This was a weird one. Lots of what honestly looked like arguing about who was gonna take the lead. After their incredibly weird mid-race "fight" a couple years ago, I've continued assuming that Barega and Kejelcha don't really like each other. But they stayed safely in the lead pack from about mid-point onward, along with some other runners who'd occasionally draw their ire by failing to run ... whatever it is Barega and Kejelcha wanted, pacewise. Funniest part was Tadese Worku, who was apparently trying to shape up for world juniors but who found himself with the big boys pretty far into the race just throwing up his hands like "dude, I'm basically a kid" when Kejelcha tried to scold him for not pushing the pace from the front.

Anyhow, it was a Kejelcha and Barega kick and Barega won. The rest of the world, including the US, has made some pretty big strides lately at 5000m and above, but there's still only two countries where people can screw around and bicker with each other while they're racing and still cruise under 27:00. Curious to see how much these selections hold. It really feels like they're trying to build a TEAM by diversifying their chances for gold in different events, but I wouldn't be shocked to see either Kejelcha or Barega end up in the 5,000m or doubling for the very boring reason that they're both extremely good at everything 1500m and above.