After Jakob Ingebrigtsen ran the fastest two-mile race in history last Friday, the focus turned to his next meet. What is possible as the Norwegian returns to his Olympic gold-medal event, the 1500m, at his home meet, a Diamond League stop in Oslo?
Peacock streams it live Thursday from 2-4 p.m. ET. CNBC airs coverage Saturday at 3 p.m. ET that also streams on NBCSports.com/live and the NBC Sports app.
Ingebrigtsen, who in Tokyo became the second-youngest Olympic 1500m champion (at age 20), was part of an extraordinary world record night in Paris last week.
Kenyan Faith Kipyegon ran the fastest women’s 5000m in history. Ethiopian Lamecha Girma lowered the men’s 3000m steeplechase world record, leaving the 1500m as the only world record in an Olympic men’s track race that is older than Usain Bolt‘s 100m and 200m records.
Ingebrigtsen is the eighth-fastest man in history in the 1500m. His best time -- the Olympic record of 3:28.32 from Tokyo -- is significantly behind the world record of 3:26.00 set by Moroccan Hicham El Guerrouj in 1998.
Ingebrigtsen has downplayed chasing that record in interviews this season. He has said his best distance is probably the 3000m (like the two mile, not an Olympic event) even though he focuses on the 1500m.
“I still need to improve my own [1500m] personal best before thinking about the world record,” he told Citius after the two-mile world record. “I see it as one of the, the biggest challenge I’m going to face during my running career.”
Ingebrigtsen has run fast in Oslo. Like last year, when he ran the world’s fastest mile in 21 years. The men’s mile is one of the trademark events of the meet. That it has been changed to a 1500m this year may be an indicator that Ingebrigtsen is chasing a special time, though a prescribed pace has not been announced yet.
The field could propel him. It includes Olympic silver medalist Timothy Cheruiyot of Kenya, plus American Yared Nuguse, who in February ran the second-fastest indoor mile in history.
Ingebrigtsen will only get so many shots at historic 1500m times. The Olympic and world championships races are often tactical and always without pacers. And Ingebrigtsen, the world 5000m champion, will at some point focus on different events.
“When I’m older and slower, I’ll go up in distance,” he said.
Here are the Oslo entry lists. Here’s the schedule of events (all times Eastern):
11:30 a.m. ET -- Women’s Shot Put
12:39 -- Men’s Hammer
12:45 -- Men’s Pole Vault
1:03 -- Women’s Triple Jump
2:04 -- Women’s 400m Hurdles
2:15 -- Men’s 400m
2:25 -- Women’s 3000m
2:27 -- Women’s Discus
2:42 -- Men’s Long Jump
2:43 -- Men’s 200m
2:52 -- Women’s Mile
3:05 -- Men’s 5000m
3:29 -- Women’s 100m
3:39 -- Men’s 400m Hurdles
3:50 -- Men’s 1500m
Here are five events to watch:
Men’s Pole Vault -- 12:45 p.m. ET
The first outdoor head-to-head this season between Mondo Duplantis, the Olympic and world champion and world record holder from Sweden, and E.J. Obiena, the Filipino who was the only man to beat Duplantis in 2022. Already this year, Duplantis upped his world record to 6.22 meters (his sixth time breaking the world record dating to 2020). This meet could be Duplantis’ toughest test before worlds given the field: Obiena, plus Americans Chris Nilsen (Olympic and world silver medalist) and Sam Kendricks (2017 and 2019 World champion).
Women’s Triple Jump -- 1:03 p.m. ET
The top seven from the 2022 World Championships, led by Venezuelan Yulimar Rojas, the Olympic and world champion and world record holder. Her latest undefeated streak began at the Tokyo Games. Jamaican Shanieka Ricketts, the last woman to beat Rojas, took silver at the last two worlds and is in this field. As are the top Americans in Olympic history (Keturah Orji, fourth in 2016) and world championships history (Tori Franklin, bronze last year).
Men’s 200m -- 2:43 p.m. ET
At this point, Noah Lyles is an overwhelming favorite for August’s worlds, but a few men in this Lyles-less field can make a statement. Start with Olympic champion Andre De Grasse of Canada, who ranks outside the world top 50 this year. Erriyon Knighton, fourth at the Olympics and third at worlds, won both of his 200m races so far this season and ranks tied for seventh in the world by best time in 2023, separated from the world leader Lyles by a few collegians. There’s also Liberian Joseph Fahnbulleh (fourth at worlds, fifth at the Olympics) and Cuban Reynier Mena, who was the world’s third-fastest man last year at 19.63 but reportedly believes he will miss a second world championships in a row while in the process of switching nationality to Portugal.
Women’s 100m -- 3:29 p.m. ET
The world’s second- and third-fastest women of 2023 go head-to-head. Jamaican Shericka Jackson and Ivorian Marie-Josee Ta Lou have each run 10.78 and 10.82 this year. Only American Sha’Carri Richardson, who is not in this field, has run faster (10.76). Also absent: world champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce of Jamaica, whose only race this year was at a parents’ day at her son’s school, though she did break 10.70 seconds a record seven times in 2022, and Olympic champion Elaine Thompson-Herah of Jamaica, whose outdoor season so far was a 400m in March and a 200m in April.
Men’s 1500m -- 3:50 p.m. ET
Ingebrigtsen clocked 3:32.59 in his 1500m season opener in May, winning comfortably from the front by 43 hundredths of Nuguse. Here, he faces his primary rival, Cheruiyot, for the first time since last September. Cheruiyot, the world No. 1 this year at 3:31.47, was undefeated against Ingebrigtsen in the Norwegian’s teenage years. Ingebrigtsen got his first win over him at the Olympics and has lost just once to the Kenyan in their last seven head-to-heads.
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