calculo wrote:
aouita's '88 ability was also incredible !!!
in 800 final, after rounds on a bum leg so heavily strapped it looked liked he was due an amputation !!!, he ran 1'44-flat in final
not only was he fatigued after rounds for final but that injury couda only got progressively worse with the rounds, so to run 1'44.06 with it was incredible !!!
( he'd run 1'44.79 semi !!! )
even more incredible, he ran ~ 9.5m wide on bends !!!
( & that's not generous )
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkNMiXzUqcg-> route-1 time of ~ 1'44.06 * ( 800 / 809.5 ) =
1'42.83
& like i said, that's with fatigue of rounds & with a terrible leg injury getting progressively worse which finished him for the meet after this run
uninjured, in a 1-off, ideal paced 800 that day, i have 0 doubt he was in 1'42-flat shape for games before that late-injury & 1'42.0 is not generous either...
Putting strapping on your leg does not prove injury. Putting lots of strapping on your leg does not prove the injury is worse still!
There is no way of measuring the extent an injury would effect an athlete's time and performance. Often athletes compete with niggles. The fact he ran 4 rounds and won bronze would indicate that the injury wasn't as debilitating as you imply. He knew he was down to run the 1500, where he would have been a bigger favourite, so the idea he continued to run on a 'serious' injury (as you claim) through 4 rounds of the 800, where he had less chance of winning, is an unlikely decision that makes little sense.
It is much more the case that he picked up a niggle in his hamstring before the first 800 heat and strapped it as a precaution to stop it getting worse. He didn't have to exert himself unduly in the qualifying rounds (1:49.7, 1:45.2, 1:44.7), and thus lined up for the final with a very good medal shot. Obviously he had to run 'all out' in the final, and it was this exertion that probably aggravated the injury further, forcing him to pull out of the 1500m. Indeed, neither the UK or US commentators of the race suggested that Aouita was anything but a serious danger in the race.
And to simply take off 0.8 for 'an injury' (and rounds) we know little about is ridiculous.
Aouita knew the 800 was going to be 4 rounds and for the 5000m WR holder, he would have had the training base to withstand those rounds and not reach the final, "tired". As has been proven to you time and time again, most athletes reach a peak at the end of a series of 3 or 4 races.
Your suggestion he ran an 'ungenerous 9.5m' on the bends is also nonsense.
You can't even see him for most of the 2nd bend, as the camera is focused on the 3 at the front who are 12m+ ahead of Aouita. What you do see of Aouita is about 4.5 secs (35.5 - 40.0) on the bend, where he is inside the line with lane 2. If he'd been in that position for the entire bend, then we're talking 2.75m. If you watch a grainy US video of the race where you see more of Aouita on that 2nd bend, it shows he is not as wide for the first 60m or so. It's more like an extra 2m on that bend, 2.5m at an absolute push.
On the 3rd bend he is also inside the line or on it for the entire bend, and with a few strides more towards the middle of lane 1. If he ran the entire bend on the line with lane 2, that would be 2.91m. He runs less than that. Somewhere between 2.5m and 2.75m.
On last bend he looks like he's about 20cm wide of the line into lane 2 as an average for the bend. He probably starts closer to the line, but at the end of the bend he is about 30cm wide of the line. I'd say he runs about 3.6m extra on that last bend.
2.5m + 2.75m + 3.6m = 8.85m. That is being generous. Certainly not 9.5m, probably closer to 8.5m.
1:44.06 / 808.85 = 1:42.92
c.200m splits of ~ 24.8, 26.0, 25.8, 27.4 (last 100m - 13.6)
Or laps of 50.8/53.2
And this is what Aouita said to the New York Times in an interview from 21.9.88: -
''I feel perfectly fit and rested,'' Aouita said several days ago. ''I am very confident in my condition, and you'll be seeing the best Aouita ever at these Games.''
http://www.nytimes.com/1988/09/22/sports/the-seoul-olympics-track-and-field-aouita-is-prepared-for-a-big-challenge.htmlSo, according to Aouita himself, he was in the best form of his life (at the 800 and 1500 at least), the week before the final of the 800m.
He then ran his 4 races on the 23rd - 26th of September.
In the first 2 rounds he ONLY had strapping on his LEFT leg, in the semi it was totally surrounding his right leg as well! Are we really to believe that he had terrible injuries to both hamstrings?
I am not suggesting that Aouita didn't have an injury as such, but I am questioning your ability to put an exact time dividend on the injury. You have no way of knowing how serious it was and if it affected him at all in the final.
There have been plenty of sports stars in the past who have competed and won at the very highest level with strapping to their muscles. Often they are capable of carrying on regardless, except the effort to do so sometimes prevents them from continuing once the event is over. e.g. Coe in Zurich 1984.
It is also typical of you to suggest that Aouita running a 1:44.06 in a championship after 3 rounds and running an extra 8.85m is worth 1:42 flat on a 1 off rested circuit race, but that when Coe ran 1:43.64 in a similar championship scenario after 3 rounds, and who ran a greater extra distance (9.5m at least, possibly nearer 10m) than Aouita, you claim he was not in 1:42 flat shape! Total biased.
And Coe's splits were - 51.3/52.3; 24.5, 26.8, 26.7, 25.6 (13.0)
1:43.64 / 809.5 = 1:42.42
So Aouita has 0.8 secs taken off for being tired after rounds, but Coe wasn't tired enough to take 0.4secs off?
In fact your made up numbers game implies Aouita in 88 was faster than Coe ever was, as you claim he never really ran sub 1:42.
Nevermind Coe ran faster than Aouita's 1:44.06 in Seoul at least 10 times! But no, Aouita's 1:44.06 intrinsically made him the faster over 2 laps! That makes perfect logical sense. A bit like how a 1:44.9 for Ryun over 880 can be converted to 1:38.9 ability for 800m! Utter nonsense, of course.
As usual your analysis is skewed and exaggerated.
And where and when exactly did Aouita run this 46.8 relay leg you claimed he ran on one of the threads on here a few days ago?
You have completely made that up. There is no documented evidence of Aouita ever running a 4 x 400m in competition.
He 'allegedly' ran a 46.9 (not 46.8) in a training run sometime in 1981! No venue or date given or known. So this can hardly be given much credence.
Aouita ran a great race in Seoul, and I'm sure in the right sort of race he had the potential to have run at least the 1:42.8 that Cram ran. But to claim he was in 1:42 flat shape (or faster) at the start of the 88 Olympics PURELY BASED on extrapolating 2.0 + secs for extra distance (which you over exaggerated), injury (which you over exaggerated) and tiredness from rounds (which you always over exaggerate) is laughable and shoddy analysis.