Who Wins The Next Lap? ⏱️
Lap 256
Lap 256: Who Wins The Next Lap?
If you’re in the Boston area on Friday afternoon for Grand Prix weekend, Join CITIUS MAG for a laid-back, fun live podcast conversation with Olympians Parker Valby and Quincy Wilson, hosted at The Track at New Balance. This special event brings together guests in celebration of the latest two limited-edition FuelCell SuperComp spikes designed by the athletes themselves. Details can be found here.
Compiled by Paul Hof-Mahoney, David Melly, Kyle Merber, & Paul Snyder
The Race Of The Weekend Could Be… A 2K?
We don’t know whose idea it was to add a 2000m to the schedule at Saturday’s New Balance Indoor Grand Prix, but we do know that person is a genius! Despite it being the first race of the season for everyone in the field, and an “off” a distance, this 2000m is teeming with intriguing storylines. That’s just what happens when we get to witness a clash of athletes from neighboring events.
If you had to describe one person in the field as its headliner, that’d be Grant Fisher, the American record holder in… practically everything! But most notably, he has two Olympic bronze medals and the world record in the indoor 5000m. Then there’s Jake Wightman, the 2022 World champion in the 1500m, who proved at the end of last season with a close silver medal that he has returned to his top—and importantly, healthiest—form.
If this was a mile, then we know where the Polymarket obsessives would be placing their bets. If this was a 3000m, then even more so. But it’s not—it’s a 2000m, which also opens the door for someone like Hobbs Kessler, who last year looked one 7+ mile run away from being strong enough to contend in some overdistance. Coming off last week, we’d be remiss not to mention Belgium’s Pieter Sisk, who set a dominant 1500m world lead of 3:34 in Luxembourg. But this isn’t a preview… it’s a love letter to the perfect distance!
For a middle-distance fanatic, the five-lapper (or in this case, ten) is ideal—not because the average human attention span continues to shrink, but because it invites a clash of titans that would normally never be competitive against one another. The aerobic gap between the 1500m specialists and the 5000m runners is significant, at least for those who lack the athleticism to clear barriers.
It’s a chance for the strong 1500m runners who suck at tempo runs to thrive without having to worry about letting a race go so slow that an 800m runner could be waiting in the wings. However, that’s rarely a concern, as the 2000m has never been part of a major championship, despite being an internationally ratifiable distance. This ain’t no World Best!
Considering the “off-year” vibes of 2026, this feels oddly right as a pro opener. The regular season doesn’t naturally build in a crescendo of interest as it would during an Olympic year. Therefore, rather than trying to coerce fans into getting as gassed up about World Ultimates as they would a conventional global championship, it’s in the interest of the public to lean into the unknown—and to embrace the chaos.
For context, the outdoor world records for the event are 4:43.13 by Jakob Ingebrigtsen and 5:19.70 from Jess Hull. On the surface, staging an elite 2000m feels like a great opportunity for meet organizers to chase the photo-op of handing an oversized check to whoever breaks a rarely contested world record. But the record’s no joke! When Jakob got his mark in 2023, he ran the first 1600m in 3:48 and then closed it out in 54.9! According to the World Athletics scoring tables, that is a more impressive performance than both Hicham El Guerrouj’s 1500m and mile records. Take all scoring conversions with a grain of salt… but still.
With the sub-four mile becoming increasingly commonplace with every passing BU meet, the sub-five 2000m should be the new barometer of success to separate the best from the rest, or at least impress dorky potential partners at bars. Since Roger Bannister didn’t run through the line for an extra-speedy victory lap, we had to wait another 12 years before West Germany’s Harald Norpoth dipped under five, going 4:57.8 in 1966.
To date, 185 men have broken five minutes at the distance. That’s fewer than the number of men who’ve run 9.98 or faster in the 100m (193). #185 on the 1500m all-time list is 3:32.13, in case you’re wondering. Since HERE IN AMERICA, we tend to tack on 109m if we want our 1500m runners to push their limits, all of those marks were run in Europe except for a single incredible race at the 2014 Millrose Games, won by a then-39-year-old Bernard Lagat in 4:54.74.
For most of us stateside, we never had the opportunity to run the 2000m. Perhaps you speculated about how good we would have been at it? Or maybe you’ve rowed on an erg at the gym, since that distance became the standardized measurement of rowing greatness during the 19th century. (Before you Google it, the men’s record is 5:35 and the women’s is 6:21.)
As we lead into this weekend’s race in Boston, it is not a fair expectation that this field will crack Kenenisa Bekele’s indoor record of 4:49.99, though it’s certainly possible. (Quick fun aside: technically, Bekele never even broke four minutes in the mile.) But we don’t care so much about the clock—we care about the chess match. Will a 56-second penultimate lap be enough to shake the milers? Will anyone be sharp enough for a sub-26 close? And the most important question of all: Who will make the off year their “on year”? We may find out this weekend.
[Statistically] The Best And Worst Events Heading Into 2026
The “trackflation” discourse isn’t going anywhere this season, and with no major championship on the calendar, the temptation to make everything about time will only grow stronger this year. But here’s the weird part: record-breaking isn’t actually a great measure of how much the sport has changed. One or two extraordinary individuals can redefine an event single-handedly, like Yulimar Rojas in the triple jump or Mondo Duplantis in the pole vault. To truly understand how much we’ve progressed collectively, it’s more important to look at depth.
To get to the bottom of this, we cracked open the World Athletics databases, started double-chugging Olipops and Beekeeper coffee, and went to work. In order to truly understand where each event stands, we compared the result score of the 100th-best performer in every single event in 2015 and 2025 – not just to itself, but to all the other events using the WA scoring tables. Here’s what we found:
The men’s 800m has actually been as insane as it has seems. No event has been as symbolic of absurd progression as the men’s 800m. After seeing only three sub-1:43 performances from 2020-2023, there have been 67 over the last two years, including 17 sub-1:42 runs. The rising tide of the best guys in the world has also lifted the metaphorical boats of their companions at the back of the pack. The 100th-fastest man of 2015 ran 1:46.70, versus 1:44.92 in 2025. That gap of nearly two seconds is worth 54 points in the rankings tables, the biggest improvement out of any event.
When evaluating the increase in points, it is worth noting that the men’s 800m wasn’t particularly strong in 2015, as the 1122 points one would get from running 1:46.70 was very middle-of-the-pack. However, the half-mile ranked sixth in 2025, up 10 spots and only 13 points off the high-water mark put up by the men’s marathon. Speaking of…
The marathon (and distance as a whole, really) reigns supreme. This makes sense, because these are the events most aided and influenced by the various advancements outlined in the intro, but it’s still impressive to see it put to paper. The men’s marathon was already in good shape, comparatively, with a 2:09:14 performance from 2015 racking up 1144 points, statistically the second-most competitive event that year. In the decade since, nearly two-and-a-half minutes got taken off that time, with 100 men running 2:06:48 (worth 1189 points) or faster last year. By 2025, the marathon has now leapfrogged the men’s 100m for the honor of “deepest event.”
The seven events that saw larger improvements than the men’s marathon are all middle- or long-distance events, which makes sense when you consider the purported performance impacts of carbon shoes and sodium bicarbonate:
Men’s 800m: 1:46.70 to 1:44.92 (54 points)
Men’s 1500m: 3:38.17 to 3:34.33 (53 points)
Men’s 20K race walk: 1:23:29 to 1:20:57 (53 points)
Women’s 5000m: 15:33.15 to 15:05.05 (53 points)
Men’s 5000m: 13:27.44 to 13:13.11 (51 points)
Women’s 800m: 2:02.07 to 2:00.14 (48 points)
Women’s marathon: 2:28:35 to 2:23:43 (46 points)
The only non-distance event in the Top 10 is the women’s 100m, where the 100th-best time dropped from 11.31 to 11.16 (32 points).
High jump hate was not hyperbole last year. In the wake of nearly every Diamond League or Continental Tour meet last summer, you could probably find a tweet bashing men’s high jump. That’s because, for a large part of the season, it was boring! An awesome battle between Hamish Kerr and Sanghyeok Woo in Tokyo was a nice cap to the season, but we saw DL competitions won in an uninspiring 2.26m and 2.25m on two separate occasions. Unsurprisingly, the down year stretched all the way to the bottom of the top lists, as 2.21m was 3cm and 27 points lower than the 100th-best mark of a decade ago. It was one of only three events (along with men’s triple jump and, surprisingly, men’s shot put) to get worse, depth-wise, and its dropoff was the most extreme by a significant margin.
It’s worth pointing out that in an event like high jump, where the marks are limited to bar progressions and whole centimeters, there could be some weirdness in this data that doesn’t translate easily. But then again, at least 100 men cleared 2.24m every year from 2012 to 2018, a standard that hasn’t been hit in the seven years since. So maybe it’s simply a matter of high jump exiting a golden era and inflated expectations on the fan’s part. Regardless, the numbers say that we’re headed in the wrong direction.
Have the field events plateaued? Across the board, field events have seen the least drastic improvements over the last 10 years. Most of the field events have still improved, just not as much as their outfield counterparts. In fact, only three track events—the women’s 400m hurdles, 10,000m and steeplechase — break up the solid run of field event futility at the bottom of the rankings.
In field events, it’s far less likely for shoe tech to play such a drastic role, or something akin to double threshold to come along and change the workout game. There’s no benefits to altitude training for jumpers and throwers. It’s difficult to see massive breakthroughs for events that are more reliant upon technique that feels somewhat finite as opposed to reaping the benefits of an expanding aerobic engine. That’s not to say that there’s no hope for the field events. From Mondo Duplantis and his pole vault pals to Camryn Rogers and her rivals in the hammer, the high-end performances we’re seeing are better and more exciting than ever in so many events. It’s simply less likely that we’d see a sea change from top to bottom like we have on the track.
The numbers don’t lie: trackflation is real. But the outliers don’t tell the whole truth, either. We tend to think of barrier-breaking performances as redefining the realm of the possible, a rising tide that lifts all boats. Statistically, however, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone taking nearly two seconds off the 400H world record actually did very little to move the needle for the 100th best long hurdler in the last decade.
We’re all getting faster, but in more of a process-y, training- and technology-driven way than a Marty Supreme “dream big” manifestation. Which is probably a good thing! Because it means that parity comes with performance, and though the bar may be higher (not literally, sorry again high jumpers), everyone is just as capable of clearing it.
The 2026 Lap Count Watch List
Everyone wants to be ahead of the curve—literally, when it comes to indoor track tactics. More importantly though, we all want to be early on the Next Big Thing, whether it’s a former college runner with the ink still drying on their pro contract or a national star on the precipice of international fame.
Last week, we waxed lyrical on the upside potential of World XC junior champ Marta Alemayo, but she’s just one of a few rising stars we’ve got our eyes on. “Rising,” is of course, all relative—the athletes on this list range from 17 to 29 years old—but there’s one thing they all share: flashes of greatness that showed up in 2025 that could portend even better things to come.
The statistical deep dives can help tell us where we are currently as a sport, but just as important is a peek into where we’re going. So we’re going to call a few shots as to who may step into the limelight and shine brightly in the coming year in track and field, and hopefully they live up to the expectations we’ve foisted upon them.
Maggi Congdon: The Northern Arizona grad came out of her final collegiate season with a pair of third place finishes at NCAAs in the mile indoors and 1500m outdoors… and immediately outdid herself at the very start of her pro journey with a runner-up finish in the 800m at USAs. She made it to the semis in Tokyo but hasn’t really made a true splash yet on the pro scene. Congdon could be a real threat in the 800m, 1500m, or both—as she proved this past weekend at the UW Preview, setting meet records in both the mile (4:27.77) and 800m (2:00.93). It’ll be hard to break into the top echelon of the 1500m with the historic level of U.S. depth in the event… but you could practically say the same thing about her shorter event these days, and she already did that.
Mercy Chepngeno: The 18-year-old prep school standout is probably a total unknown to most of our readership right now… but the team caught this interesting feature in Kenya’s Daily Nation newspaper. Chepngeno is the African U20 champ over 3000m, but her real passion is the steeplechase, where she cites 21-year-old World champ Faith Cherotich as an inspiration. She has big shoes to fill as Cherotich had already run 9:06 at her age and Chepngeno’s current PB is 10:05.49… but improvement comes in leaps and bounds in the steeplechase, so who knows?
Yan Ziyi: Throws fans will probably throw their phones across the room and complain that we’re referring to Yan Ziyi, the world junior record holder in the javelin, as an up-and-comer. That’s because she tossed the third farthest mark in the world last year at 65.89m… but she wasn’t eligible to compete at the World Championships as she’s still only 17 years old and the throws events are subject to age limits. Ziyi only competed outside her home nation of China twice in 2025, both in the Czech Republic, so hopefully she spends a little more time on the international circuit this year.
George Couttie: Our most recent look at Virginia Tech junior George Couttie was in a British national uniform, as the Yorkshire native led off the mixed relay for his home country at World XC in Tallahassee. Couttie is a versatile runner who’s been bubbling under the A-tier of collegiate competition for two years now, finishing 14th and 10th at the last two NCAA XC championships but cutting his teeth on the track more as a mile/3000m guy. He only finished 13th in the 3000m at indoor NCAAs last year, but coming off a 7:36.74 PB at BU in December, good for NCAA #9 all-time, he’s due for a breakout championship performance.
Sydney Sutton: Anyone who followed New Balance Nationals in the last year or two knows the name Sydney Sutton… but if your track fandom begins on the collegiate level, you’re about to get to know her in a big way as the Florida freshman comes into college with 400m/400H PBs of 51.23 and 56.04. Sutton ran a 37.19 300m to open up her collegiate career behind two of her teammates, including, notably, fellow freshman Tyra Cox. Is Florida the new 400U? If so, it’ll be in part because Sutton follows up her historic high school career with a similarly legendary run through the collegiate ranks.
Shure Demise: The 29-year-old Ethiopian marathoner was first a name to watch 11 years ago, when she set the world junior record of 2:20:59 in her debut at the 2015 Dubai Marathon, a time that’s still her lifetime best to this day. So why are we re-upping on her now? Because she had a downright Lazarus-like return to the marathon in 2025 after three years away from the distance, going two-for-two with wins in Milan and Toronto, the latter of which was just four seconds off that epic 2015 run. She kicked off 2026 with a 12th-place finish at World XC, and it seems clear that the rumors of her “Demise” have been greatly exaggerated.
There’s no more exciting moment in any sport’s cycle than the humming potential of a new season. The podiums are all empty and a lot of medals are up for grabs: anything is possible! And until the results start to trickle in, the biggest source of our collective excitement is the prospect that the next generation-defining talent may be emerging any day now. No pressure, but we’ve got high hopes.
More News From The Track And Field World 📰
– Ethiopia swept the podiums at last weekend’s Doha Marathon. Tamirat Tola took home the win in the men’s race in 2:05:40, followed by Asefa Boki (2:05:55) and Boki Diriba (2:06:26). The women’s race was won by Tigist Gezahagn in 2:21:14, with Tigist Girma (2:22:33) and Muluhabt Tsega (2:23:21) rounding out the top three.
– The BAA has announced the full elite women’s field for April’s Boston Marathon, and it looks like it’s gonna be another doozy. Defending champ Sharon Lokedi returns, but a back-to-back victory is far from certain. 10 other women in the field boast lifetime PBs under 2:20. American record holder Emily Sisson is slated to compete, but she won’t be the only U.S. athlete eyeing the podium—Fiona O’Keefe, Susanna Sullivan… you know what, just look at the full list.
– Crikey! Aussie teen sensation Cam Myers lowered the facility record at the University of Washington’s Dempsey Indoor Center to 3:49.81.
– Despite the World Cross Country Championships being now but a happy, neon-blue-water-y memory, the World Cross Country Tour carries on. At the Cross Internacional Juan Muguerza in Elgoibar, Spain, steeplechaser Winfred Yavi broke the tape in the women’s 7.6k battle (25:23) while perpetual runner-up Berihu Aregawi finally took top honors in the men’s 9.7k race (29:33).
– I’ve got a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymo– oh wait. Drew Hunter kicked off his indoor campaign by running a PB in the 3000m in Manhattan, just not the one you’re probably thinking of. He won comfortably in 7:39.77 at the K-State Thane Baker Invitational, hosted by Kansas State in Manhattan, Kansas.
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Happy to see Kyle in the byline. Welcome back
I'm backing Wightman for the 2k, followed by Kessler and then Fisher. Think the 1500m guys will have enough juice over that last 500m.