Josh Kerr vs Jakob Ingebrigtsen: Beef and the Bowerman Mile
There’s no hiding it: Josh Kerr and Jakob Ingebrigtsen have beef.
It all started when Ingebrigtsen – the overwhelming favourite to win the 1500m at last year’s World Athletics Championships – was pipped at the line by a British underdog for the second year in a row.
Ingebrigtsen is a remarkable athlete, but, as I’ve written before, he has trouble pushing into the unknown. I won’t repeat myself here, but the gist of it is that the last great 1500m champion – world record holder Hicham El Guerrouj – faced a similar mental block when chasing the Olympic title. It took El Guerrouj nine years to win the sole 1500m Olympic gold of his career, despite seemingly collecting world records and global championships at will. Ingebrigtsen was an Olympic champion at 20 years of age, so that’s not his problem. His problem is that when people find a new way to beat him, it takes him an alarmingly long time to come up with a solution. We first saw it with Timothy Cheruiyot, and we’ve since seen it with Jake Wightman and Kerr: two athletes who grew up running together at the Edinburgh Athletics Club and have each beaten Ingebrigtsen to the 1500m world title in the past two years.
So, it’s not hard to see why, when the same singlet moved past him at the same point in the same final, Ingebrigtsen was annoyed. (Kerr admits to wearing Wightman’s singlet over the current Team GB design at the 2023 World Championships to psych out Ingebrigtsen. Apparently, it worked.)
His annoyance could only have grown when Kerr hopped on a podcast two days later to pin Ingebrigtsen’s showboating in the semi-finals to an underlying insecurity.
“I do think it comes from a place of insecurity, where something has happened, and he’s frustrated, and he hasn’t got the attention that he normally has when he’s run world records.”
Two days later, Ingebrigtsen successfully defended his 5000m world title. In his post-race interview, the Norwegian took the chance to respond to Kerr, explaining that he’d been sick all week and that Kerr was “just the next guy.”
And thus, the beef was born.
Josh Kerr (M) beats Jakob Ingebrigtsen (R) to the 1500m world title
Kerr came back a few days later at the Zurich Diamond League press conference.
“I know he wanted the 1500 title…he can be disrespectful to me; that’s fine. I still have the World Championship gold medal, and I’m going to be the world champion for the next two years, regardless of his comments. Obviously, I don’t love disrespectful comments…but if that’s the kind of route he wants to go down, that’s fine with me.”
Ingebrigtsen largely ignored those remarks and returned to the Diamond League circuit that he had so dominated prior to the World Championships. In September, he fittingly lifted the Diamond League trophy for the mile and the 3000m, bringing an end to a season where he had won every race except that fated 1500m. Meanwhile, Kerr opted to delay the inevitable rematch between himself and his Norwegian rival, heading to New York to close out his season with a road mile and sparking some rumours that he was ducking Ingebrigtsen.
Those rumours intensified when Kerr went back on his decision not to race at the World Indoor Championships earlier this year. The Briton said the timing of Ingebrigtsen’s withdrawal had no bearing on his decision, but when you sign up for an event the moment the guy you’re accused of ducking reveals an Achilles injury, it comes across as suspicious to say the least. (For those interested, Ingebrigtsen picked up the injury on his honeymoon, which he kicked off with a 5:22 beer mile).
Regardless of how he got there, Kerr’s decision to run indoors was a good one. He broke the indoor two-mile world best in February and claimed his second consecutive World Championship in March, this time over 3000m.
Josh Kerr points to the crowd as he approaches the line after running the fastest indoor two-mile in history
Meanwhile, Ingebrigtsen sat on his couch, nursing his Achilles and reigniting the feud.
“It is not certain that [Kerr] runs any better now than last year at the same time; he did not run two miles then,” he told TV2 in Norway after Kerr’s two-mile performance.
“I would have beaten him in that race, blindfolded. But it’s good that people run better than they have done before.”
A month later, Ingebrigtsen was in the public eye again, this time in an interview with The Times.
“I’m at a significant level with my intervals. Not where I want to be, but probably better than the rest of the world,” Ingebrigtsen explained, confirming he had recovered from his injury.
The conversation took an inevitably quick turn to the Olympics later this year and the prospect of a rematch between himself and Kerr.
"If I don't get injured and I don't get sick, I think it's going to be a walk in the park.”
A few weeks later, Kerr announced that he was going to race at the Bowerman Mile in May with a social media post intended for one man.
“Been flirting around with other distances, time to get back to what I’m the best in the world at.”
That man was not happy about Kerr’s choice of words and made no secret of his opinion towards the Briton in a recent episode of the European Athletics podcast, Ignite.
“I think some people are just assholes and being idiots. I've won it [the Olympics] before, so I don't know what all the fuss is about.”
Ultimately, Ingebrigtsen and Kerr are two sides of the same coin. Since this all began last August, they have both been saying the same thing, just with a different tone. Kerr’s message has always been “I am good enough to win”, while Ingebrigtsen’s stance has remained “I am the best, so I will win”. In a way, they’re both right: despite not being the world champion, Ingebrigtsen is the best 1500m runner in the world. And, despite not being the best 1500m runner in the world, Kerr won at the World Championships. Their rivalry boils down to one guy thinking he will win and one guy thinking he can win, which is all just a case of semantics at this point.
Which brings us to this weekend. Most people thought that we wouldn’t see these two go head-to-head until the Olympics, but a preview of their showdown is set to take place at the Bowerman Mile in Oregon on Saturday.
Regardless of which side of the rivalry you fall on, it’s hard to argue that Ingebrigtsen doesn’t go to Eugene as the favourite. The Norwegian made his Bowerman Mile debut as a 16-year-old to become the youngest sub-four miler in history, has returned to the event every year since, and hasn’t lost a Diamond League race in three years. Kerr beating Ingebrigtsen was an upset – not one that can’t be repeated, but an upset nevertheless – and Ingebrigtsen’s 17-0 record in the mile against the rest of the field cannot be ignored.
Then again, Kerr is a two-time World Champion, beat the Norwegian in their last clash, and has already run four personal bests this year, while Ingebrigtsen is yet to race in 2024.
In the end, Jonathon Gault put it best: “Only one of them can ultimately aspire to Muhammad Ali’s old claim that ‘it ain’t bragging if you can back it up’.”
That being said, the win may not go to either of them. This is truly an all-time mile field, and almost everyone brings a potentially race winning resume to the table. Here is a breakdown of the entire field (the brackets detail each runner’s 1500m/mile personal bests):
Jakob Ingebrigtsen (3:27/3:43): Reigning 1500m Olympic champion, 2022 and 2023 5000m world champion, 2022 and 2023 1500m world championship silver medallist, indoor 1500m world record holder, 2000m world record holder, third fastest mile in history
Josh Kerr (3:29/3:48): Reigning 1500m World champion, reigning 3000m World Indoor champion, 2021 1500m Olympic bronze medallist, indoor two-mile world best holder
Geordie Beamish (3:36/3:51): Reigning 1500m World Indoor champion
Cooper Teare (3:32/3:50): Two-time national champion
Reynold Cheruiyot (3:30/3:48): 2022 1500m World U20 champion
Mario García (3:29/3:47): Top six in the 1500m at the 2022 and 2023 World Championships
Lamecha Girma (3:29/debut): 3000m indoor world record holder, steeplechase world record holder, four-time world championship silver medallist, Olympic steeplechase silver medallist
Neil Gourley (3:30/3:49): Four-time national champion
Oliver Hoare (3:29/3:47): Reigning 1500m Commonwealth champion
Cole Hocker (3:30/3:48): 2024 1500m World Indoor silver medallist
Hobbs Kessler (3:32/3:48): 2024 1500m World Indoor bronze medallist, reigning road mile world champion, road mile world record holder
Abel Kipsang (3:29/3:50): 2022 1500m World Indoor bronze medallist, fourth place in the 1500m at the 2021 Olympics, fourth place in the 1500m at the 2023 World Championships
Cameron Myers (3:33/3:52): Second youngest person to ever break the four-minute mile barrier, U18 mile world best holder, U18 1500m world best holder
Yared Nuguse (3:29/3:43): Fourth fastest mile in history, 2024 3000m World Indoor silver medallist
Jake Wightman (3:29/3:50): 2022 1500m World Champion
Josh Kerr (R) smiles as Jakob Ingebrigtsen (L) points to the crowd in the semi-finals of the men’s 1500m at the 2023 World Championships
Find out more about the Eugene Diamond League here.