how to see natural talent??????

"""""""""""Carlos Lopes"""""""""""

...Thats all I have to say about this subject.

This thread sheds light on what I think is a common misconception in the running world. Sometimes I'll meet guys who are naturally talented, but not hard workers and they'll say stuff like, 'oh yeah if i ran as much as that guy of course i could beat him.' People overemphasize raw talent. The drive to run high mileage and withstand hard training is a talent itself, and nobody recongizes that.

well, there are several types of physical talent. For instance:

1) what you start with (i.e. what you have at face value, like 52s quarter speed doing nothing)

2) how you respond. Some people are really good responders and, even though they may not show much at first, will continue to develop almost endlessly.

3) Durability. If you can't absorb the training to be the best, you won't be the best.

The world-beaters have all three in various quantities. Seb Coe, I think, had the last two in spades plus a special mental edge. Remember that he was only a 49.9 HS 400m guy, and went to uni where he dropped to 46.xx.

Someone like Bekele has all three in spades, if rumors are to be believed (especially the one about him running an 8:45 2 mi at altitude off of nothing).

Someone like Jim Spivey has awesome face-value talent and very little durability (only ran ~60-65 mpw, broke 3:50 in the mile).

Basically, all talent isn't what you show at first. For instance: A lot of people think that Trent Briney is just a damn hard worker who has pulled himself up by his own boostraps, and who doesn't have any talent to speak of (4:48 HS mile especially). I do not mean to take anything from his work ethic, but consider that he has EXTREME durability to withstand the 160 mile weeks at Hansons, and a fair amount of responsiveness to training. Most people would break down if they tried to take on his workload, myself included. Now, you can certainly make an argument for adapting to progressively higher workloads to get to that level, but the point remains that most people would just get hurt or sick if they tried to do what he does.

Of course, all this talk about sheer physical talent doesn't take into account the mental side of pushing yourself to destruction, which Ritzenhien and Gebresellasie have demonstrated on several occasions.

1st hs: 18:56

HS PR: 16:09

College PR: 14:57

Current PR; Workin on it

omark wrote:

The drive to run high mileage and withstand hard training is a talent itself, and nobody recongizes that.

The drive to run high mileage is a passion/decision, not a talent. Anyone who can run at all can choose to at least attempt high mileage.

The ability to hold up doing high mileage or hard training involves structural durability, which is a talent of sorts.

5k progression:

HS - 21s and 22s

college frosh - low 20s

end of college - high 16s

this is an interesting discussion. i think there is something genetic about it - body type, bone structure, responding to trainig - but its still unclear to me. my sister and i have virtually the same pr's but our training is vastly different (dif. coaches). i'm not sure what that says but it just seems strange.

1st HS xc 5k: 26:06

HS xc 5k pr: 19:40

1st College xc 8k: 32:08

College xc 8k pr: 29:21

This is an interesting discussion....and yes your 'natural talent' does matter.

There are plenty of college coaches who would rather have a 9:25 guy who started running his Jr. Year of HS, and avged 30 mpw over the summer, than a 9:00 guy who trains like a D1 athlete. Coaches often focus on potentioal, for better or worse. They just hope the work ethic will be there when it needs to.

In response to the talent level at different levels. I think hard work can make you relatively sucessful at the HS level, but once you get to the NCAA, it takes a lot of raw talent to be a standout, because 95% of the athletes work really hard.

Improvement is not really a barometer of your natural talent either. A runner who went from a 5:30 mile in 9th grade to a 4:10 in 12th has a lot of natural talent, it just developed later.

asdfdsa wrote:

can you usually tell someone\'s natural talent while they\'re in h.s.?

You\'ll know natural talent when you see it.

I watched some local HS running for a while in the mid-90s when I was helping out at my old HS. A frosh girl on team started out as a swimmer, tried track in the spring was was the top runner on the team by the next Fall and eventually made the Footlocker cross nationals by her senior year. She shot to the top locally and placed well at state right away, so that\'s talent. She didn\'t run REAL fast times on the track despite lots of hard work, so she wasn\'t an extreme talent (there are obviously different degrees of talent right up to the top). She had a solid but not standout NCAA div 1 career, once placing ~10th or so in the indoor 5k. One guy ran 1:56 in the 800 as a soph before moving and changing schools to us. He was an extreme talent, but needed lots of outside motivation from coaches, and teammates to get him to train. He would tear it up in interval workouts but it would be hard to get him to go for a run as short as 5 miles (early on just bailed), much less 10. He ended up having a great HS career (1:51/state cross champ/footlocker cross finalist), but it could have just as easily have been nothing without the good team environment kind of propping him up, keeping him training for the most part. He didn\'t do anything in college. It might be a bummer for us that a lot of talents \"go to waste\", but everyone has there own life to live and who\'s to say that someone should run just because they are good at it?

"Someone like Bekele has all three in spades, if rumors are to be believed (especially the one about him running an 8:45 2 mi at altitude off of nothing)."

No one has ever and will ever run an 8:45 2 mile at altitude off of nothing.

Sorry for the typos. I know how to spell "their", etc.

MAN EVERYONE STOP TALKING ABOUT TALENT, HAVING NATURAL TALENT MEANS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING

the person you should be looking out for is not the big manchild kid who you imagine could be good. look for the kid who is struggling but still tries, a kid who will never give in, someone with guts and determination. Talent does not come with this and you cannot be a champion without it.

Physical talent is only one of several components necessary to be good and there are late bloomers even in track and field.

As a coach your goal is to create a training atmosphere that requires everyone to work up to their potential at every stage of their development. I don't think trying to segregate or even identify the "naturally talented" from the average athlete is productive.

That is unless you are going to take that individual and send them to Colorado Springs.

But at least it gives us something to waste time writing about.

Look for the kids who grit their teeth and smile at the same time.

Abdi Abrirahman ran 15 something 5k off of no training at all in his debut didn't he? That's natural talent! Hehehe, he went on to like 13:20 or so

I'm glad e- brought this up. Some people have built-in ability, and some have built-in potential (the really fast ones have both). The ones with potential might be the ones are lean, committed, and able to withstand hard training. The ones with built-in ability will be fast from the gun, but that doesn't necessarily mean they will always be better even if they do have focus. Some people really don't improve as fast as others off the same training. I have seen this in action plenty of times.

Also, how do you know no one ever ran an 8:45 2 mile at altitude off no organized training? That kid became a completely dominant force in XC off about 3 years of training.

If you think the Africans are only better because they run more as kids, you haven't looked into it much and you're just trying to reconcile their performances with your ideas that hard work always wins in the end. A large percentage of them did not have far to run to school, and I doubt they just ran all over the countryside for kicks. Farm work will not help your running much either. The coaches who work with them know there is extreme God-given running ability there.

Michael Bautista wrote:

Abdi Abrirahman ran 15 something 5k off of no training at all in his debut didn't he? That's natural talent! Hehehe, he went on to like 13:20 or so

This tabula rasa, the state of "no training" does not exist. consider:

1. the kenyan schoolboy who runs 8k to school and back twice a day. If asked he would probably not consider it "training". After all doesn't everyone run to school and back?

2. the kid who plays soccer all day every day from the cradle until at 14 yrs or so decides to take up athletics. no training or not?

3. the kid who swims age-group from age 5 or so, then takes up athletics

4. the kid who runs around all day outdoors, no specific activity

5. the kid who couch-potatoes until age 14, decides to become an athlete

6. the kid who was strapped to a hospital bed for some serious ailment until age 14, was released and took up athletics

No doubt the above examples could be expanded to a more continuous spectrum. Which point do we label "no training"?

[That said, I think 13:20 show abdi has some talent]

Don't consufe talent with running faster then other kids in the group.

It may be that the fast kid has led a more active life prior to hs( games, mountain hiking, running from cops etc.), thus is ahead in the development of speed and stamina.

omark wrote:

People overemphasize raw talent. The drive to run high mileage and withstand hard training is a talent itself, and nobody recongizes that.

My head coach and I have this argument all the time. Our #1 last year had very little leg speed, so he would always say "she doesn't have any talent, she just works her butt off."

I say she had tons of talent because she had great lung capacity, an amazing ability to focus, a body that withstood an unlimited amount of mileage at a fast pace, and excellent receovery time. She runs 80 miles a week, with most days at tempo pace. She does no preventative work and has NEVER had an injury in her whole life. No stretching, ice baths, massage, cross training, drills, plyos, etc. etc. I have great leg speed, but can't do 40 miles a week without getting hurt, even with much of it being easy pace and going to the training room regularly.

I would say we are equally talented, just in differant ways.