he leaves the final kick until the last 150-200 meters where he can be overtaken. The sad truth is that Jakob won't have a pacemaker in these finals (Nordas most likely won't) and he does not have the instantaneous gear change that el guerrouj had. He just can't win. This year it can be Nuguse who overtakes him, Kipsang, Kerr again, Wightman, Nordas. He is still a tremendous runner and in a paced race I think he can take the 1500 and mile record, but the world championship gold seems to be unlikely for the runner.
You obviously didn’t watch Jakob’s pb run in Silesia -3.27.14 with almost no help from the pacers (and on a bad day, according to himself). So I go for your logic if Kerr or others can hang to 3.27 flat -if not Jakob wins easy even in a solo run…
And just for the record: Jakob would have run seconds faster both indoors WC and outdoors if he hadn’t been sick. And we don’t even need his words for this -just look at the context (f.ex beat Tefera with 3 sec only weeks before WC, and then Jakob suddenly ran more than 3 sec slower -in a very similar run, only the positive covid test making a difference). So your reasoning could have been right, but it isn’t, because of your lack of context in everything you are writing here…
His Silesia run was impressive but just because he’s a few meters behind a pacemaker doesn’t mean he magically lost a ton of help by them. He knew right where the pace was at with the wave lights and he caught up to mcsweyn around 900 anyways. Also, just because he can run 3:27.14 in a paced race with wave lights doesn’t mean he can front run it 😂 . Absolutely nobody in history has run theirs PR in a championship final in a time that’s sub 3:28. The only reason why el guerrouj did it in 99 with a time of 3:27 was actually because he HAD a pacemaker. Plus his PB that year was 3:26 was it not? So it seems reasonable that he could run 3:27.5 anyways. Jakob at the fastest front running is probably high 3:28 which might be enough to win but the last few championships he couldn’t. Now I know he’s claimed he sick but I find that hard to believe when he’s lost the same way every time. Maybe I’m wrong though, let’s wait until the world indoor championships in march to see if he even competes and if he can finally win the gold
Imagine if Jakob avoided racing Tim after Tokyo and then went on a podcast 3 months later to attack his character. That’s basically what this.
Pull up the video on YouTube and go to the “Yakob” timestamp if you want to listen to Josh criticize Jakob for doing something that he himself has also done. All of the defects he finds in Jakob (huge ego, lack of self awareness, need for attention) are more evident in himself during this interview.
Jakob would never do it, so it’s hard to imagine. Should Jakob provide explanations right after his losses? Kerr and Olli Hoare obviously think he should not and it’s some huge affront to not give the winner a long moment. But we get the excuses later on from them, so it feels like splitting hairs. Kerr has put his whole 2022 season on lack of motivation, and bad diet after the Olympics. For Europeans, he put that on COVID I think. Maybe he waited until 2023 to speak on it, but the fans want to know and taking Jakobs prompt transparency so personally is weird. I think Kerr makes it personal with the yes-man and ego comment, everyone knows Kerr has an ego himself.
This is not directly related to this, but I still don’t understand why there hasn’t been more fanfare around Jakob’s 7:53. There should still be active threads going to this day about that run. He ran seven. fifty. three…. for two miles. It’s completely ridiculous. If anyone had predicted that on January 1, 2023, they would have been laughed out of the room. It’s better than the 3000m record, the same one many consider the best distance track record. Conditions for running fast are better now, yes, but it was one of the best runs on the track of all time, and there may even be an argument for it being the best run ever. That is part of the context here, we are talking about one of a very small handful of GOATs.
Imagine if Jakob avoided racing Tim after Tokyo and then went on a podcast 3 months later to attack his character. That’s basically what this.
Pull up the video on YouTube and go to the “Yakob” timestamp if you want to listen to Josh criticize Jakob for doing something that he himself has also done. All of the defects he finds in Jakob (huge ego, lack of self awareness, need for attention) are more evident in himself during this interview.
Jakob would never do it, so it’s hard to imagine. Should Jakob provide explanations right after his losses? Kerr and Olli Hoare obviously think he should not and it’s some huge affront to not give the winner a long moment. But we get the excuses later on from them, so it feels like splitting hairs. Kerr has put his whole 2022 season on lack of motivation, and bad diet after the Olympics. For Europeans, he put that on COVID I think. Maybe he waited until 2023 to speak on it, but the fans want to know and taking Jakobs prompt transparency so personally is weird. I think Kerr makes it personal with the yes-man and ego comment, everyone knows Kerr has an ego himself.
Jakob's whining about having been sick took some of the spotlight away from Josh and could be interpreted as an attempt to water down Josh's massive accomplishment. Jakob has to hear about this until he takes the belt back.
Arrogance is the problem. He is the distance darling on the track all season long in paced races and doesn't appreciate how fast and fit his competition is. We know this to be true because he makes excuses. It doesn't seem he's learned from this championship final losses yet, so for the 1500 he'll continue to be very vulnerable in those finals. I see the same arrogance growing in the 5k... he's been lucky that the competition hasn't had the will to push the pace hard enough.
Finally, until the next championship final, Josh can continue to talk trash. No one in their right mind would prefer winning a bunch of diamond league races over a championship final. Josh knows Jakob is sore and is trying to stay in his head.
I don’t think Jakob is sore at all! Because you (and a bunch of others) didn’t understand his “just the next guy” comment -he really meant that. And it isn’t unfounded arrogance: Jakob knows very well that he also could have been beaten by Nordås (who with a little better tactic also could have beaten Kerr) and Nuguse (who missed his peak or tactics). So Kerr is “just the next guy” because Jakob was sick, meaning he was the next in line that day (if something goes wrong with Jakob, and it must really go wrong, because Jakob out runs Josh by approximately 2 sec even in a solo run, and Jakob clearly knows that. And “tactics” isn’t a word in Jakob’s mind, he knows he need to be the best, and that at his best he wins with huge margins).
If Jakob hit the scene 20 years ago he never would have called El Guerrouj, Morceli, Lagat or Ngeny “the next guy” -he knows these guys probably were of another standard than the Scotch men. Only thing is that after Nuguse’s mile run we all (even Jakob) must acknowledge the possibility that some athletes (even Wightman and Kerr) may have some resources we didn’t knew about…!
This is not directly related to this, but I still don’t understand why there hasn’t been more fanfare around Jakob’s 7:53. There should still be active threads going to this day about that run. He ran seven. fifty. three…. for two miles. It’s completely ridiculous. If anyone had predicted that on January 1, 2023, they would have been laughed out of the room. It’s better than the 3000m record, the same one many consider the best distance track record. Conditions for running fast are better now, yes, but it was one of the best runs on the track of all time, and there may even be an argument for it being the best run ever. That is part of the context here, we are talking about one of a very small handful of GOATs.
Bc 2 miles doesn't matter
None of this matters. It's sports. But it certainly entertains when you break a record held by Daniel Komen.
Kerr had help getting lean, and that's what made the difference. He says he used dietician and chef. Was there a doctor too? We can only speculate. I wouldn't hold it against him, it's an unnatural state for his body and hard for him to get there. Most likely Jakob does exactly the same. But to attack his rival isn't a classy move. Just beat him again. One is an anomaly, like KB losing world cross country.
Everyone before 2023 - "hardest world record to break is definitely Komen's 2 mile, no one will ever break it!!"
Mental Gymnists (aka haters) in 2023 - "well sure Jakob broke a Komen record but its not that impressive because its miles not kilometers blah blah blah cope cope cope"
I mean this in the nicest way possible, Kerr has no room to talk when it comes to other people having unnecessarily big egos. He knocks Jakob for his tactics, but doesn’t mention that Jakob’s beaten him at every other global championships, be it Doha, Tokyo, Eugene, or even world U20’s. Kinda funny to see that he’s still so upset about being called “the next guy.” I know he’s saying this just to probably get under Jakob’s skin but I think it’s ironic given he still isn’t over Jakob’s statement.
And on top of that, the 1500 isn't even Jakob’s best event.
This definitely and someone should ask Kerr how many European Cross-Country Championships he's won.
Jakob to my knowledge has never directly spoken badly about a competitor. This guy is trashing someone that has dominated him. It's just not a good look. In sports everyone has their day, I knew I wasn't the best player on the court but I had my moments and games where I played very well against guys that were better than me. You keep your mouth shut because when it's not your day you don't want to get embarrassed. If this guy doesn't earn a medal in 2024 he deserves to get embarrassed and unfortunately it's not going to happen because this is track not some other sport.
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