US Women's Steeplechase is wide open

Fastest american woman steeplechaser this year so far is Gabi Jennings. Total fan of the new blood ascending in this event.

It’s going to be interesting. We know Allie Ostrander is going for a spot. Maybe this will considerably motivate her.

You can't just "switch to steeple" at the last minute if you don't have steeplechase experience.

And I don't know if we will have a totally new steeple team or not. But I do think that this will probably be our slowest women's steeple team in the last decade.

anna WILLARD

I’m a big fan of Olivia Markezich. I would like to see her on the team. I’m also wondering if a long shot like Annie Rodenfels could improve to the point to be a contender.

I’ve been a bit out of the loop. Has Courtney Frerichs retired or is she injured?

Citius just posted an article on this exact situation. (No mention of Allie Ostrander).

citiusmag.com

A Look At The Olympic Picture For U.S. Steeplechasers After Emma Coburn’s Injury - CITIUS Mag

For the first time since 2013, the U.S. women's steeplechase team for a global championship will not feature Emma Coburn.

Link:citiusmag.com/articles/emma-coburn-wil...

interesting article. I was also thinking about Gracie Hyde as a dark horse. she's the kind of runner who can go into this with zero expectations and zero pressure and just run relaxed and crush it.

Maddie Boreman and Emma Gee are training in Flagstaff with Nikki Hiltz/Krissy Gear (they just posted a video) I could see Maddie being there in the end.

If Gear is fit, I don't see anyone outkicking her at the end. Wayment or one of the others will need to really push the pace.

unless we're talking sprints or hurdles what often happens when you have injuries/ retirements/ suspensions and the field "opens up" like this is the old guard is done but does anyone who finishes top 3 have the olympic number. there are several women with the 9:41 or 10:12 the trials wants. but there is just one runner (jennings) with <9:23 to qualify for the olympics. and sometimes the one with the number isn't the one who "makes the team."

it is early days for this exercise -- they have a few months to get the olympic number -- but when the old guard who go to DL and get the number in their sleep, disappear, it can be back to the drawing board. this is not 100H where probably 90% of the semis will have the right time banked, if they land atop the board, or even 100m where we could make a whole final of eligible women.

and i fight myself on this, because i thought a new set were stepping up, but based on WA's stats, we used to have the 2 down near 9, and we now have a top time at 9:19 and three under 9:30. the winner went sub 9 at DL and coburn wasn't looking competitive to me even before she did whatever she did.

even last year, 6 women SB'd under the olympic number, over the course of a full season through the fall (and in this situation they will have less than half a season), 1 of whom just broke her ankle. and 1/3 of that 6 were under the mark by tenths or even just a hundredth.

Currently, there are six including Coburn (Jennings was added to the list in post #8).

Gear's last race was a 4:42 road mile just a few weeks ago. That doesn't sound like someone who is in shape to make an Olympic team.

Gear is scheduled to run the 1500 at the Sound Running meet next week. It will interesting to see how close she can get to the 4:09 she ran in May last year.

I didn't mean to imply they're running poorly or out of shape, just that Wayment and Gear are not unbeatable. in fact far from it. watch the 2021 Trials when Coburn and Frierichs dusted the field. if they win it won't look like that, way too many talented runners in the field will be on their heels.

Gear won the BAA Mile but the coming months events will be a better indicator of where she is.

Katelyn Tuohy would be the darkhorse shocker to come out of the shadows and make the team in the steeple. She would first have to run at least one good one to initiate ranking.

Logan Jolly is high enough in the World Rankings right now and Lexy Halladay-Lowry is one spot outside of the top rankings by 4 points, so with a top-3 US Olympic Trials finish, will likely be high enough in the rankings. Especially because US Championship Steeplechase races tend to be run pretty fast compared to other distance races. Plus, some of her times have been run in comparatively low-level meets.

There is NO WAY that Tuohy is going to come off a hamstring injury and run the Steeple.

The women’s 5K is also wide open. Should be interesting.

No way she makes the team, she has looked terrible in her last outings. Previous to the one you mentioned, she was terrible at Millrose and even worse at Cross Champs. Something is definitely off with her lately.

unless it was a ploy