More current 5000s…

There were three interesting 5000Ms this past week. Two of the three were championship races and one of those plus the third race saw a record fall.

The first was the men’s NCAA 5000M championship. The winner, Parker Wolfe, ran a 1:52 final 800M (which is blazing fast) to win the race in 13:54. This was also noteworthy because Wolfe defeated the first collegiate athlete, Nico Young, to have run under 13:00 for the distance. It’s a good illustration of how a tactical race doesn’t necessarily favor the fastest person in the field.

The women’s NCAA 5000M championship was won by Parker Valby (apparently it was advantageous to be named Parker in the NCAAs) and was never in serious doubt. She had a comfortable lead most of the way and broke her own collegiate record. What was interesting in this race wasn’t the event itself but the predictions for her going forward. She’s dominated the college scene but she apparently runs 3 to 4 days per week, doing the rest of her workouts on an ARC trainer. There’s a lot of talent but what she’ll do at a higher level is unknown. Can that same type of training work or will she need to up her mileage? If the latter, how will that look? She’ll be at the Olympic Trials later this month which will be an early, though not definitive, indicator of how she’ll perform long-term.

The third race was this past weekend and the most interesting outcome was the person who finished 8th, Daniel Simmons. The reason is that this was a high schooler who was racing with pros and he took nine seconds off the national record by posting a 13:25.86. He missed the Olympic Trials automatic standard by .86 seconds but up to 30 people will be invited so he has a good chance at being there. While his chances of making the team are low, that is some significantly good experience at that age. Nine seconds is also lot of time to knock off of a record at that distance.

The trials start on June 21, where the three 5000M participants for Paris will earn their spots.

Sources used:

DyeStat.com

https://www.letsrun.com/