Claytons 2:08

It's legendary that one of Clayton's injuries occurred when he ran into a tree. His line was something like, "Yes, I saw it all right, but I just couldn't get out of the way!"

The particular run you are referring to is up in the Dandenongs. It was my regular sunday run, usually with Rab Wardlaw's group. 2 mile or "Clarkey's Hill" is on Upper Coonara Rd. The terrain is generally very hilly throughout the beautiful fern/mountain ash forests.

The other hill he is referring to would either be Aeroplane Hill or Terry's Avenue. In my time most guys inc Rob De Castella, went up Aeroplane if they were doing the longer runs. I think a lot of guys did Terry's back in Clarkey's day. I used to do Terry's on a midweek 17 miler, and go the other way on sunday and do Aeroplane.

Those certainly weren't the only hills however, just the more notorious.

My conversations with the older guys back then indicated Derek often ran his long run on saturday on his own. Usually 25-30 miles and reportedly at 5.30 pace or faster. He would then join them for 17-22ml on sunday, this was often the only time he'd train with anyone as others found his pace too fast.

Every guy of that era seems certain Derek ran big mileage, 150 -180 mile weeks. They also suggest much of it was dam fast. No one seemed to ever run with him at slower than 5.30 pace.

Mind you Clarkey used to crank out those fast laps of Caulfield racecourse in his day.Many guys finished those runs carrying Clarkey's suitcases.

Derek himself says he used to run at least 100 miles per week and would then build to 160 plus and hold that for a couple of months before a marathon. He also said he thought 200 was probably too many miles!!

About that race:

Night to Remember - Antwerp May 30, 1969I recently came across an article written by John Curtain in 1979 for the now defunct "Canadian Runner" magazine. The race focuses on that famous run, when Derek Clayton a cocky Australian shattered the world record in the marathon, a time that would last for 13 years. What intrigued me in re-reading the story was the simplicity surrounding the life of elite runners and racing venues and the reminder that Toronto’s own Dr. Bob Moore had a significant role in that historic run. To runners weaned on racing in the 90’s and the new millenium, here is a historic glimpse of that run for the record from one runner’s perspective.Derek Clayton’s recently published account of his grim assault on the marathon world record is by now part of sports history. On a cold, windless evening ten years ago in a small town in Belgium, the burly Australian destroyed a stellar field international field before charging off into the night to record an unbelievable 2.08.33! In doing so he realized his dream of putting the marathon record "out of sight" and satisfied his killer instinct by grinding several of his archrivals into the ground.Clayton’s description of the race is an interesting and dramatic one but it doesn’t tell the whole story. What many people don’t know is that tow intrepid Canadian runners also toed the starting line that night. In fact, the man who set the pace and drew the pack through a scorching 29.25 10km was none other than incorrigible front-runner Dr. Robert Moore. Bob is now a veteran of some 800 races and three dozen marathons but way back then he was a young colt of 29 in one of his first big international meets. Although advised by his doctors to quit marathon running for good due to an ankle injury, he managed to finish fifth in the Boston Marathon and earn himself an invitation to Antwerp.Wayne Yetman, also meriting an invitation on the basis of his strong Boston showing, was shooting for a "good one". But he cautiously stayed off the suicidal early pace and reaped the benefits in the final 2km as he passed Moore to grab tenth place in 2.22. Bob hung on for eleventh spot clearly a victim of his own kamikaze tactics but satisfied that he had a "bash".Here is Moore’s version of the event given in a phone interview. It includes the pre-race bus tour, several amusing anecdotes, and a few aspersions on the Aussie man of steel’s character. "Clayton was really quite obnoxious. He’s Lancashire born, Northern Irish raised and Australian finished. He combines all the bad qualities of all those particular cultures. He was very obnoxious. I had breakfast with him several times. He kept forgetting my name and I had been talking with him for the last half an hour! He was high as a kite and was convinced he was going to run a world record. He said: "There’s nothing here but bums. There’s Alder and Hogan but they are overrated." Hogan was the current European Champion and Alder was the Commonwealth champion. There was also Toth of Hungary who was a European champion too. They had the best Pole and Russian and that sort of thing. And he said: "These guys are rubbish, absolute rubbish. Thank God we’ve got Alder and Hogan because I’m going to smash these guys good. I want someone good in the field so it looks good."Before the race Hogan (he’s one of these Irishmen whose every second word is - - - - ) had quite an animated conversation with Clayton. We were going round in a bus before the start. He was very perturbed because he thought the course might be long. Clayton was talking to Hogan and Alder and he was saying: " I’m glad you guys are here because I’m going to smash you into the ground. I think I can run a world record. I’ve just come from Ankara in turkey where I ran 2.17 and it was a breeze and I think I can go under 2.10." Alder said: "I don’t give damn about world records. I would rather win the Olympic gold even if I ran 2.30. I reckon that nobody remembers who holds world records. Everybody forgets them almost as soon as they’re made." Clayton said: " Well I’m going to run the world record anyway and I bet you’re wrong. People will remember my world record. You won the Commonwealth Games but they won’t remember you. They’ll remember my world record." So Alder says: "You’re just ------," And Hogan said, "You’re just a - - - - bastard." The mini-bus was full of athletes. They were listening open-mouthed. They were hanging on every word. The start was really quite primitive. Little villages around Toronto have better stadiums. All you could do was urinate against a wall. The track was beaten earth. So we stomped around. I felt good and said to myself: "Just run as the spirit moves you." As we headed out of the stadium I thought it was bit slow so I took the lead. And I thought: "Well, here goes nothing. Maybe I’ll stick, maybe I won’t I just don’t know." I led through 5k and 10km. I was quite staggered by the 10km because I had never run anything like it before.Clayton passed me around 12km. By 15km (45.20) Toth, Alder and Hogan were with me. I was in fifth, I was still fifth at 20km (63.00). At 20 miles I was sixth. I finally finished eleventh.There was a huge crowd of cyclists following the course. Running fifth I just couldn’t get through. So I was hitting their buttocks and saying, "Get out of my way, you bastards!" and thumping my way through the pack.In those days it was fashionable not to drink during the race. So I didn’t, except at 20 miles where I said, "Oh, hell I’ve blown this. This is too bad, so I’ll take a drink. And I took the drink and poured it over myself because I didn’t feel that thirsty¼. It was hot Ovaltine! It stained all my running gear. I never wore it again. I was staggered! I had to run along holding the vest away from my body because it was so hot!What happened after the race was another funny thing. I had finished. There was Wayne and I and quite a few others just left stranded. There were no busses. Nobody gave a hoot. It was two miles to the hotel. We were penniless. We hadn’t 10 cents in our pockets. The British all piled into a car and left. Clayton has someone meet him and left. Wayne and I were shivering and cold so we gatecrashed a party. It was going on at a house near the stadium. The lights were on so I said, "Come on Wayne, here goes nothing." The people in there were very polite. We never found out what the party was about. They gave us drink and something to eat. It was as if some naked people were to walk into a church. People would pretend they weren’t there. We just had shorts on. The people said "Oh hello."After awhile I said to Wayne: "OK I think we know the way back. We feel better now don’t we?" So we walked back to the hotel. Wayne and I couldn’t sleep. At one o’clock in the morning he comes thumping on the door and said: "Can you sleep?" And I said "No" He said; "Oh I can’t either, let’s go out for a walk. So we walked down the main street, which was totally deserted¼ And up coming up the other way were the three British runners and their coach. We all went into a bar at half past one in the morning. We sat there until about three o’clock just talking and drinking and generally having a good time. We were the only people in the place..."

Brilliant stuff, HRE, thanks for sharing...

As for Clarkey and his Caulfield race course training, here's what he told us...

He did a lot of his tempo running at Caulfield race course,

where he would go after working a full day as an accountant. Caufield race course was an all-grass horse racing track, which Clarke said was a great place to run.

He said it was a mile and a quarter and 100 yards around, so a little over 2K., for those of us who think metric...

His usual run there was 10 laps, so about 13 miles or 21 K. or something like that. He said he always felt that he was in control of those runs, but when he felt good, they were very fast. At his peak, there was virtually no-one in the World that he wouldn't break on those runs.... And then on Thursday, he and Clayton would have a 17 mile flat out "road-race", as Clarke called it...

Man, those were the days...I am so glad I got to meet Ron, and listen to his stories first-hand...

You did something I've always wanted to do. Clarke is at the top of runners I'd like to meet.

Well worth the experience, if you ever get the chance.

In the interim, you should try and get hold of DST in Guelph, and get a listen to those audiotapes. As I said, they are old and scratchy, but the immense mental strength of Clarke is very evident in his stories, and I would suggest very instructive for our younger runners...

Here's 1 more quick story from Ron Clarke (directly told).

He had been racing in Europe for about a month, and made the long plane ride(s) back to Australia, and on the same evening he arrived home from that, he was scheduled to have a go at the World 10 Mile Record on the Track. He also mentioned that he hadn't seen his wife for a month, so.....and then he smiled, and his wife smiled - she was also there listening. Apparently, they got "re-acquainted".

Then he got a call from the Race Organizer, and he said the race was off, because the weather had turned very bad, stormy or whatever.

So Clarke had a bunch of food, which included a couple of bowls of Jello, which he said he really enjoyed...

Then the Race Organizer called back, and said the weather had cleared, so the race was back on again...

So Clarke went over, and set the World 10 Mile Record that night, within the same day that he had travelled back from Europe, shared some quality time with his wife, and ate a big meal...

Then he said, if you check the splits, you will notice there was 1 very slow lap in the middle, he smiled and said the Jello was re-occurring on him...Digestive issues apparently.

But that's what the man was made of --- no b.s., just let's go...

This story was triggered by a question from the audience in Vancouver, where a coach was saying that his athletes seem to not be to able to race well after travelling...

Clarke's response was typically blunt and to the point....

He said he reckoned that was a flat-out excuse, and representative of some sort of mental weakness, and shouldn't be tolerated. He then said, sure you will feel a bit different after travel, with the time zones and all, but that's JUST A FEELING IN YOUR BODY, nothing that you should not be able to overcome...He said surely, if you can run 13:20 for the 5K before you left, then you should be able to run at least that fast when you arrive...

Your fitness hasn't changed - you just need to be mentally stronger.... Wow ! Needless to say, I was impressed...

there is some good stuff on clarke's training here

http://forums.glenhuntly-athletics.com/index.php?showtopic=53

Thanks for the Clarkey stuff rsb.

Here's a question:

As an athlete and an aspiring coach, I went out of my way to find as many people as possible, that had success at any level in the sport, to get advice and provide insight. This led to friendships, contact, correspondence and info from such greats as Percy Cerutty, Chicks Hensley, Albie Thomas, Pat Clohessy, Remy Korchemny, Ron Clarke, Rod Dixon, Lorraine Moller, and many more. I simply could not get enough info from these great people. It seems that many of you are the same. The lessons that they can teach are unlimited. And yet, when I tried to get some of todays distance runners to listen to them or to seek them out, I was almost uniformally rebuffed or told that they were no longer relevant. A typical comment was offered when we lined up Kenny Moore and Lorraine to talk to our top marathoners a few years back. "Why should we listen to a guy that ran 2:11 when we need to run 2:06?"

What can be done to change this scenario?

Excellent point, Ray. When I was a young coach, I did the same --- sought out opinions from the best coaches and athletes I could find, and tried to consider which to incorporate into my own style and approach to coaching distance runners. I was fortunate enough to have support from B.C. Athletics, so we were able to bring many of these people to Vancouver & Victoria to speak to large groups of athletes and coaches. This would have been in the late 70's/early 80's, and the results from B.C.-based runners during the 1980's and early 1990's speak volumes about what the coaches and athletes learned from the best in the World.

Within a few year period, we listened to coaches as Arthur Lydiard, Harry Wilson, Peter Schmidt (Wessinghage's coach), Luis de Oliviera, and others I have probably missed. I have spoken directly on several occasions with Ron Clarke, John Walker, Rod Dixon, Grete Waitz, Lorraine Moller, Thomas Wessinghage, Steve Scott, as well as all the great Canadian runners and coaches from that era, and I tried to learn a bit from all of them...

I was also fortunate enough to attend the European Distance Coaches in Congress in Portugal one year, and spent several days (and late evenings in the Pub) talking to many of the World's top distance running coaches.

I clearly remember sitting at the same table in the pub. with Harry Wilson, Peter Coe, John Anderson (Moorcroft's coach), and a couple of others, and it was so much fun listening to the British coaches go at each other. Harry Wilson (may he RIP), loved to "tweak" Peter Coe - Harry had a wonderful sense of humour - great man, and great coach.

Anyways - back to the question. I can't directly answer your question. I can only point to the time when all the top coaches and distance runners in British Columbia were directly exposed to all those wonderful Coaches and Runners who had already proven how to be Top of the World, and everybody listened to their every word...

The Runner's World Week in San Francisco each year was also wonderful - a panel discussion on training and racing with the likes of Ron Clarke, John Walker, Brendan Foster, Frank Shorter, Grete Waitz and others willing to share their knowledge? How good was that?

Is anybody doing that kind of stuff anymore?

Sorry to be posting so much, I just have a bit of time now, and find this topic to be very interesting. I hope you do too.

One more Ron Clarke story for now.

I was interviewing Ron, in front of the audience in Victoria, and trying to get all the information I could about his training and his mileage.

He said he thought it was really important to find a balance of quality and volume in your training week that you could maintain without breaking down. Then he said for him, that was about 70 to 80 miles a week.

I was a bit taken aback, because I already knew he did more than that. So, I asked for clarification. He said that was only his main session, he didn't count his morning mileage. He said it was just a health and wakeup jog for him, and he thought counting it as training was not okay. So 5-7 miles, at least 5 mornings a week, which he didn't count.

The next morning He and I (and his son Marcus and a few local athletes) went for one of those "health and wakeup jogs". Now this was 10 years after he had finished his competitive career, and we were "jogging" along on the morning run at around 6:30/mile. So you can extrapolate that the 30 or so miles he ran in the mornings, when he was really fit, and which he didn't count, were probably in the range of 5:30- 6:00/mile. He said that was probably about right. Afternoon runs were always well under 5 minutes/mile, he said...

On that run, one of the athletes I was coaching, Debbie Scott, was having a good morning run, and charged ahead with Marcus Clarke, who was very fit at the time. I told Ron that Debbie was getting ready to head off for the World Cross-Country Championships soon. He said she looked good, and could come top 10. She came 8th, so Ron knew the sport pretty damn well...

Great stuff. This "sandbagging" of AM runs seems to be an Old School thing (Coes being perhaps among the bigger examples?). Can't tell if it's an Anglo cultural thing, a competitive thing, or some kind of mental thing to minimize the overall stress?

Interesting that Clayton, Clarke and Snell were all pretty meaty fast guys who hammered training runs a lot, and now Solinsky seems to be doing similar training...

On that exact topic, Clarke said he didn't count the morning mileage, because he wanted to just concentrate on what called "the main session", and he thought that was what really counted in getting fit. He said too many runners, in his opinion, were getting mixed up by doing 5 miles in the morning, and 5 miles in the evening, and counting it as a 10 mile day. Which Ron said was a totally different thing that running a solid 10-Miler...

I get it. He wanted to emphasize quality as well as, or more than, the quantity, of which there was plenty. I do the same thing using an "intensity" rating in addition to mileage, so I can gauge the training stress/benefit of each workout, as well as the longer time frame. So if I do a 70 mile week with an intensity aggregate of 21, that is different, and probably harder than, an 85 mile week with an intensity of 16. Depending on the overall plan, each has their place.

rsb wrote:

On that exact topic, Clarke said he didn't count the morning mileage, because he wanted to just concentrate on what called "the main session", and he thought that was what really counted in getting fit. He said too many runners, in his opinion, were getting mixed up by doing 5 miles in the morning, and 5 miles in the evening, and counting it as a 10 mile day. Which Ron said was a totally different thing that running a solid 10-Miler...

Very interesting. I have used a "perceived effort" scale in the coaching of distance runners for a long time, and had some reasonable success with it...I believe that when an athlete and a coach are really connected and in tune, "perceived effort" (and feedback afterwards) is as accurate or more so than any other more "scientific" measuring tool.

ray,

You see this sort of thinking here at LR all the time when people argue that Ryan Hall is a better marathoner than Shorter or Rogers were or Webb is a better miler than Ryun because he has a faster PR. I think it's a result of the over emphasis on times rather than placings in the sport today. Were I speaking to the people claiming that Moore is irrelevant I'd ask how many of them have already run 2:11 or even made an Olympic team let alone placed fourth in an Olympics.

rsb,

Don't apologize for posting. It's great stuff.

HRE,

I agree and it is one of the reasons that we are not running to the level we should be. Another guy that taught me a decade worth of lessons in just a few short visits and letters was Fred Wilt. Again, runners and some coaches who were a part of those discussions claimed Fred had "lost it" when in fact, everything he had to offer made great sense.

As a side note, I worked for Ron Clarke in Australia for a couple of years. I think he was coping with heart problems at the time. Marcus had moved onto Aussie Rules and was getting away from running comp. The focus in our discussions then waas what Deek was doing at the time.

ray wrote:

As a side note, I worked for Ron Clarke in Australia for a couple of years. I think he was coping with heart problems at the time. Marcus had moved onto Aussie Rules and was getting away from running comp. The focus in our discussions then waas what Deek was doing at the time.

Ray, I've read that Ron thought that one of Deek's marathon wins, Commonwealth Games in very hot conditions I think, was the greatest marathon run up to that point in time. I've also read that Ron felt that Clayton would have won the '68 Olympic Marathon had the race not taken place at altitude.

Did Ron ever give any indication which runner he thought was superior?

It's been awhile, but I recall ron saying Clayton was an "animal". I can't add anything to the comments already written about him here. I do remember ron being very excited about Deek as a bearded Charles Manson looking runner just out of the junior ranks winning the PCG 10km I believe. He saw great things to come and then we all saw that in the fukuoka win in 2:08.18. the thing about Brisbane in '82 was not only the heat and humidity but it was a pretty hilly course. Shihanga and Ikanga went out at WR pace with Deek sitting patiently in the next group. The entire country watched on live TV as their "mate" Deek narrowed the gap and captured the victory 2:09.18 to 2:09.30. For what it meant to the country at that time, the course, the conditions, etc I believe Clarke was right in saying it was the most impressive marathon up to that point. See an article on it here:http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1126019/2/index.htm