1968 Olympic 1500 final Keion v Ryun

updated link

Sir Lance-alot wrote:

party line wrote:

I thought East Africans didn't exist before 1990?

Who ever said THAT?? People only say that they they did not have a full-scale program of athletics and full squads of distance runners until the late 80's. In the 60's and 70's and early 80's they just had a few here and there, but man.....those handful were they brilliant ( Keino, Bikila, Yifter and many more). The East Africans have ALWAYS been brilliant, but now they just have many more runners competing, and even have women squads dominating.

Yes, and back in the day every single one of your beloved, brilliant East Africans (Keino, Bikila, Yifter) were beaten many times by unnintimidated white runners.

The point is not that Keino's time is equivalent to something better because he ran it long ago, but because he ran it at altitude. God do I hate it when people criticize a post without even comprehending what they are reading.

hells nope wrote:

God do I hate when people claim that older times are "worth" more these days, as if the stopwatch somehow slows down as the years go by. This statement is as stupid as when race directors age grade races to see who is "truly" the fastest.

I suppose if I ran a 5:10 mile in say, the year 400 B.C., that would have to be worth at least, what? 3:14 for 1500m today?

Lou Reed wrote:

26mi235 wrote:

In my oopinion, it was a number of years before an intrinsically superior mile/1500 was run..

I think you should learn the meaning of "instrinsic" before you post.

I suggest you learn to spell "intrinsic" before you post. DUMBASS

haha wow the guy who posted that needs to go back to grade school

Converted times for Kip, 3:26.6 & Jim 3:29.5. Anyone agree?

hells nope wrote:

God do I hate when people claim that older times are "worth" more these days, as if the stopwatch somehow slows down as the years go by. This statement is as stupid as when race directors age grade races to see who is "truly" the fastest.

I suppose if I ran a 5:10 mile in say, the year 400 B.C., that would have to be worth at least, what? 3:14 for 1500m today?

3:34.9 in 1968 would win most 1500s. 3:34.9 today will not win most 1500s, certainly not most major international ones. 3:34.9 in 1968 was less than two seconds off the WR. Today it's about 8 seconds off the WR. Hence, 3:34.9 in 1968 was "worth" more than it is today.

Excellent point about Ryun's mono, which definitely hindered his training. In fact, it might have been the mono as well as the whole effort leading up to the Olympic final that caused Ryun to lose his perch as the world's best miler. He may have been physically ruined by the ordeal, even though he was only 21. I don't think his coach Bob Timmons believed in rest days.

Conversions like this are pretty tricky, because they assume everyone reacts to altitude the same way. It's possible, although unlikely, that the altitude did not affect Keino at all. It was Keino's PR, and he was far from a "flash in the pan". Four years later he was second behind a guy that some say was blod-doped to the gills.

Keino's mark was #2 on the all-time World Lista the end of 1968, behind only Ryun's WR of 3:33.1 (it drops to #4 if you convert Ryun's two mile WRs). Ryun's 3:37.8 was still in the top 20 marks at the same point. If you agree on the NCAA's altitud conversion, you're looking at Ryun running 3:30 or so at sea level that day. Personally, I don't believe Ryun was 3 second better than the WR that day, but he wasn't that far off it either.

Which makes me wonder about the mono and the hamstring stuff. It just doesn't make sense that Ryun would run an awesome race and THEN fall apart afterwards from mono and injuries suffered BEFORE the race. My take is that he imploded mentally. He ran an awesome race and got his ass kicked, which had never happened to him before. Also, I've never seen him admit Keino just flat-out beat him--he always cites altitude, mono, injuries, and so forth as excuses.

Awesome link, thanks!

Very cool to see those pictures and videos.

You could be right about Ryun falling apart mentally simply because he got his ass whipped. Maybe he was such a prodigy coming out of high school that he couldn't handle defeat in the Olympics. The year before, he had easily beaten Keino and anyone else he lined up against.

I also think he might have been mentally stale after the mono and the nonstop intense training that he was subjected to. (As I recall, he dropped out of the Olympic Trials 800 meters.)

Whatever the reason, he was over the hill at 21, which was a catastrophe for American distance running. The following year, he sometimes had trouble even breaking four minutes for the mile, he started getting beaten by the upstart Marty Liquori, and then finally dropped out for a year. When he returned, he simply wasn't the same. He would struggle to run 4:10 one week and then could run 3:57 the next. People thought maybe it was allergies. I wonder what Ryun would say about it today.

My guess is that he was severely overtrained and a little more psychically fragile than most. His early years as a phenomenon probably left him unprepared for a major defeat. I also think he was exploited by his coach, who went from being a high school coach to head coach at Kansas thanks to Jim Ryun.

mmmgood wrote:

updated link

Is there a way to get the video to play on Windows Media Player.

Thanks.

I thought Bikila only lost once between Olympics.

I agree that conversions are tricky and that Keino's time at altitude might not have been "worth" the same sea level adjustment as Ryun's. I was really commenting on a generic 3:34.9 in 1968 vs. that same time today.

But you are leaving one chapter out, at least. And that was in 1972 he came back to try to win the Olympics again, and I, for one, believe that he would have done so, had he not got tripped from behind by an inexperienced runner, only to crash to the ground.

He easily outsprinted Dave Wottle, who won the 800 meter gold that year, in the 1500 trials. I believe that he was no worse than even money if he had been allowed to run after being tripped from behind. But he wasn't.

perspective wrote:

But you are leaving one chapter out, at least. And that was in 1972 he came back to try to win the Olympics again, and I, for one, believe that he would have done so, had he not got tripped from behind by an inexperienced runner, only to crash to the ground.

He easily outsprinted Dave Wottle, who won the 800 meter gold that year, in the 1500 trials. I believe that he was no worse than even money if he had been allowed to run after being tripped from behind. But he wasn't.

You are so right.

I was watching that race and was concerned from the start at the antics of that runner, I think he was a (rare) Indian runner.

He ran as if he’d never run on a track in his life and Ryan was confidently running at the back early on assuming he was safe from any tripping in a slow run race.

It was an accident waiting to happen and to this day, I’m amazed that the US team officials didn’t strongly support Ryan and put in a very vigorous protest over the incident to get him reinstated.

The protest would have been fully justified and there would have been few objections.

Had he been a third world runner of similar renown and that country had subsequently kicked up a fuss, he would have instantly been reinstated.

The US Olympic officials really let Ryan down that day.

Even more bizarre was the fact that Ryan shouldn’t have even been placed in that particular heat.

His mile time had been submitted to the seeding authority and some idiot determined that 3.51 couldn’t possibly be a mile time - it must represent his 1500mt time and seeded him thus!

I’d loved to have seen Ryan in the final that year, that race was very much devalued by his absence.

They did and it was turned down.

You are leaving one chapter out. Wottle smoked Ryun in the 800 meter trials. Ryun finished fourth, even though he was the world record holder. The guy was sadly over the hill at 25.

ryun was up and down during that comeback. He had some great races in 1972 and some real bombs. Obviously, he ahd enough of the former to make the Olympic team and may well have been able to win the race. But his inconsistency that year also leaves some doubt.