Dathan's new blog post

I would love to see Ritz take it out at 1:04:30 and close in 1:03:30-1:04 or faster. He's never attempted to run one this way, and given his late race issues...

I concur,

I think he shoud go out in his marathon pr through half way and then try to negative split. If he would have done this in the trials he would have made the team.

However, I dont believe he will try this approach b/c he will want to be in the mix with the leaders.

I love Ritz and of course want to see him max out his potential but man it is sad to think that ritz's best case marathon scenario is still several minutes off of the top Africans.

Precious Roy wrote:

Dathan will be 33 in 2016. Too old for the track. His future, for better or worse, is in the marathon. Meb will have retired by then.

I wouldn't count on it.

I agree but what are his choices? If he had made the team this year I think he would have finished no worse than 5th in the Olympic Marathon. Should he get down under 2:09 he will be a medal contender in 2016.

33 isn't too old for the track

it is too old for someone who has no kick whatsoever

his problem is he has no speed, if he did he could stay on it longer

if he spent more time developing his speed when he was younger, he would be better off

instead he went to the marathon just after college and sealed his fate of getting outkicked in slow-moderate paces

I agree with you and I think going to Hudson after college and running the marathon was a mistake. As we now know he is better on the track and if he had used those years to develop a kick he might be more of a contender in the 10k right now. Hindsight is 20 20 I guess.

The World XC course in Spain would have been perfect for him.

Don't forget that Ritz was out in under 1:03:30 at the OTM. If he was able to hang on for a sub-2:10 after that largesse, he was probably fit enough to run 2:08:30-2:08:45 with more sensible pacing.

And that off of only three months of training after almost all of the previous year off and a good deal of the one before that. It would not surprise me if he ran sub 2:08 in Chicago. And about his Olympic performance, he hadn't run on the track in two years, he had injuries for most of two years, and in addition to some 5000s, he ran four 10000s on the track this year, two in difficult conditions, the heat of Hengelo and the monsoon of Eugene, and three within a ten week period.

Uncivil Engineer wrote:

Don't forget that Ritz was out in under 1:03:30 at the OTM. If he was able to hang on for a sub-2:10 after that largesse, he was probably fit enough to run 2:08:30-2:08:45 with more sensible pacing.

Ritz is made for the usually grinding style Olympic marathon- partly evident by beating Hall for 9th in 2008. I agree with an above poster that he would've done fantastic in the '12 OG Marathon. He had little training time for the trials 26.2, & just missed it.

Ritz has his best times in the 5K- but it's clear to anyone *watching* that his potential is @ 26.2. The *only* problem there is he lacks 26.2 training durability. ***And anyone wanting to say his injuries mean he doesn't have 26.2 potential- you know what I mean & only want to argue.

I mentioned to Ritz (on his blog) a while back (Winter of '09/'10?) that I thought his best events were the half-marathon and 12k XC. He basically agreed. My question was if he wished either one of those was an Olympic event, and he said he was fine with how it is now. If I remember correctly.

Sagarin wrote:

...I do think he was probably in 27:00 shape....

Then why not click-off 66 sec laps from the start?

marathoners might want to rethink the way in which they go about their business.

i'm thinking that both ritz and hall should be on a steady diet of 10k and half marathon races.

and do some 3 and 5k on the track for speed work.

when you can run a hard 59 for the half, or an easy 62 then you enter the big marathon 6-8 weeks off.

instead of committing to the marathon - then doing a mediocre half ... and going on to run a crapish marathon...

Hall should do a steady diet of half marathons or even go back to the track before doing any more marathons. Ritz should stay in the marathon solve his cramping issues and run 2:06.

Montesquieu wrote:

And that off of only three months of training after almost all of the previous year off and a good deal of the one before that. It would not surprise me if he ran sub 2:08 in Chicago. And about his Olympic performance, he hadn't run on the track in two years, he had injuries for most of two years, and in addition to some 5000s, he ran four 10000s on the track this year, two in difficult conditions, the heat of Hengelo and the monsoon of Eugene, and three within a ten week period.[quote]Uncivil Engineer wrote:

I think Ritz is capable of a sub-2:08. Just haven't seen any evidence of it. He did close well at the marathon trials (fastest last 5k of the top four, I believe), but he tends to struggle late off of a fast early pace. Perhaps he goes out in 1:04:00 since he's not too far removed from his 10k fitness.

Fixed it - Ritz was made to finish 9th in the OG marathon when he can qualify for the team.

If his 26.2 potential was so clear then he would have achieved it by now. Lacking the training durability is a major issue. What you mean is he lacks speed but makes up for it with a lot of VO2 max.

VO2 max is not a major factor in the Marathon. It is a major factor in the 5k. You can't satisfactorily extrapolate a 26.2 time off of 5k PR.