this is from a PH D candidate in Exercise science (by now he probably has earned the degree - my understanding is he went to Kent State...so if you knows any moron PH D's from Kent State you may have just run into this guy).
Guy's wife ask me how fast i can run a mile..."4:30's i say"...oh, well he (her husband - Steve Hamer) ran a 4:08. I'm thinking wow - this Masters student who doesn't look like he can run an 8:00 min mile was a 4:08 miler (I get the impression this is from high school days because he says he got injured after that).
Next time I see him, I ask where he went to high school because there haven't been any 4:08 milers in Kansas in some time. Oh, this wasn't in high school - it was in 7th grade! he tells me - serously believing that he is a 4:08 Junior high school miler....after i point out that no one in the world has ever run that fast that young - he tells me more - it was in Cross country. well that it explains it - since anyone with a brain knows CC times/courses are not accurate.
but don't you have enough common sense to realize that if you ran 4:08 (the fastest time in the world for a junior high runner) that it is courious that you couldn't come remotely close to that in track season...that there were probably a handful of other runners that day the ran well below the fastest they had ever run (like sub 5:00).
and to think that you are going to get a PH D in exercise Science but aren't smart enough to conclude on your own that you didn't run a mile in 4:08 in junior high...and that now that i have pointed out the error in your judgement i wonder if this guy and his wife still believe and tell people that he once ran a 4:08 mile.
I wish i could say that is the end of the story, but he conducting a stess test on me in the WSU lab - where i real PH D person had tested me at 80.9 max vo2 about 1 year earlier (i know i said i was only a 4:30 something miler ealier - but that is what i could run at that time - my best is 4:10.9)...in his moronic version of the stress test it only last 15-18 minutes, doesn't even remotely take me to my max, he even tells me to sprint the last minute (meaning my max heart rate occurs during the cool down = this test was filled with so many error i couldn't believe it)...the final results were my max vo2 was 54 something - to which i tell him there must be some mistake as i have tested much higher previously, and can run a sub 31:00 10K...a 54 vo2 max and sub 31:00 don't jive.
he doesn't have enough intellegence to question his methods, but wonders if i held my breathe during the test - what?
Later, in a separate moronic incident he tells me a lady he has tested ran her marathon at 97% of her vo2 max - again i point out that this is highly unlikely - as most world class runner don't hold much over 90%...but crazy thing is he believes all these things: that
1) he ran a 4:08 in 7th grade (so he is the world's best)
2) that my vo2 max is 54 though i can run sub 31:00 10K
3) that a recreational runner ran at 97% of her vo2 max for a marathon.
and he may well hold a PH D in execise science today. WOW!