A Look Back at the Moscow World Championships

Kiprotich bringing the pain

Mad competition on the Moscow track last week. Some genius mind even developed a cellphone app so that nerds like me could follow the competition and real-time results during office coffee breaks or while traveling to a wedding in Telluride. Technology is something else.

You know what else is something else? Marathon champion Stephen Kiprotich of Uganda who repeated his gold medal performance from London. Absolutely brilliant that the underdog of London who brought down all of team Kenya over the last 7km of the Olympic marathon, would return to Moscow only to dismantle all of team Ethiopa and one Kenyan challenger over the last 7km of the World Championships. That's the stuff of legend right there. I'd love to see him run New York. Team America was overmatched but ran bravely, running 13th, 27th, and 37th. The American women ran even better led by Olympic medalist Deena Kastor in 9th, teammates in 18th and 23rd.

Lap of honor for Mrs. Simpson (Go Buffs!)

We had solid performances in the distances but came up short for a podium spot. Galen Rupp ran to a 4th place in the 10,000m, Shalane Flanagan 8th in the women's final. Bernard Lagat ran to 6th in the 5,000m final, and we advanced all three of our 5,000m women's team into the final, led by Molly Huddle with finishes of 6th, 7th, and 12th. Evan Jager was a strong 5th in the Steeplechase one second off the medal hunt. It was the middle distances though where we finally broke through. A medal from each event - Nick Symmonds struck first with a silver in the 800m, followed by Jenny Simpson (Go Buffs!) with a silver in the 1500m, then Brenda Martinez with a bronze in the 800m, and finally Matt Centrowitz with silver in the 1500m. Simpson and Centrowitz were repeat medalists from the Deagu Championships in 2011. It's likely that Team USA even left two or three medals on the table with a few sub-par performances. Gonna be super strong over the next four years in Mid-D. Yay America, yay Rocky, yay stone-cold marathoners that run without fear.

Related Posts:
  - '12 Olympic Marathon Recap
  - '12 Olympic 1500m Recap
  - '12 US Indoor Track & Field Championships - Abq, NM