When I was in college we would be running 200 repeats in about 27 and the football players in the off season would run their 40's. If there was ever a time when we were coming around and they had just started or started right after we would always gain on them. These were the starting running backs and wide receivers. Granted we were running and they were starting but it isn't like a 27 is flying.
It's one thing to be able to do something and to actually do it. Chris Johnson may have the innate ability to run 9.6, but that's a far cry from actually doing it. He would need several years of training.
I think it's crazy to think all the fastest guys just happen to run track, which in reality is a niche sport.
Mtn Dew wrote:
Most folks don't take track as seriously as football. I would also argue that football players are generally better coached than track athletes.
Football players who have much more body fat and rarely attain full speed. I think the fact that Margus Hunt is doing so well at SMU speaks to the top class of athletes in track and field, particularly in Europe and the Caribbean where American Football has hardly any draw (while acknowledging that football, rugby and cricket are very popular).
I bet someone like Lebron James, Vince Carter, or Tracy McGrady could run under 10 right now if they stepped on the track. They're taller (longer strides) and more powerful than most of the sprinters you see in the professional ranks. A few weeks of training and I could see them chasing down Usain Bolt. You'll never get them out there though because they're making $20 mil a year playing basketball and Usain is making $500 k a year. Athletes flock to the $.
12-16-09 wrote:
Is this a clean Bolt, or a Bolt on drugs (the typical Dolt)?
And you think running backs in the NFL are clean? ha ha ha!
You want the one sport where PEDs are used with more regularity than track and cycling? The NFL. The difference is the NFL doesn't care.
Mtn Dew wrote:
It's one thing to be able to do something and to actually do it. Chris Johnson may have the innate ability to run 9.6, but that's a far cry from actually doing it. He would need several years of training.
I think it's crazy to think all the fastest guys just happen to run track, which in reality is a niche sport.
I agree with you completely. The potential world record holder could be in the NFL right now (hell, it could be Chris Johnson), but it would take several years of sport specific training for that person to become world class.
Mtn Dew wrote:track, which in reality is a niche sport.
you think? it is the spectacle of the Olympics, has more participation than football (how many people over the age of 22 play football on a regular basis?) and is done world wide.
you may want to rethink that.....
james f wrote:
I bet someone like Lebron James, Vince Carter, or Tracy McGrady could run under 10 right now if they stepped on the track. They're taller (longer strides) and more powerful than most of the sprinters you see in the professional ranks. .
Why did you leave off Shaq and Yao Ming?
http://www.nbainchina.com/wp-content/uploads/yao-ming-running.jpgchris johnson < walter dix < usain bolt
although johnson was on a 40.39 4x1
I say some rich person should offer a half million to the winner. Either would take it I'm sure. Loser pays a half million out of pocket to the donor's favorite charity. Let's see if he races Bolt then. Nobody, nobody, and I repeat NOBODY on this planet can beat Bolt in a hundred.
Let him put his money where his mouth is.
kevinb wrote:
Mtn Dew wrote:track, which in reality is a niche sport.you think? it is the spectacle of the Olympics, has more participation than football (how many people over the age of 22 play football on a regular basis?) and is done world wide.
you may want to rethink that.....
In America its certainly a niche sport. Participation is overrated because most people that participate don't take it seriously. How many folks show up for the college relay meet vs the rivalry game? How many kids dream of being Tyson Gay vs. Peyton Manning?
There are 3 college football players faster than Chris Johnson right now. He's fast no doubt, but he couldn't beat Usian Bolt at anything longer than 30-40 meters. No chance. He could juice up and still not beat Bolt.
alum wrote:
Actually, most of these NFL speed guys ran track in HS, some in college.
Needless to say, they weren't the best or fastest then so why would you expect them to magically beat everyone now.
At Olympia High in Orlando, Johnson played football, but he was known more for running in straight lines. He lost his only track meets to future NCAA champion Xavier Carter and future Olympic bronze medalist Walter Dix. "People thought of me as a track guy," Johnson said. "But I only ran track four years. I played football all my life."
CJ may well have the talent to be a world class sprinter. That said, he hasn't trained that way and there are a lot of world class sprinters that are field fillers for the Usain Bolt show.
presidentialadvisor wrote:
Nobody, nobody, and I repeat NOBODY on this planet can beat Bolt in a hundred.
Maybe, maybe not. Something tells me that Bolt is not the zenith of human speed. Of the 6 billion people on Earth only a tiny fraction have trained to be fast.
Mtn Dew wrote:
In America its certainly a niche sport. Participation is overrated because most people that participate don't take it seriously. How many folks show up for the college relay meet vs the rivalry game? How many kids dream of being Tyson Gay vs. Peyton Manning?
yes football is a bigger SPECTATOR sport. but how many people actually play football? not as many as track and field.
it may be niche in terms of spectators but not participation. and this was the original dispute, how many quality people enter football and/or track.
regardless, did not the data of Bolt running through the 40y in 4.2, including his reaction time, settle it?
no way he beats bolt.
Want to see interest in track and field? Make this race happen and you will be amazed.
I repeat. Nobody can beat Bolt. In fact, if track and field were smart, they would offer the money themselves. Frame the race with a few others and television would eat this up. They'd make their money back and more. And, after Bolt annihilated Johnson, more people would realize that the really fast people are running track.
Track and field, in general, is poorly coached and most participants do not really give a crap about it.
More quality people enter football than track. Even football players that do track generally don't take it seriously. Can you name a famous football player/track athlete that picked track over football? I can't.
Chris Johnson is a football player, not a track athlete. He doesn't simply work on being as fast as possible in a straight line on an all weather track like Bolt does. I'm not particularly confident that Johnson could beat Bolt, but Johnson certainly isn't optimally trained like Bolt is, so the comparisons right now aren't legit.
Teddy Ginn Jr. was not nearly fast enough to 13 seconds in the highs. He only got as fast as he did because Sr. was on his ass 24/7. Left to his own devices, he is merely another talented doofus not reaching his potential.
If I said, "All the best curlers in the world are currently participating in curling" I would get ridiculed. Track is only a little different.
It makes no logical sense to think that the best possible athletes in each event are participating in that event. I'm sure there is a 24m shot putter in the NFL somewhere.
Anyone who thinks Johnson or anyone in the NFL, for that matter, could come anywhere close to Bolt in a 100m race is clueless. Hell, they couldn't hold Bolt's jock strap over 60m, either. Bolt is the fastest man in history, a physical anomaly. There are some speedsters in the NFL but they would all be also-rans next to Bolt. Maybe, over 40m or less, a few of them could make it interesting. Beyond that distance, they'd all be left in the dust!
