Some fairly recent ones to ponder:
Seneca Lassiter
Bryan Berryhill
Franklyn Sanchez
ADAM GOUCHER
Keith Kelly
Some fairly recent ones to ponder:
Seneca Lassiter
Bryan Berryhill
Franklyn Sanchez
ADAM GOUCHER
Keith Kelly
Ritz - he's on the road to ruin, you really have to wonder what he was thinking when he left Wetmore. He hasn't run much faster since leaving CU. ~1 sec in the 10K.
He finished third at the Olympic Trials which is better than he fared before on his broken bones.
lease wrote:
comes back from injury and illness to be in great shape at the next OG,
Boy, just once in my career I'd have liked to coach someone whose career was as big a "waste" as this guy's.
Sheesh.
You obviously weren't following Ryun's career in 1971 and 1972, when no one knew which Ryun would show up for a race. The 4:09-4:12 Ryun or the 3:52-3:54 Ryun? Maybe his bizarre weekly performance swings were due to allergies, maybe due to the after-effects of mono, maybe due to chronic overtraining, or maybe due to the psychological strain of impossibly high expectations.
Marty Liquori recently said that Alan Webb had another five years to improve his PRs. Liquori himself had a long career. If Ryun could run 3:51 for the mile at the age of 20 but often finished last in races when he was 24 and 25, something was going on. I don't think it has ever been explained.
Living in the Past wrote:
lease wrote:comes back from injury and illness to be in great shape at the next OG,
Boy, just once in my career I'd have liked to coach someone whose career was as big a "waste" as this guy's.
Sheesh.
You obviously weren't following Ryun's career in 1971 and 1972, when no one knew which Ryun would show up for a race. The 4:09-4:12 Ryun or the 3:52-3:54 Ryun? Maybe his bizarre weekly performance swings were due to allergies, maybe due to the after-effects of mono, maybe due to chronic overtraining, or maybe due to the psychological strain of impossibly high expectations.
Marty Liquori recently said that Alan Webb had another five years to improve his PRs. Liquori himself had a long career. If Ryun could run 3:51 for the mile at the age of 20 but often finished last in races when he was 24 and 25, something was going on. I don't think it has ever been explained.
Like a lot of folks at that time, I was indeed following his troubles during those years.
But is someone seriously going to say that his career overall was a "waste of talent" (quoting the thread title)? Get a grip.
the real mobile9 wrote:
He finished third at the Olympic Trials which is better than he fared before on his broken bones.
2nd
It is a testament to his amazing talent if his career was indeed a "waste." I realize "waste" is a strong word, and certainly his career wasn't a "waste," but anyone who knows of Jim Ryun's story will readily admit that there was a tremendous amount of potential that was left untapped. He was setting WR's at 19, but where are his WRs at age 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26... there aren't any. He burned out psychologically after Mexico City. I'm not trying to disrespect the guy - his career, as short as it was, was one of the greatest in the history of track and field, but that doesn't mean he fulfilled his potential.
As for Ritz, just because he has made the Olympics doesn't mean that his potential has been fulfilled. He has not matched his high school dominance in his collegiate or post-collegiate careers except in a handful of examples, if that. Thankfully Ritz is still relatively young and with a strong showing in Beijing and a few years of injury free training, he has a great shot at fulfilling his potential. But the guy who thumped Sage, Dobson, etc. in 2000 and the guy who thumped Webb, Hall, etc. in 2001 has rarely been seen since high school.
You guys ripping on Ryun in this thread are just plain irresponsible. He was the best in his day and his accomplishments show it. Gee-sus.
1972 was a different time and one where a guy who is raising a family of 6 couldn't make a living legally as an amateur. So he joined the pro track circuit which turned out to be a bust and he couldn't run anywhere else. Ok, maybe not a good decision but at that time he thought it was the best. By then he had 5x the life and accomplishments of any runner and moved on with his life and, well, became a congressman. Yeah that's a waste...
AND, if he new what we know now about altitude training he'd have a gold medal (albiet 2nd to Kip Kieno is nothing to be ashamed of, I mean freakin' KIP KIENO!) and if he wasn't knocked down in the semi's in '72 (where now they would reinstate his ass in if the Olym Trials are any indication this yr) he's have another medal (gold, maybe, maybe not).
And to compare his career with Liquori is silly, one Dream Mile race he catches him and the rest of the time Ryun owned him (hey, it was a great race though).
But here is the contrast between a runner of the 60's and the professional/amateur of the 70's and beyond as we know running today.
I'd love to work my butt off, win a silver medal set records and have guys sitting at keyboards say I was a waste of talent...
It's absurd to label any silver medalist and multiple world recordholder one of the top 5 all-time wastes of talent. Ryun had several extraordinary years. The fact that he had them earlier in his life than is now the norm does not diminsh that.
Heck, why mention Ryun and not Gerry Lindgren?
obvious one: Jason DiJoseph (not sure about the spelling).
sanfrany wrote:
And to compare his career with Liquori is silly, one Dream Mile race he catches him and the rest of the time Ryun owned him (hey, it was a great race though).
Liquori beat Ryun at the NCAA championship in the mile in 1969.
I should have mentioned Lindgren. I realize that naming Ryun is controversial, but that's why I asked about the definition of "waste." Clearly, Ryun achieved a lot. More than all but a handful of athletes in history. However, anyone who knows about him knows that he could have achieved a LOT more. Anyone who sets WRs at 19-20 and doesn't set any more for the rest of his career clearly has/had unfulfilled potential. It takes a really stubborn and biased person not to admit this.
Intergalactic wrote:
How do you define waste? People who **** their talent away by making bad decisions or simply athletes who didn't pan out, which could include psychological issues, injury, etc?
Bad decisions:
Obea Moore
Roy Martin
STEVE PREFONTAINE
DAVID MACK
CHRIS NELLOMS
Elijah Kimeu is worthy of a top 3 slot
To further explain my point, I know people who ran really fast as 10, 11, 12 year-olds but is that who we're talking about here? Are we talking about people who flame out in HS, in college, or as pros? Ryun reached a very high level of success, but whether any of his fans (of which I am a HUGE one, by the way) want to admit it or not, he flamed out before his time. It's objectively true, end of story.
Casey combest. Best indoor high school sprinter ever.
Oh, during the year Ryun had bouts with mono, good point.
Living in the Past wrote:
Liquori beat Ryun at the NCAA championship in the mile in 1969.
Bob Weir
Whatever happened to Alvin Crenshaw? He was Texas state high school 880 champion his sophomore and junior years (1972 and 1973). I believe he ran 1:53 as a sophomore and close to 1:50 as a junior. The guy was practically a celebrity in Dallas, and he still holds records in meets around the state. But he sank into obscurity at the University of North Texas (then known as North Texas State).
Look, you could make the case that Ryun overtrained and may have got burned out in the end, but the man was on 3 olympic teams, that's a hell of a career even by today's standards. Nobody ran track for that long back then and coaches are smarter now. But nobody trained like he did. He took his talent and did the most he could with it.
The word "waste" by any definition shouldn't be attached to such an amazing person.
He gets knocked by non runners for never getting the gold medal, but we runners know its not that simple. Among peers he should get our respect. that's the end of story.