Muller London Diamond League

[The Flying Pigdog]

Strange, but predictable. ET and SAFP have the same enigmatic and autocratic coach, who since 2015 has kept them in separate races except for national trials and the Olympics. For that reason, I don't think ET will do the double in Doha.

Absolutely. I just didn't want to be the one to say it. If Thompson only does the 200, it will a shame. This happened in 2015 and his excuse was that ET's start was to weak for the 100 or something silly like that. Personally I am getting the feeling she will double. Or so I hope.

[The Flying Pigdog]

SAFP's current form, and overall relay pedigree/history there should be no reason why she's removed from anchor.



Will be very interesting to see what happens with ET.

There's no pressing reason except I think the team can be even faster if Thompson anchored. Won't happen though of course.

[The Flying Pigdog]

More accurately, you never know when her coach will tell her to just coast it.

Yeah of course. She always runs to his instruction. Running 11.4 in Cali and then going 10.7 a week later in Europe makes it so obvious. Sucks for viewers but I suppose they have a strategy and you can't argue with success.

[trackCanuck]

Absolutely. I just didn't want to be the one to say it. If Thompson only does the 200, it will a shame. This happened in 2015 and his excuse was that ET's start was to weak for the 100 or something silly like that. Personally I am getting the feeling she will double. Or so I hope.

The coach sounds like quite the patriot. Flush a likely silver medal down the toilet.

[Paced]

Eh, I don't think it's that deep. Athletes from that camp just rarely double. Powell didn't. SAFP didn't for years despite having the ability to be competitive over 200m, and has still only doubled twice. Apparently it's about preserving the body/ensuring longevity.

With Thompson's achilles issue it should be no surprise to see her focus on one event this year and double up at the big one next year, just like last time. In 2015 it made sense for her to focus on the 200m as her start and RT were consistently awful, but since then she's improved on that front and has been equally as big a threat in both events. I think the 200m would probably be an easier route to gold this year though, with the way SAFP is running, as long as SMU focuses on the 400m.

Bear in mind that SAFP was not around in 2017 yet Thompson still focused on one event at the World Championships.

Also +1 to keeping SAFP on anchor. Never seen her fluff it, and wasn't her 2013 Moscow anchor timed as one of the fastest in history? She seems to be approaching that kind of form. A little nervous and Thompson's handovers on that backstraight though. Not great here and not great in Rio, which inevitably hampers her performance. Her best was on 3rd leg in Beijing 2015 in my view.

[18.99s]

Yeah of course. She always runs to his instruction. Running 11.4 in Cali and then going 10.7 a week later in Europe makes it so obvious. Sucks for viewers but I suppose they have a strategy and you can't argue with success.

It sucks for the athletes who wanted that lane. If you're going to coast to 11.4, stay out of the meet and let somebody else get the lane.

[_Jay]

It sucks for the athletes who wanted that lane. If you're going to coast to 11.4, stay out of the meet and let somebody else get the lane.

🧐 She received a check for running in the meet I’m sure. I don’t blame her for not giving that up. 🤷🏾*♂️

[Alan Shank]

The record was Marius Bakken's 13:06.39

Oops! Yes, Henrik recently set the 3000 NR, not 5000. He just ran 13:15.xx in that race Cheserek won.
Cheers,
Alan Shank

[Per Andersen]

He's physically in sub-47 shape, but that doesn't mean he has or will have the skill and timing to smoothly clear all hurdles while moving at that speed.

I don't see why a superb athlete like Warholm should have more of a problem with technique at sub 47 speed than the other 2 top guys. He is close to going 13 steps over all ten hurdles. Today he did 14 steps to the last hurdle since he was forced to lead with his right. Normally he does 15 steps between 9 and 10.
Benjamin does 13 steps all the way but he leads with his right and is thus forced to be in the middle of the lane over the hurdles in the turns. ( Warholm leads with his left.)

[scottmitchell74]

Nice to see a Woman's sub-2:00 causing distress on the athlete's faces. Fun race!