Honolulu Marathon – News – Fourth At The Olympic Trials, Ciattei Hopes That The Merrie Mile Will Jumpstart His 2025 Campaign

FOURTH AT THE OLYMPIC TRIALS, CIATTEI HOPES THAT THE MERRIE MILE WILL JUMPSTART HIS 2025 CAMPAIGN
By Rich Sands, @thatrichsands.bsky.social
(c) 2024 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved

HONOLULU (06-Dec) — Coming off a second-place finish at last year’s Kalakaua Merrie Mile here, Vince Ciattei knew he was ready for a breakthrough. Though he’d been running professionally for several years, he had yet to realize what he believed was his full potential. But after the dissolution of his previous team, the Oregon Track Club Elite, a move to train at high altitude in Flagstaff, Arizona, in 2023 was yielding results, and in the prestigious Honolulu road race he signaled that he was legitimately one of America’s best milers.

In the Merrie Mile, he finished a close second to Yared Nuguse, after they had caught and passed the women’s field, who had been given a 30-second head start in the mixed-sex pursuit race. Though it’s a relatively low-key event given that most athletes are far from peak form in December, it gave Ciattei a rejuvenated sense of self-assurance heading into the Olympic year.

“Last year this race was huge for me. It was a springboard into everything that happened in 2024,” Ciattei told Race Results Weekly in an interview on the eve of this year’s edition. “I’d never done fall in Flagstaff before. I’d never spent that much time at altitude, so first and foremost it was a confirmation that I was responding well to this.”

Nuguse was coming off an epic season –winning the U.S. title, placing fifth at the world championships and smashing the American mile record– and third-place finisher Hobbs Kessler had won the world road mile title earlier in the fall, so the results were a reliable barometer for Ciattei. “Being right near Yared, being in the thick of it with those guys, that gave me the mindset that I can mix it up with them on the bigger stages,” he said.

That confidence, along with a full contract with the Under Armour Dark Sky Distance squad in Flagstaff, propelled Ciattei to the best season of his career at age 29. Ironically, his most impressive performance of the year was also the most agonizing.

At the U.S. Olympic Trials in Eugene, Oregon, Ciattei finished fourth in the 1500 meters, one spot from making the team for the Paris Games. In the process, he shattered his three-year-old personal best, clocking 3:31.78 behind Cole Hocker, Nuguse and Kessler, two-thirds of the eventual Olympic 1500m podium.

“I’m proud of that race, but I’m still…