Drew, I have 'lurked' watching this thread and where it is going. I too don't believe that many posters realise the affect of altitude.
I am no expert but have been around this game for enough years to have some understanding (see Lydiard or Daniels thread).
I am particularly interested in Dr Daniels conributions on this thread regarding the work he did with the guys at altitude.
I don't have 'written' evidence and am operating of quite a bit of 'memory' here, but thought I would throw in what I can recall what we in New Zealand were trying to do to combat the Altitude factor of Mexico.
Bill Baillie had gone up to Kenya (circa1967) to run and train with Kip Keino and to see what the altitude did and how he reacted to it. I recall he came back and said. Forget times. All the distance runs will be condierably slower regardless of who wins them. He also said that NZ teams needed to go up to Mexico City some weeks out from the Games to aclimatise. Our guys did that.
Regarding training : Don't change anything we are doing.Concentrate on a high level of Aerobic conditioning.
our distance runners were : Rex Maddaford, Evan Maguire and Mike Ryan.
Results : Rex ..10th in 5k final and 12th in 10k
Evan : Did not finish the 10k (He was a 28:15 runner at the time)
Mike Ryan ; Bronze medal in the marathon.
I can recall the likes of Rex being prescribed Ferrous Glucanate tablets every day in order to assist in the 'increase' in haemoglobin levels. How truly successful that was I don't know but that became the trend with many Distance runners nation wide that year !!!
I also recall Mike doing 30 plus mile Long runs in his preparation. he used to run from Tokoroa to here in Rotorua on a Sunday morning on quite a regular basis.
Rex was also a regular on the famous waiatarua 22 miler.
All in all Kiwis felt we had done well at Mexico and that what Bill felt would happen did so.
Major exception the 1500m. I can still see the old timers (many of Arthur's Boys) shaking their heads at the Time run and the comments in how well Jim Ryun had run in that race , most of them had predicted a mid to high 3:40's time.
Many of those guys knew and had run against Herb Elliot and to see someone carve up his Oly record (At Altitude !) was something else. To have another guy run a phenomenal time and get second was amazing considering he was a 'low altitude' runner. As far as NZ runners were concerned Jim Ryun was 'The Man!".