IAAF World ChampionshipsAug 21, 2015 by Lincoln Shryack
Jenny Simpson Knows World Championship Rounds Are 'Great Equalizer'
Jenny Simpson Knows World Championship Rounds Are 'Great Equalizer'
BEIJING - On the eve of the 2015 IAAF World Championships in Beijing, Jenny Simpson noted that despite her status as a former World champion in the 1500, she has grown accustomed to being an underdog.
Even though the 28-year-old has collected medals at the last two World Championships, gold in 2011 and silver in 2013, Simpson once again finds herself in that position this year in a season where 24-year-old Ethiopian Genzebe Dibaba has turned the event on its side with her 3:50.07 World record in Monaco on July 17th.
A day before she was scheduled to compete in the first round of the 1500 in Beijing, Simpson acknowledged that although Monaco was a defining moment in women’s 1500 history, it hasn’t at all changed her approach heading into this year’s championships.
“Monaco really shook things up in the women’s 1500 in a lot of different ways, and a lot of different layers. But I have hardly ever come into a race as a favorite, I’ve spent most of my career with other people better than me, and I’ve found ways to be with them and in some occasions beat them,” Simpson said Friday in Beijing.
Simpson, who won the Diamond League title in 2014 and is a veteran of three previous World Championships, finished more than seven seconds behind the Ethiopian at Monaco in 3:57.30, a time that is just .08 seconds away from her PR. Although Dibaba’s stunning run has made her the clear favorite in Beijing, the experienced Simpson noted today that championship racing is an entirely different entity from a Monaco-style paced effort, and that difference has been a huge factor in her success at the last two championships.
“Rounds are a different story, there’s no pacer. That kind of elevates me to another level. Hopefully if history repeats itself the rounds will serve to my favor.”
Simpson was the surprising champion back in 2011 in Daegu, where she kicked past the field in the final 250 meters en route to a 4:05.40 winning time. The American entered that season’s championships with just the 15th fastest time in the world in 2011, 4:03.54, and managed to win gold over a field where nine out of the twelve women in the race had run faster than Simpson before Worlds that year.
Now four years later, Simpson is a much more polished athlete than she was when she first became a world champion, and currently sits at fourth in the world this season with her run in Monaco. She is certainly among a short list of women expected to contend for a medal again in 2015, as her experience combined with her consistency makes her one of the toughest competitors in the world.
But the question remains, can she really take on Dibaba, who enters Beijing undefeated in 2015, and who appeared unbeatable after that race in Monaco? Simpson wouldn’t say exactly, but as experience has shown her at the last two championships, the three rounds at Worlds tend to level the playing field in a way that a Diamond League meet cannot.
Two years ago in Moscow, Simpson came into Worlds with a 4:00.48 season’s best, nearly a full three seconds slower than what Dibaba had run that year. With the three rounds playing a tremendous factor, Simpson was second in the final while the Ethiopian was a distant 8th. Could 2015 be a similar story for the American, even after Dibaba has put herself on a level where no other woman has ever been?
Simpson is confident once again that the three rounds in Beijing will make the competition much closer than it was in Monaco.
“The starting line of a World Championships is the great equalizer,” she said. “Im more prepared for here (Beijing) than I was there (Monaco).”