More high schooler madness!

[whaletail]

At the US Track & Field National Championships (World Team Trials), Cooper Lutkenhaus, a 16 year old sophomore finished 2nd in the men's 800m final, and will compete at the World Championships in Tokyo next month. He'll apparently be the youngest Team USA world teamer in history, and may be the most talented American middle distance runner since the great Jim Ryun 60 years ago.

Incredibly, he ran a 1:42.27, knocking 3s off his own U18 and U20 World Record (set last month at the Texas state meet). He's now the third fastest American ever, and only 1.4s off the world record (David Rudisha - Kenya - 1:40.9, set in the 2012 Olympic final). Mind, a few months ago, his personal best was a 1:47.x. Blisteringly fast for a high schooler, for sure, especially one who only started running competitively in 7th grade, but not world class.

1:42.27 would have won every World Championship final to date, as well as every Olympic final until last year.

 As an aside, he even managed to make Donovan Brazier's incredible comeback victory a sidestory. Brazier, the 2019 World Champion and one-time American record holder, only returned to racing in June, after injuring his achilles tendon at the 2021 Tokyo Olympic Trials. Injured until earlier this year, he was widely believed to be essentially retired until suddenly returning this summer.

 

[Doublehalf]

I'm starting to get a little more into T&F- my neighbor is actually the head coach at a local university and ironically also wrestled in high school the same time I did albeit in a different part of the state. But we are always keeping each other looped in on each other's current areas of interest.

[red viking]

Lots of pole vaulters are wrestlers. 

[ionel]

6 hours ago, whaletail said:

At the US Track & Field National Championships (World Team Trials), Cooper Lutkenhaus, a 16 year old sophomore finished 2nd in the men's 800m final, and will compete at the World Championships in Tokyo next month. He'll apparently be the youngest Team USA world teamer in history, and may be the most talented American middle distance runner since the great Jim Ryun 60 years ago.

Incredibly, he ran a 1:42.27, knocking 3s off his own U18 and U20 World Record (set last month at the Texas state meet). He's now the third fastest American ever, and only 1.4s off the world record (David Rudisha - Kenya - 1:40.9, set in the 2012 Olympic final). Mind, a few months ago, his personal best was a 1:47.x. Blisteringly fast for a high schooler, for sure, especially one who only started running competitively in 7th grade, but not world class.

1:42.27 would have won every World Championship final to date, as well as every Olympic final until last year.

 As an aside, he even managed to make Donovan Brazier's incredible comeback victory a sidestory. Brazier, the 2019 World Champion and one-time American record holder, only returned to racing in June, after injuring his achilles tendon at the 2021 Tokyo Olympic Trials. Injured until earlier this year, he was widely believed to be essentially retired until suddenly returning this summer.

 

That was a phenomenal race!  The 3 are a great team for us as they have different styles and strengths for the 800m.  As strong as the kid was at the end he can probably go faster in a perfect race. 

[whaletail]

3 hours ago, red viking said:

Lots of pole vaulters are wrestlers. 

After my parents decided I was too small to play football anymore, I 'ran' cross country to get in shape for wrestling. For obvious reasons, here was some overlap at the top of both sports, but something like pole vault would have been better.

I'm not sure I was ever athletic enough to safely compete in something like that (unless I'd been doing it since I was a toddler), but the body control alone would be really helpful for wrestling. You can always run on your own.

[whaletail]

42 minutes ago, ionel said:

That was a phenomenal race!  The 3 are a great team for us as they have different styles and strengths for the 800m.  As strong as the kid was at the end he can probably go faster in a perfect race. 

I've never seen anything like it!

Last year's Olympic 1500m final wasn't even as special, to me, as seeing Brazier comeback to win yesterday, and look like he'd never been away. I was almost in tears. I assumed he was done with the sport, and athletes rarely make it back from that sort of irrelevance.

Mind, the 800m has also evolved mightily since 2019, when he set the American, and WC record, in the World final. From 2022, when no one broke 1:44 until late summer, to last year, when Bryce Hoppel broke Brazier's American record, running 1:41.6 in the Olympic final (and only finishing 4th).

Now you have to be near WR pace to win Diamond Leagues, let alone World Championships.

Not only did Brazier it back (and in three godd@mn months), he set a new PB and won the damn race. Whether he medals at Worlds or not, he'll be relevant in Tokyo.

And a 16 year old kid, who only began running in middle school, somehow finishes a tenth back. Even crazier, the kid's final lap was fastest in the field by a full second, and his final 200 would have placed in the Texas state meet!

This kid may have the fastest kick in the world, and that means a world record in the near future isn't hyperbolic thinking!

As you mention, Lutkenhaus may well have run even faster in a faster race. His kick was there when he was running 1:50 last year, and it was still there when he ran 1:47. He still had it when he ran 1:45 in June, and somehow, he still had it yesterday, when he ran 1:42.27!

At Worlds, Emanual Wanyoni (Kenya) and Marco Arop (Canada) will almost certainly run a similar first lap to yesterday (49 low), on their way to 1:41 low (or maybe even 1:40 high). If Lutkenhaus' legs can handle a slightly faster third 200m (the first half of the final lap), and he closes as he has been, he'll be with them at the end.

Not that much different than Jax and PJ looking like the class of their age groups last year, then suddenly beating NCAA champs a few months ago, and finally beating World Champs a few weeks ago.

Viewed from a practical perspective after-the-fact, these performances surely reflect the world class coaching and training environments now available to young athletic prodigies, but seeing them happen in real time is still absolutely mind boggling!

 

[ionel]

35 minutes ago, whaletail said:

I've never seen anything like it!

Last year's Olympic 1500m final wasn't even as special, to me, as seeing Brazier comeback to win yesterday, and look like he'd never been away. I was almost in tears. I assumed he was done with the sport, and athletes rarely make it back from that sort of irrelevance.

Mind, the 800m has also evolved mightily since 2019, when he set the American, and WC record, in the World final. From 2022, when no one broke 1:44 until late summer, to last year, when Bryce Hoppel broke Brazier's American record, running 1:41.6 in the Olympic final (and only finishing 4th).

Now you have to be near WR pace to win Diamond Leagues, let alone World Championships.

Not only did Brazier it back (and in three godd@mn months), he set a new PB and won the damn race. Whether he medals at Worlds or not, he'll be relevant in Tokyo.

And a 16 year old kid, who only began running in middle school, somehow finishes a tenth back. Even crazier, the kid's final lap was fastest in the field by a full second, and his final 200 would have placed in the Texas state meet!

This kid may have the fastest kick in the world, and that means a world record in the near future isn't hyperbolic thinking!

As you mention, Lutkenhaus may well have run even faster in a faster race. His kick was there when he was running 1:50 last year, and it was still there when he ran 1:47. He still had it when he ran 1:45 in June, and somehow, he still had it yesterday, when he ran 1:42.27!

At Worlds, Emanual Wanyoni (Kenya) and Marco Arop (Canada) will almost certainly run a similar first lap to yesterday (49 low), on their way to 1:41 low (or maybe even 1:40 high). If Lutkenhaus' legs can handle a slightly faster third 200m (the first half of the final lap), and he closes as he has been, he'll be with them at the end.

Not that much different than Jax and PJ looking like the class of their age groups last year, then suddenly beating NCAA champs a few months ago, and finally beating World Champs a few weeks ago.

Viewed from a practical perspective after-the-fact, these performances surely reflect the world class coaching and training environments now available to young athletic prodigies, but seeing them happen in real time is still absolutely mind boggling!

 

The 5k race was also pretty phenomenal.  You had a 1500k guy leading the whole race till in the last lap.  And what generally happens in that situation ... he gets dropped to not even place.  But no ... he comes back and wins it.

 

Btw why does swimming barrier things?  It's not like getting bumped in the pool is gonna cause you to fall over and hurt yourself.  

Edited Monday at 10:45 PM by ionel

[whaletail]

I've not been a track fan for that long, and have been so spoiled by runners like Ingebritsen, Faith Kipyegon, Yomif Kejelcha and Beatrice Chebet, et al. taking it out quick, setting WRs etc., that I haven't learned to love tactical races yet.

I'm also not a huge Hocker fan. I was rooting for Graham Blanks to make the 5000 team, and as a huge Grant Fisher fan, I was already annoyed he was outkicked in the 10K. When Hocker outkicked him in the 5, and Blanks had obviously been dropped, I was like wait, wait, how's Hocker the only race winner to hold a lead this weekend?

After Nuguse and Hoey had already blown up after leading their respective races, I figured Hocker would be next, but no, he drops to P7 only to storm back like Kejelcha on EPO and win the damn thing.

As an aside, a tactical race I did enjoy was the women's 5K, as I've always thought there was a good chance Shelby was innocent, and to see her lose 4 years, come back coaching herself, and still pullout the W was validating.

They're surely testing her constantly now, so I think it's fair to assume she's at least clean these days. That she lost 4 of her prime years, is now in her early 30s, without even a coach, yet still performs at nearly the same level she was at when suspended suggests that either PEDs weren't helping her the way they usually do, or she wasn't on them.

Between her current performance, her background as a small town Iowa girl made good, and the fact that she apparently wouldn't even wear super shoes prior to being banned (she supposedly viewed them as cheating), it's hard to imagine her searching out PEDs by herself, then being comfortable injecting them.

It sucks we'll probably never know the truth.

/soapbox

As for swimming, I never even though about pool lane dividers being an odd addition to competitive swimming, but maybe they're a safety issue? Or maybe they're more meant to orient swimmers, and help them traverse the pool efficiently.

Without them, it'd be a lot easier to accidentally swim at an angle (especially when back stroking), which would look unprofessional at best.

Then again, when runners get bunched up, some have to run outside lane 1, and we consider being able to avoid that a valuable skill.

Why should it be any different for swimmers?