Amanda Vestri and Ryan Ford will both be looking to improve upon their 10k personal bests and positions on the descending order list for the Olympic Trials this Saturday night in London. Amanda has already run a 14 second personal best this season with her 31:54 clocking in winning her section of The Ten in March. At the same meet Ryan shaved 2 seconds off his personal best and club record, running 28:07.
Ryan currently sits 25th on the descending order list for entry into the Olympic Trials next month. The top 24 will earn a spot on the start line. While it is likely at least 1 athlete on the list will not compete there are still opportunities to athletes to move up on the list after this weekend, namely at the NCAA Championships 2 weeks prior to the Trials. With 8 athletes between 28:00 and 28:07 there is an opportunity for Ryan move up significantly on the list by clocking his first sub 28:00 performance. There is a pacing group scheduled to run at 27:45 pace on Saturday. If Ryan were to break 27:45 he would be guaranteed entry into the Olympic Trials by virtue of running underneath the automatic qualifying standard.
Amanda is currently positioned in 19th on the descending order list with at least 1 athlete ahead of her confirmed to be out for the season, putting her effective ranking at 18th. She is in a much stronger position for entry into the Trials, but is eager to take another crack at it after seeing improvement in her fitness since her club record performance in March.
Amanda was always planning on running the 10k this weekend in London. The race in March was more of a last minute decision. She was coming off an injury over the winter that kept her out of the US Cross Country Championships in January, and ramped back into form quicker than expected. She decided to enter the meet in March knowing she was in position to improve her 32:08 time from last year and did just that. Having the 31:54 under her belt will give her the freedom to be a bit more aggressive in targeting a time underneath the Olympic Trials automatic qualifying mark of 31:30.
Final entry lists have not come out yet, but both Ryan and Amanda should be in the UKA Championship sections, races #16 and #17 on the schedule here. Amanda’s race starts at 8:30pm local time (2:30pm eastern) with Ryan to follow at 9:25pm (3:25pm eastern.) Full meet info can be found here. Last year the meet live streamed the races on their YouTube channel. It’s unclear whether they will do that again this year, but if they do it can be found here.