The Norwegian lacked strength on the home stretch of the Olympic revenge at Weltklasse Zürich. But that didn’t stop him from continuing to dream of ten world records.
Unfortunately, you rarely get to see races like this 1500-meter race in Zurich. Four athletes had put up a great fight for the medals at the Summer Games in Paris, and all four were back for revenge. This was especially important for the great loser in Paris: Jakob Ingebrigtsen had practically run ahead like a hare in the Olympic final before being relegated to fourth place.
In Zurich, as is usual in the Diamond League, he had two pacemakers in front of him, and in such races the Norwegian is usually in a class of his own. But on this evening he was clearly not at full strength. On the home straight he was overtaken by the American Yared Nuguse, the man who had snatched the medal from him as Olympic bronze medalist. The winning time of 3:29.21 minutes was well above the standards that Ingebrigtsen had recently set.
Ingebrigtsen now has the Diamond League final in Brussels to show that he is the real number 1 in this distance. And that is how he sees himself. The 1500 m is a brutal discipline that demands everything from the runners. Hicham El Guerrouj, the king of this distance at the turn of the millennium, always said that it takes the heart of a soldier to be able to survive over 1500 m. The Moroccan dominated the discipline and ran one of the best world records in the history of athletics in 1998 with a time of 3:26:00.
Sleeping for four years under the image of defeat
What El Guerrouj means by the special attitude can be illustrated by looking at himself. In 1996, he fell in the Olympic final. He printed out a photo of the mishap and hung it above his bed. For four years, until the Sydney Games, he saw this picture every day. Years later, he would still burst into tears when anyone asked him about it.
El Guerrouj was a man of strong words. After his Olympic dream was shattered again in 2000, he said before the 2004 Games in Athens: “Anyone who wants to beat me here will have to walk close to death, their lungs will have to explode. If there is such a runner, I will shake his hand and say: ‘You are a great champion.'” The Moroccan won, but the statement can certainly be applied to the world record: it takes a truly great champion to break it.
Jakob Ingebrigtsen certainly doesn’t lack the self-confidence to say that he is such a great runner. The Norwegian was physiologically measured as a child and is said to have had values that are usually only seen in much older athletes. At 23 years of age, he is now an outstanding runner and recently ran a world record of 7:17.55 over 3000 m in Poland.
But a year earlier he had already made it clear that individual personal bests were not enough for him. His goal was to break all world records for distances from 1500 m to the marathon. He spoke of ten personal bests, without naming them specifically. If we assume that the races are outdoors, these would be: 1500 m, 1 mile, 2000 m, 3000 m, 2 miles, 5000 m, 10,000 m, half marathon, marathon – and 3000 m steeplechase.
When it comes to various distances, you might ask yourself how Ingebrigtsen comes up with the idea of talking about records without any basis. The marathon, for example, is very different from track racing, and the record is 2:00:35. Does the man want to break the 2-hour barrier as well?
But it seems even crazier to aim for the steeplechase in addition to nine flat races. But Ingebrigtsen pointed out that he ran over the obstacles when he was younger. As a 16-year-old (!) he ran 8:26. For comparison: the Swiss record has stood at 8:22.24 since 2001. When asked why he sets himself such crazy goals, Ingebrigtsen replied: “If people can do something, I believe I can do it better.” That is his way of thinking, and it helps him stay motivated.
If you stick to the distances mentioned above, the Norwegian has now achieved three out of ten records: he holds the best times over 2000 m, 3000 m and two miles. If he wants to proceed systematically, he should now tick off the shorter distances and lengthen the distances as he gets older. The best record is that of El Guerrouj over 1500 m. The one over the mile, also held by the Moroccan, is considered somewhat less high-class.
Jakob Ingebrigtsen also runs against his father Gjert
In view of the herculean task that Ingebrigtsen has set himself, the question arises as to what actually drives him. Does he want to prove that he is as extraordinary as his physiological data as a child suggested? Or is he simply playing with the media when he makes such statements? When he is asked something, he always takes a little time to think and then speaks as coolly as if he were an iceberg in the polar night.
It is almost certain that the 23-year-old is also trying to prove to himself that he has all the strength he needs. Even as a young boy, Jakob Ingebrigtsen was trained to perform by his father Gjert, who was self-taught and turned his family into a kind of athletics club. The story went viral, and the Ingebrigtsens were even celebrated in Norway with a TV series.
But the supposed fairy tale seems to be turning more and more into a horror story. In 2022, Jakob Ingebrigtsen announced that his father was no longer his coach. In 2023, he and his siblings stated in an open letter that Gjert Ingebrigtsen had tyrannized them for years and had also used physical violence against them. The police began investigating.
In the spring it was announced that only one of the cases was criminally relevant, for the others there was not enough evidence or they had expired. The proceedings that were opened as a result presumably concern 18-year-old Ingrid Ingebrigtsen, who has since stopped competing in competitive sport. But Jakob successfully lodged an appeal and his case is now also being pursued. Shortly after the world record over 3000 m, he was questioned for two hours by the public prosecutor in Oslo.