Ali-Frazier.
Yankees-Red Sox.
Nike-Brooks.
No matter how you slice it, Tuesday night's Olympic men's 1500 meter final at the Stade de France has more at stake than just three medals for the first three men across the line.
At 8:50 pm Paris time/11:50 am Pacific time, defending Olympic champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen of Norway and Josh Kerr of Great Britain (Paul Merca photo), who runs for Seattle's Brooks Beasts, will toe the line and run 3 3/4 laps of the purple oval to determine whether Ingebrigtsen successfully defends his Olympic title, or if Kerr can snatch the crown.
True, there are ten other men in the field aspiring to take the Olympic title. Should either man focuses on beating the other, and fail to pay attention to the others racing for the three and a half minutes it will take to navigate the track, with 70000 fans screaming at them, someone else could walk away with the gold medal.
World Athletics president Sebastian Coe, the 1980 and 1984 Olympic champion at this distance, has been quoted as saying that Tuesday night's showdown is a "race for the ages."
The feud between Kerr and Ingebrigtsen began in the semifinals at last year's world championships, when the Norwegian riled up the crowd on the final turn, before turning on the jets and passed Kerr and several others to win.
Ingebrigtsen's act was perceived as a bit of showboating in a heat where he was comfortably qualified for the final.
Kerr got payback in the finals when he passed Ingebrigtsen with about 200 meters to go to win the world title in 3:29.38. Afterwards, Jakob told reporters in the mixed zone that he was sick during the finals, which came across as excuse-making for Kerr's win.
As numerous outlets have written, the two have traded barbs through social media and in the press.
In "The Sunday Podcast" (starts at the 17:20 mark), Kerr said that Ingebrigtsen is often the beneficiary of pacers, which aren't part of championships races. He doubled down on it by saying that in the Tokyo Olympic finals, Ingebrigtsen benefited from Kenya's Timothy Cheruiyot front-running (Cheruiyot finished second in that final, with Kerr third.
"I'm like, 'You've won so many races, you ran fantastic all season that you're just on this -- you must be surrounded by so many yes-men that you don't realize that you have weaknesses.' And I think that was part of his downfall," Kerr said. "If he doesn't realize that he's got some real major weaknesses, then he will not win the 1500 meter gold medal next year. And you know, I'm OK with that ... I would love for him to be listening to this."
After Kerr set a world best of 8:00.67 in the two-mile at the Millrose Games in New York in February, Ingebrigtsen responded by telling Norway's TV2 that, “I would have beaten him in that race, blindfolded … But it’s good that people run better than they have done before.”
Since the war of words, Kerr beat Ingebrigtsen at the Bowerman Mile at the Nike Prefontaine Classic 3:45.34 to 3:45.60 by taking a page out of Ingebrigtsen's playbook by pushing the pace after the halfway point.
During the Olympics, Ingebrigtsen threw another grenade by calling Kerr as the "Brit who does not compete," referencing how Kerr has not competed in a single 1500 meter event this year.
Fellow Norwegian Narve Gilje Nordås, who was third at the world championships in Budapest, added some gasoline to the fire when he was overheard in the mixed zone telling Kerr after Friday's first round that, "You can beat my countryman."
Both men were placed in Sunday's semifinals, with Ingebrigtsen winning the heat in 3:32.38 to 3:32.46.
With more than the Olympic title on the line Tuesday, all I can say is, "get your popcorn ready"
It's going to be a barnburner.
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