LRC wrote:
Nearly everyone agrees that improving the drafting, reducing the number of turns, getting optimal weather, etc. won't put Eliud Kipchoge at sub-2 hours in his record attempt. It's only possible if the shoes he's wearing have revolutionized the way people run.
So the world is going to watch to see the following, 'Can an external aid that no one else has access to put him under 2?'
For our reaction to that question, let us paraphrase what the great coach Colm O'Connell said to use when we talked to him in March about the sub-2 exhibition, 'So what?'
That's not sport. Everyone should have learned from the doping scandals over the last 40 years that it's not sport if you achieve mainly because you have access to an external aide that few others have access to. Sport is supposed to be about who has the most talent, works the hardest or smartest, etc. not about who has access to and/or whether our sports equivalent of a 'cheat code' in a video game actually works.
So Eliud, you are one of our favorite athletes but tonight we are rooting against you. The sub-2 hour marathon, if it ever happens, should be one of the most celebrated achievements in the history of sports, not another performance enhanced mark that needs an asterisk.
Just don't do it.