Talk:United States Olympic trials (track and field)

Why aren't the Olympics considered the best track meet in the world?

In the intro. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 20:09, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

I wrote that line (and most of the article), I'll explain. Over the decades in many events, primarily the sprints, hurdles and jumping events where the United States has excelled, the competition in this meet is at a higher level, it has more top ranked competitors than the actual Olympics these competitors are trying to qualify for. This is not my WP:OR, but I will try to use these examples as an explanation why this is a widespread opinion. Look at the World rankings for the Men's 100 metres, an event the USA excels in: just in Olympic years 1948; 5 of the top 10, 1952; 6 of the top 10 (6/10 for shorthand), 1956; 6/7, 1960; 5/10, 1964; 4/10, 1968; 4/8, 1972; 4/8, 1976; 4/10, 1980 7/10, 1984; 6/7, 1988; 4/8, 1992; 4/8, 1996; 4/10, 2000; 5/10, 2004; 5/10 and 2008; 3/10. Even stronger, the Men's 110 hurdles: 1948; 7/10 including the entire top 5, 1952; 7/10 including the entire top 5, 1956; 9/10 including the entire top 7, 1960; 6/9, 1964; 5/7, 1968; 7/8, 1972; 5/10, 1976; 4/10, 1980; 6/10, 1984; 6/10, 1988; 5/10, 1992; 5/10, 1996; 6/10, 2000; 4/6, 2004; 3/7, 2008; 4/7 For the overwhelming majority of years, the results of the US Olympic Trials eliminates Top 10 competitors from the Olympic final a month before the race begins. Trackinfo (talk) 02:04, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

In some events, due to American strength in depth, I agree that this is true. In others, it is clearly not. Consider that the US has won only two medals in the Olympic men's 1500m in the post-war era (neither of them gold) and there has never been an American female 1500m Olympic medalist. Similarly, there have been no Olympic medalists in the men's long distance events in over 40 years. Only one female shot put medal (a bronze) in the history of the Olympics. Only two javelin winners ever (none in over sixty years) and Larry Young's two bronzes comprise America's entire walking medals since 1924.

I don't doubt the US's strengths where they have them (sprints, relays, hurdles, some field events), it's just that they are highly concentrated in certain events. While many Americans might consider these events the "prestige" events, this is a bit of a cultural lens – just as the the middle distance events are more considered the "prestige events" in West/Northern Europe, the field events in Eatern Europe, and the long-distance events in Africa and Asia. SFB 16:48, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Admittedly we americans are a jingoistic lot who live in a bubble. Only the events where americans excel are important . . . But again, this is not my OR. See it here by America's leading track journalism entity, obviously promoting their own tour; or here by Nike promoting the meet, or here by our top newspaper more than a decade before I created this article. I attributed it "this has been considered by many to be the best track meet in the world" and I believe these and many other sources can back that statement. Trackinfo (talk) 21:27, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

So, at least in the more prestigious events (as viewed by Americans), and especially if the definition of track meet excludes field events (I don't know), the average stregth of competition at the event as a whole can be stronger at the USOTs than at the Olympics, making it the best meet. But isn't a very high number like #1 or #2 often not an American?, He would try as hard as possible because it's the Olympics and he could win (I don't know if track world records are broken at national events, if so it can't be many). Right now Usain Bolt is so fast for example, I don't know if anyone even has a chance of beating him. What about other events, like the World Championships or those other international meets they always have? Maybe the allowed number of entrants per country for those meets is still not high enough for this statement to be untrue? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 21:47, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

USATF likes to promote the US team as the #1 track team in the world. At least they do it internally, I'm on a lot of committees. I would guess over the course of history, scoring points or medal count, you'd find the American team wins a majority of competitions, certainly more than any other team across the board. The Soviets, East Germans even the British might have had their share of eras, the Kenyans, Ethiopian and currently Jamaican teams having periods of dominance in certain ranges of events. I will concede in recent history it is a rare, almost fluke, occurrence when an American wins any medal in a race longer than 400 meters. But the point of the line in the article is, slanted view or not, many American aficionados (and maybe others) do consider this meet better than the Olympics. Trackinfo (talk) 00:40, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Requested move 11 February 2022

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) TheBirdsShedTears (talk) 05:20, 18 February 2022 (UTC)

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• United States Olympic Trials (track and field) → United States Olympic trials (track and field)
• United States Olympic Trials (wrestling) → United States Olympic trials (wrestling)
• United States Olympic Trials (swimming) → United States Olympic trials (swimming)
• 2012 U.S. Olympic Trials (gymnastics) → 2012 U.S. Olympic trials (gymnastics)
• 2016 U.S. Olympic Trials (gymnastics) → 2016 U.S. Olympic trials (gymnastics)
• 2020 U.S. Olympic Trials (gymnastics) → 2020 U.S. Olympic trials (gymnastics)
• United States Olympic Trials (diving) → United States Olympic trials (diving)
• 2020 United States Olympic Trials (track and field) → 2020 United States Olympic trials (track and field)
• 2020 United States Olympic Trials (swimming) → 2020 United States Olympic trials (swimming)

– Sources don't generally capitalize "trials" in these, just as they don't cap track and field, swimming, gymnastics, diving, wrestling, etc. These apply also to older years on the last two. Dicklyon (talk) 01:52, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

Background info

Discussion started at project: WT:WikiProject Olympics#Capitalization of "Trials".

But no reaction there in several days, and no reactions to all the lower casing edits that I did, so these changes are presumably OK at the project. Dicklyon (talk) 23:38, 12 February 2022 (UTC)

There are numerous searches that can be done here (e.g. this n-gram), but none show consistent capitalization of "Trials" in contexts other than titles. Per MOS:CAPS, we care more about sentence context, and we should use lowercase. Dicklyon (talk) 02:04, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

Support/Oppose and discussion

• Support as nom per usage stats above. Dicklyon (talk) 02:04, 11 February 2022 (UTC)
• Support per nom, and WP:NCCAPS, MOS:CAPS (especially MOS:SPORTCAPS): WP doesn't capitalize that which is not capitalized almost uniformly in sources. This is just yet another example of sports fans overcapitalizing simply because something is sport-connected.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  05:24, 11 February 2022 (UTC)
• Support per nominator. The sources are clear enough. Tony (talk) 07:24, 11 February 2022 (UTC)
• Support per evidence from Dicklyon and creteria identified by SMcC. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:58, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.