Happy 70th birthday to Jim Ryun, America's greatest miler and greatest high school athlete as voted by ESPN.
Happy 70th birthday to Jim Ryun, America's greatest miler and greatest high school athlete as voted by ESPN.
Seconded!
GOAT
You have to actually win at least one gold medal to be the GOAT.
Major fail on that one.
not in boycott meets
Altered Image wrote:
You have to actually win at least one gold medal to be the GOAT.
Major fail on that one.
That's highly debatable. So who's the GOAT in the marathon if that's part of the criteria, Sammy Wanjiru? Not saying he wasn't amazing, but there are/were a number of guys with better marathon resumes that you are eliminating from the conversation. You are asking that the GOAT is required to be on top of his game on one particular day that comes around maybe two or 3 times in a career - doesn't matter if he gets tripped (Ryun), was injured that day, was sick, or whatever. Not a reasonable requirement.
Whenever I think that I get a tough set of intervals, I always think of Jim Ryun and how hard Coach Timmons' training was. Whenever I'm about to start a race, I think about Jim Ryun and how hard he said he drove himself. Whenever I doubt that I can be any good at all, I think of how unlikely Jim Ryun was and how great he became.
Happy early 70th to Jim Ryun
No one else could stand up under that regimen, but what it produced was equal or better to anyone at any time in the history of the sport. 3:26 was not exactly run unpaced on dirt.
The "infamous" 36.4 final 300 meters in a 3:38.2 1500:
Roger Stone wrote:
The "infamous" 36.4 final 300 meters in a 3:38.2 1500:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUsEuv3Debs
Wow that was unreal! How have I never seen that video before damn
Ryun could easily prove that 36.4 300 by breaking Guido Müller's 70-74 WR of 59.xx for 400m.
Happy B-day Uncle Jimmy!
You still look 40.
No. To be the GOAT in any event you need a WR and an Olympic title.
There are several other middle distance guys with both. Ryun isn't one of them. He ran in 3 Olympics, could have run both events in 68 and 72, and was young enough to go to 76. He didn't have the mental strength to try again.
How many chances and excuses can you make?
He was an all time great but not in discussion for GOAT.
Ryun is such a trainable talent, I wouldn't be surprised if he came back to running and was coached well that he'd break all the records from 400-5k.
I would. He was done by the time he finished college. That's how it works with kid phenoms, fast to peak, fast to decline.
Altered Image wrote:
No. To be the GOAT in any event you need a WR and an Olympic title.
There are several other middle distance guys with both. Ryun isn't one of them. He ran in 3 Olympics, could have run both events in 68 and 72, and was young enough to go to 76. He didn't have the mental strength to try again.
How many chances and excuses can you make?
He was an all time great but not in discussion for GOAT.
OK, so who's the GOAT in the marathon? Someone has to be.
It is even more amazing when you consider he did all this in spite of his asthma during a time before the isoprenaline inhalers and glucocorticoid injections like you have today.
Just wow... wrote:
Altered Image wrote:No. To be the GOAT in any event you need a WR and an Olympic title.
There are several other middle distance guys with both. Ryun isn't one of them. He ran in 3 Olympics, could have run both events in 68 and 72, and was young enough to go to 76. He didn't have the mental strength to try again.
How many chances and excuses can you make?
He was an all time great but not in discussion for GOAT.
OK, so who's the GOAT in the marathon? Someone has to be.
That's really not even a debate. Kipchoge has the oly gold, is a few ticks off the wr, likely one of the fastest top 3 marathon avg's, has won multiple marathon majors, and has manhandled every single challenger with relative ease.
Just goes to show ya how great American high school tradition is. The collegial tradition. Mr Ryun was the victory baby and then dedicate his post career to public service and ministry.
Just my opinion wrote:
Just wow... wrote:OK, so who's the GOAT in the marathon? Someone has to be.
That's really not even a debate. Kipchoge has the oly gold, is a few ticks off the wr, likely one of the fastest top 3 marathon avg's, has won multiple marathon majors, and has manhandled every single challenger with relative ease.
Thanks for making my point.