Sorry guys, ALL you have is conjecture and 3rd hand speculations. THAT'S IT. Really.
Trackhead, where on earth did you pull the 3,000 or 3100 miles a year figure from???
And to the guy who quotes the "80 miles a week before Moscow" from his bio, PLEASE give us the exact quote where it states: I ran 80/80+ miles a week prior to Moscow. And then for Trackhead's sake, the exact quote where he states: and this did not include the warm-up miles that I always ran before each run. Give it to us in black and white.
Trackhead, besides the fact that you do seem to really believe this idea (that Seb ran base mileage weeks in the range of 80-100 miles per week often), let me ask you this: why do you WANT to believe it so much(and you clearly DO want to believe it badly)?? So Seb can fit into a neat little training scheme that says everyone trains the same way??? Clearly that is NOT reality. Different runners train different ways. There are MANY paths that lead to the summit, many ways to skin a cat. Yes, there always similarities within top runners programs, but there are also often very severe differences. So no matter what JK or others say (JK of the school of thought that there is ONLY ONE WAY to reach the top), there are actually different ways that suit different athletes. For every training scheme you embark on, it is an experiment of one, and you will NEVER know if you could have done things a little differently that might have helped you improve. And it also true that for each training scheme/plan that one undertakes, it will end up favoring one principle over another. So every training plan is imperfect. Seb's might have been low on volume, but it was high on speed (not necessarily lactic acid buffering work all the time, but FAST running), power, muscle elasticity, and explosiveness. It worked wonders for him. With more volume could he have run under 3:29 for 1500?? Quite possibly. But if he had always trained that way (higher volume), might he not have run 1:41?? Again, quite possibly.
But in the end, please do not try and re-write history.