What is the most outrageous high school gym mile exaggeration you have ever heard?

Castaway wrote:

Your VO2 max of 80.9 is th emost outrageous thing you posted

Agreed.

[quote]chyeaa man wrote:

I'm surprised if anyone breaks 5 in a gym class mile if they don't already run xc/track...

I ran a 6:25 gym class 1600m in 10th grade and came in 4th in my class out of the 20-30 or so boys and girls (this was before I joined xc and track and got 1000x better)... /quote]

Not breaking 5, but like someone else noted above, we did the 12 minute run 2-3 times/year in gym class. In the fall they wouldn't tell us the first time they were going to do it, but later in the fall and then in the spring they'd give you a week's notice. Our gym classes were double size, 40-50 students, 9th through 12th grades mixed. They set up cones every 100 yards so it was 4 cones per lap. Oh, this is on a cinder track, high tech late 70's/early 80's haha, with most of the guys in Chuck Taylors or Nike basketball shoes. We always had a handful of guys who did 34+ cones in 12 minutes, which is solid sub 5:45 miles. Always used to surprise me because you'd always have a few smokers/potheads who could do well over 2 miles in 12 minutes. Motivation was if you did 33 or more you got an A for the quarter and didn't have to do the run it next time. I think the best I ever did was about 25, but I was a golfer back then not a runner, and I was always in the bottom half of the class. They kept a chart on the wall in the gym hallway and the best I ever remember was 38, so 2 miles plus 660 yards. I'd say those guys would have been close to sub 5:00 for a straight up mile.

Maybe things are different now in gym class, but back then 6:25 would have been the median, maybe just slightly above.

I met a girl who said she'd been recruited to a DI school but had decided not to keep running in college. It came out that we'd gone to nearby high schools, and I thought it was odd that I couldn't remember her at all, as we did not come from a strong conference, only a very few girls were good enough to run DI, and I thought I knew all the top runners.

I looked up her name at Dyestat or somewhere to see if we'd run together... the best times I could get for her were around 26-27 minutes in xc as a junior, making her one of the slowest runners in the race. I don't know if she was lying and thought she wouldn't be found out or if she was totally delusional about her own capabilities - one of those people who's sure they could have had a massive PR, and just didn't get in the right race despite the weekly opportunities. She seemed really sincere and convinced that she'd had college potential.

Once I was wearing a XC shirt of a medium sized college race I had run a month or so back. An nice middle aged woman asked me if I ran the race, I said yes. We got to talking and She asked me where I placed. I told her I won the race ( I finished, maybe 20th). She siad Oh, what is your name. I told her my name, cuz I couldnt figure out how to lie about my name. She said Im Ms so and so, my son so and so won that race. Are you sure you won that race, I further messed up and said yes, well maybe it was a different race at that college. She said Oh then you know my husband the coach of that college.

I still cringe sometimes at night. That was 20+ years ago

jerrry wrote:

1) he ran a 4:08 in 7th grade (so he is the world's best)

2) that my vo2 max is 54 though i can run sub 31:00 10K

3) that a recreational runner ran at 97% of her vo2 max for a marathon.

and he may well hold a PH D in execise science today. WOW!

Generally you post was pretty reasonable, but there's a few things we should clear up if you're going to continue telling this story at cocktail parties:

1) it's Hammer as in Stop! hammertime! (not Hamer) as you mentioned, and he does have a PhD

2) your vo2peak is probably just as likely to be 54 ml/kg/min as it is to be 80+ ml/kg/min

one would mean your running economy is quite "good" (54) and the other would mean for a ~31min 10k, it's not all that impressive (80) - it's probably truthfully somewhere in btwn

3) why would a vo2peak test need to last longer than 15-18min? that's a pretty good range for most if not all protocols to elicit a v02peak

How long will the test take? A complete VO2 Max test takes approximately 1 hour including set-up and cooldown;

however the exercise phase will never exceed 10-12 minutes.

4) though you're probably right that female rec runner did not run a marathon at 97% of v02max, she maybe ran a marathon at 97% of what she achieved at v02peak in the lab.

a) the test may not have been done well

b) the test is based on volitional exhaustion, so it has a huge ability to be impacted by the participant

c) the test may have been done when she was out of shape, coupled with a low tolerance for discomfort that day, and her marathon was after much training and improved fitness and improvement in v02peak.

- i'm not suggesting that she actually ran a marathon at 97% of her current peak v02 on race day, but with a qualifier, the statement that she ran a marathon at 97% of her lab tested v02 peak, is at worst a lie, at best a statement without full disclosure.

thank you for your time, and nickelback stinks.

haha nice thread idea. I've heard the works. My friend claims he ran a 5:50 mile and thinks he ran a 10 minute 2 mile. Haha. His mile is probably 6:30 and his 2 mile would be baaad. I know another guy that thinks he ran a 5 flat, probably couldn't break 7. Most of the exaggerated claims I've heard are from people that go running, look at the time on their ipod, and guesstimate how far they ran. Or people that measure out the distance with their car hahaha. Like the tennis team back at my hs. They ran a "2 mile" and produced some ridiculous times.

I'll follow "Castaway"'s lead here and tell an embarrassing little story about myself pertaining to exaggerated mile times....

I ran track in college for two years. I decided to quit my junior year but I won't go into that. I had been a 200/400 guy, but after I quit the team I decided to train on my own and try the mile/1500 for fun. My training basically consisted of running one mile all out a couple times per week and maybe doing a long run (6-7 miles) here and there.

These one mile time trials were actually done on our indoor track at the student rec center. My understanding was that 8 laps equaled a mile. A few weeks into my "training" I had dropped my time to a 4:36. I assumed that if I put on some spikes and got in a real race I could run under 4:30. I was interested in transferring to Appalachian State the following year, so I called up the coach there and told him I wanted to run the mile up there at an upcoming college meet. I told him I had been training on my own and ran a 4:36, hoping to improve that time and maybe be a walk on at App State. He was nice about it and said he'd look for me at the meet.

Long story short, I ran the race, placed DFL, and ran a 4:56. I basically just told him I didn't know what happened and he pretty much blew me off. A couple weeks later I ran into my old coach and told him about the whole thing. He said, "You know that track at the student rec center is actually about 180m right? Not 200m."

Right now there is a sorority girl at my Division 1 college who is telling people she broke the school record in the 800 (which is 2:02 by the way) and she's telling everyone she has practice every morning at 4am. Funny thing is, she ACTUALLY gets up at 4am and leaves to make people think she is going to practice. Her whole sorority is fooled. She has blocked everyone from my team on facebook because some of us were calling her out on her wall.

Not to mention her FB statuses are about practice and what not...girl is PSYCHO!

It's annoying having to tell random people who ask me about her and how AWESOME of a runner she is that, no, she is in fact a PHONEY! heh heh its quite amusing actually.

fair enough - but let me response...

1) sorry i got the name wrong

2) I didn't say my 10K pr was 31:00 - I said at the time of the VO2 test I was probably in sub 31:00 shape (i was training for triathlons at the time - so i don't have a time to compare - only what i estimated i could run)...the test was on a bike not a treadmill (both of my tests were - that shouldn't make much difference as i was training for both running and biking, but it might)

However, The VO2 test seemed very bogus to me because i was no wear near exhustion AND ISN'T THAT THE WHOLE POINT OF A VO2 MAX TEST - the previous V02 test where i scored considerable higher was done by an experienced tested (who had been tested a number of local athletes - his protocal seemed valid)...the second test at only 15 or 18 minutes TOTAL clearly did not take me to my max...and the woman who supposedly did a marathon at 97% of her max vo2 was probably given the same (too short) vo2 test - therefore she also probabaly did not achieve her max.

Hey the guy doesn't have to be perfect...i just found it stange that anyone who can run in the range that i run is going to test much higher on a vo2 test (i don't think running economy can turn a 54 vo2 into a 31:00 10ker - maybe he didn't know that - but when i suggested it...he didn't seem able to process that and instead suggested i might have been holding my breathe - that doesn't even make sense because you are on a ventilator (I would have passed out) or at minimum if a subject was holding their breathe intermittenly the tester would have noticed this. and of course, i am telling him - no i wasn't holding my breathe - it was because I was not at my max.

3) the reason the test needed to be longer was it started at a very low effort. IF it had started much higher, then perhaps it could work within 15 minutes - but even then i bet most expert testers would go with the longer test for greater validity. The other vo2 test took me 45 minutes and i definitely reached my max...and that again is the point - when i am telling the guy i didn't reach my max - so of course the final numbers are going to show a very low v02 and finally you can't ask subjects to sprint at the end - they are supposed to aleardy been reaching full exhuastion by the end. My max HR occurred after the test during the cooldown - why? because when you hammer a hill - you actually hit your highest HR shortly thereafter.

Now to be fair - Dr.Hammer may well be a very good reseacher as at the time he was working on a Master's. and i wish him the best...but he/his wife claim him to be a 4:08 7th grade miler - that sounds pretty bogus - and when it comes from someone who is going into a research field/execise science i would expect him to know better. If he no longer tells that story - I would fully retract my post - and not tell this story anymore. I hesistated using his name, but figured if he thinks he ran 4:08 and he did (just not likely on an accuarte course) then he is putting it out there himself. On the other hand, If he really is a 4:08 jr high school miler then he deserves some notice for being possible the world's fastest at that age/grade.

While its not a bogus 1 mile time, a triple jumper on my track team in college told all the distance guys that he routinely ran a 10 mile loop near his house in "around 48-49 minutes". Was good for a few laughs.

That bodybuilder thread is amazing! haha

I met I guy who claimed to have a 47.x, 1:52, 4:15 and 15:25 as best times. Only times I ever saw him run in person he ran a 1:59. Sad, sad. No history of injuries. Blamed it on the change of conditioning from high school to college (DI).

I also like the "story toppers". I had an uncle who story topped me every year I got faster. When I ran 5:45 he said he was a 5:00 miler in his day. I only got down to 5:10 the next year so it was still okay for him to say 5:00. Ran 4:55 the next year and all of a sudden he was a 4:50 miler in high school. Moved down to 4:44 and he became a 4:36 miler. I didn't race the mile for a few years and jumped down to 4:17 when I did so he stopped story topping me. I had a friend who's dad did this with his 800 times.

a couple of twin football players from my old high school supposedly ran 2:07 800s at a time trial. but they were very, very athletic, so i think i probably believe it

I'm in 6th grade and I can run a 2:27. Mile that is.

What is the most outrageous high school gym mile exaggeration you have ever heard?

Gym is a building, you mean Physical Education class?

I know a guy that claims he ran a 4:20 mile in 5th grade PE. He's in college now and is still under the impression that he is a good cross country and track runner. His name is Phil B. (last name withheld so as to not embarrass the poor schmuck)

Doesn't Gerry Lindgren claim to have broken the 5k world record enroute on a 4 mile xc course he ran in training? Or something like that.

I don't know what type of fancy institution you went to but at my high school it was called gym class.

A coworker of mine claimed that he ran 3 miles in 5 minutes when he was in the Marines. When I explained to him that there was absolutely no way that happened he backed off and said "Oh it must have been 3 miles in 15 minutes." While this also did not happen i didn't want to embarass him to much as he was much, much bigger than I, so I just let it drop.

On the bodybuilding forum thread, I love the response by the guy who said he could throw 123 mph from both arms.