Until very late in the season, Chris Solinsky led the 2010 performance list at 10,000m. This was a striking fact for several reasons, including that Solinsky is American - no American has led the world lists for the longest standard track event since the 1980s - and that so far he has run the distance only once on the track -- and is not necessarily in a hurry to do it again.

In fact, Solinsky's 2010 season established him as the fastest 10,000m runner ever born outside Africa, the first sub-27:00 runner not born in Africa, and with his 12:55.53 5000m in Stockholm in August, the second-fastest non-African ever at that distance. Had Bernard Lagat not run 12:54.12 at the Bislett Games in June, Solinsky's run would have been a US record. And he was a contender for the win in Zürich until the last 200m, finishing third there in 12:56.45.

It was an impressive season for an athlete whose previous international credential was a 12th-place finish in the 2009 World Championships 5000m final in 13:25.87, but Solinsky has every expectation that 2010 represented not a peak but a new level of consistency.