Is LetsRun blind to sprints?

Sprint Geezer wrote:

Yeah, it's true that 99% of posters here don't give a crap about sprinting.

And why should they?

Sprinting is NOT running, and getting better at either makes you worse in the other.

Oh well, after all, it's not letssprint.com

I've said some of that before--you maybe have to be competing in sprints to understand that sprinting is NOT running, and I think a lot of sprinters don't want to be accused of being runners. If you don't believe me, try to convince a 49-point kid that his future is in the 800.

But go do a search for Wariner, Felix, Tyson and compare with, say Bill Rodgers or Salazar. Not as many as Rupp or Lagat, but a lot more than you might expect to see on a "running" board.

Why do you think that is?

Maybe because Wariner, Felix, and Tyson (when healthy that is) actually win something, and the distance people excepting Lagat are pretty bad at that game by comparison.

And why do you think they won't let you list the first and last name of the American Record holder in the 100m and Galen Rupp in the same post?

Well tracking back on topic i always knew Richard had it in him.... but not in THIS fashion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-G6KW0AgZXk

Race is about a minute into the video and is better quality (not choppy) like the other one.

Richard is known for his incredible "torpedo" start but in this there was no such thing. He had some insane speed endurance to blow the field away like this with such an average start.

I personally think Thompson is ready for Worlds and can duplicate the time. BOLT had better watch out because now there's another guy whose covered 100m faster than him this season.

I'd love to see him panic when 2, 3, maybe four guys are in front of him the first 30meters into the race.

To the fake "homey" posting here: 2/10

Sprint Geezer wrote:

To the fake "homey" posting here: 2/10

I think he's a spam bot.

no. Indifferent

Until Lemaitre wins the 100m at the Olympics. Then all of a sudden we'll see how much no one on here gives a s**t about sprinting. The site would probably crash with all of the activity. Geeze...he's barely cracked 10 a few times and he's already been elevated to near hero status on these boards even though he's french and he's not beaten any of the world's top sprinters thus far.

People don't sprint into their 50's, 60's, 70's by and large.

People do long distance running into those ages.

I knew a 48 second 400 guy from college D3, 7 years later, he now runs 3k for giggles, and coaches high school girls, 11:03 lol. I never thought Id see him run a 3k.

runfastman wrote:

Until Lemaitre wins the 100m at the Olympics. Then all of a sudden we'll see how much no one on here gives a s**t about sprinting. The site would probably crash with all of the activity. Geeze...he's barely cracked 10 a few times and he's already been elevated to near hero status on these boards even though he's french and he's not beaten any of the world's top sprinters thus far.

Lemaitre is hardly a hero on here. He is mentioned on here occasionally because his being world class at sprinting is sort of a man-bites-dog kind of story. No one talks about throws either, and throws are dominated by white people.

2 ez wrote:

People don't sprint into their 50's, 60's, 70's by and large.

People do long distance running into those ages.

I knew a 48 second 400 guy from college D3, 7 years later, he now runs 3k for giggles, and coaches high school girls, 11:03 lol. I never thought Id see him run a 3k.

What cave this white boy train in? We have master runners running under 100 meters in there 80's.

There's a fellow named Willie Gault you might have heard of.

There's a fellow named James Lofton you might have heard of.

Sprinting is hard work, just like middle distance done right with all of the interval/hill sessions is hard work.

Long distance runners don't want to work that hard, and they don't want to work as hard as their competition. Long distance runners just want to jog distance mileage and make believe they're training. That's why sprinters win, mid distance runners get some medals, and long distance runners lose. What they do at 50+ is no different than what they do at 20. You see that around here all the time.

Sprint Geezer

I understand not wanting to out yourself but what event(s) did you sprint and how fast? 20 low or mid 10s is fine to help keep from being unmasked.

"What they do at 50+ is no different than what they do at 20."

Yes it is, it is slower!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Seriously, here are some things about sprinting training:

First, real sprint training involves certain kinds of weight training, which real sprinters have been doing throughout their lives, and which some like, but which some absolutely hate. But IMHO it is absolutely essential to a sprint training regimen--properly increasing your strength envelope will allow you to be better aware of where you are, muscularly, when you are doing sprint drills, and will help prevent injury.

Second, sprinters have a tendency to go too fast in training--I know I do, and I know others who do. In my case, the "season" here up north is short and I am impatient to run fast quickly. That's a recipe for injury, and it happens all the time with sprinters. A big part of the coach's job is to tailor the training, and to tutor the athlete carefully, in order to prevent the athlete from injuring himself or herself--because left to their own devices, they almost certainly will.

Third, overdistance sprint training relies on energy systems that are not typically used, lying somewhere between brief and intense activity, to sustained aerobic activity. I'm talking about 200 to maybe 500 metres here. This type of training is absolutely not fun for sprinters, especially since they often run too fast for optimal training. When you hit the wall with that energy system, it really hurts, and you feel it--unlike brief high-intensity stuff where you just slow down or fail to move a weight, and unlike sustained aerobic stuff, where you can back off and get back in the zone (unless totally bonked), when you exceed in this zone, you are f'd, with no recovery possible other than stopping or slowing to a painful jog.

Fourth, there is a BIG catch-22 in sprint training: the better your sprinting form, the less likely you are to get injured; but you need to train a lot during a period of bad form in order to achieve good form, which is a recipe for injury. So slowly building up in the sprints to good form, AND THEN MAINTAINING THE TRAINING is essential, as that is the way to really avoid injury. The problem is that people take breaks, and resume training with bad form, and get injured, and then stop sprint training altogether.

Fifth, because of the injury cycle related to sprint training and the pain of overdistance training, almost no post-collegians train for sprints, and unless you can take a break in the middle of the day to train with college or pro guys, you will be training largely alone, which can suck.

It's halfway through August, and I'm JUST getting good form, to the point where, having "trained through" some injuries, I can now go to the track and get in a good training session without worrying too much about ending up injured. The latest was my right calf, REALLY sore and knotted up to the point where I couldn't do starts/accelerations, and was limping around throughout the day. I tried stretching, it didn't work. Lots of pain on plantar flexion, especially under load. Paradoxically, I decided to plantar flex as hard as I could with no load, while massaging, and it worked! I then went to the track and did 100's, making sure to keep the ankle dorsiflexed, AS SHOULD BE THE CASE IN GOOD SPRINTING. I can now train again, and it is better to the point that I did some starts and accelerations last workout. It probably happened as a result of not dorsiflexing enough to begin with and plantar flexing too much, resulting in too much contact time and too much/too long a load on the calves--which is a cardinal sin in sprinting, and actually results in SLOWER sprinting.

So bad form combined with a built-in desire to go too fast and a bad pain profile sets up the perfect storm for injury, which repeats itself, and is a drag to deal with, especially alone as sprinters often have to.

Those are some reasons why people generally don't train sprints as they age.

coach d wrote:

Sprinting is hard work, just like middle distance done right with all of the interval/hill sessions is hard work.

.

LOL! Comparing sprinting, which is filled with people whose idea of hard work is 3x200 and some starts a few times a week in the spring, to distance running! ROFLMAO!

Of course, training for any athletic event is difficult, if trained at the highest level.

I will say this, however: most, if not all, trained distance runners ARE INCAPABLE OF SPRINTING without specific sprint training.

I don't care if they can run back-to-back 24-second 200's in training all day long...they will not be sprinting them.

Although a real sprinter would sprint the 200's, in certain cases they may well do it slower than a trained distance runner could run the 200's.

Same with the 100, although there would have to be a huge disparity in the basic ability of the sprinter vs the distance runner for the distance runner to be faster over the 100m--like, say, Bekele vs the 70-74 masters sprint champion.

So just because a sprinter can sprint doesn't mean that they can cover a particular short distance faster than can a trained distance runner--but the runner will not be sprinting that distance, he or she will be RUNNING it, no matter how hard they try they will not achieve a sprint mechanic.

And the trained distance runner will never be able to keep up over 100m with any sprinter who has any reasonable basic ability.

We used to laugh at the 1500 guys who tried to sprint, it's actually kind of funny. When you actually tell them what they need to do, if they can even approximate doing it, they look hilarious, and generally give up laughing after a few strides. They can't believe that it is worth it because they feel that it is terribly inefficient and difficult.

Well it is, but it is also much faster over 100/200 metres

Trained distance runners cannot sprint without specific sprint training. In fact, "sprinters" cannot even sprint without specific sprint training. The better trained they are, they better they "sprint". Children and HS kids are by and large (with a very few exceptions) fast runners, not sprinters, even if they are winning the 100m and 200m distances--that is why their times are nowhere near the times of real 100m and 200m sprint times.

But, ANYBODY normally fit can run at the drop of a hat. They might not run well, but they can run. After taking a year off, an athlete can go to the track and run (or "jog", whichever you prefer), but could not go to the track and sprint. THAT is why post-collegians run distance instead of sprinting.

To run WELL, you need lots of base.

To sprint AT ALL, you need lots of base.

I would venture a guess that the number of older post-collegians who run well is about the same as the number who sprint at all, and that the rest of them are just hobby runners who are actually just jogging.

wejo wrote:

The time is impressive. The question is whether it is legit. He had not broken 10.00 in 2 years and now runs 9.85. I'm not implying doping but perhaps it was windy or the timing wasn't perfect.

Just like some sprint people discount the Eugene sprint times, do you evaluate this one the same way? I'd love for some experts to chime in.

Innocent until proven guitly I say. So it isn't news because us distance runners assume something's wrong about the time? He has run 9.89 in the past and is an Olympic Silver medalist. Sometimes runners struggle for a while and then they break out. Until proven otherwise why assume it wasn't legit?

Stock LRC Response wrote:

coach d wrote:

Sprinting is hard work, just like middle distance done right with all of the interval/hill sessions is hard work.

.

LOL! Comparing sprinting, which is filled with people whose idea of hard work is 3x200 and some starts a few times a week in the spring, to distance running! ROFLMAO!

Looking at the name i must assume this is sarcasm? Regardless, the post is moronic enough to warrant a sarcastic perspective.