More Impressive:Daniel Komen's 2 mile or Kenenisa Bekele's 5000m WR?

I believe Bekele easily could have broken the 3000m world record. He was a monster in in 04/05.

haha wrote:

I believe Bekele easily could have broken the 3000m world record. He was a monster in in 04/05.

Easily? And yet...

Andtheansweris... wrote:

haha wrote:

I believe Bekele easily could have broken the 3000m world record. He was a monster in in 04/05.

Easily? And yet...

....he hasn't attempted the record very much. He's been busy ruling world cross, the 5000, and the 10000. He can only focus on so many races at once.

3k is the best

haha wrote:

I believe Bekele easily could have broken the 3000m world record. He was a monster in in 04/05.

There is no way in hell he could have "easily" broken the record.

In '04/'05 he was worth maybe 7:19 with perfect pacing & drafting.

If he ever did break it it would have been by fractions. And I doubt he could have gotten it anyways. He would have had to sacrifice his 10k endurance to get more 1500m speed.

Komen was a 3:29 / 12:39 guy. Bekele was only 2 seconds faster over 5k, yet 3 seconds slower over 1500m.

Bekele was indeed a monster in '04/'05, but don't forget that he didn't even win the olympic 5k the year he broke the world record.

To get an idea of how much of a monster Komen was, watch his '97 world championship win over 5000m. It puts Bekele's surge with 2k to go in Beijing to shame.

Andtheansweris... wrote:

Komen's 3k record is the best, here is why:

Neither El Gerrouj nor Bekele could break it. I believe El G tried at least twice.

Guerrouj did fail to get the record at least once, but wasn't the pacing the big issue? I seem to recall that his pacer set him up terribly when he ran 7:23, like 7:30 pace or worse until the last lap or two. Maybe I just made that up though.

you are correct about the pacing issues ( although the splits will have to be dug up - they're here somewhere )

it started off slow ( not terrible, iirc from listed splits but not on track for 7'20 ) & hicham was frustated enough to what appeared to be to "shoo" on the pacer to speed up but who then sped of like a startled rabbit

the end result was a suicidal 4'53 split based on a slow km & a fast 2nd km, mostly off ~ 1 lap

i remember after that ridiculous lap thinking that hicham was finished

there was just no way he was going to recover & even if he held on magnificently, he'd be lucky to go about 7'22

7'23.0 was a fantastic result in view of pacing

my thought immediately after was that he wouda gone ~ 7'20/7'21 if he'd been smoothly paced to about 4'54

one of the most frustrating races i ever saw...

this.

Komen's is better, obviously, because 3000 meters is closer to the ideal race distance of 800 meters.

The further away a race is from 800 meters, the less important it is. Marathon records are worthless.

The real question is, Komen vs Bekele at 800 meters. Who would win that. If you ever want to compare two runners and figure out who is the greater, figure out who would win at 800 meters.

it's claimed komen did a 1'47tt just 1/52 prior to his 7'20

kennster also says in a bbc vid that his best tt is 1'48

it may surprise some, but komen likely had better basic speed than kennster ( 3'29 & 3'46 is some solid evidence ) but just years of kennster running 53s in 12'52+ races makes his speed look better than it is ( unfortunately there is no vids online of him getting hammered in last laps by chebbi & later songok which woud cause people to reassess his speed - the chebbi race was the most awesome finish i can remember in a 5k - if he'd been around in '12, he wouda left mo eating dust )

it's just as likely if komen was running these 12'52+ races in his peak shape, he too woud be churning out 53 finishes, but he was a guy who didn't settle for 12'52 clockings

Bekeles 5000m WR is better than Komens 2 Miles WR - it's not even close. The 5k WR even is better than the 3000m WR from Komen (which obviously is better than his 2 Miles mark).

To me, the 5k record is the best distance WR at the moment, even little bit ahead of the fantastic 1500m record from El Guerrouj. But there never will be a clear answer to this question (we don't even have a clear definition what "better" means at all!)

Here is a link to some stats which I have posted here a while ago. Maybe someone is interested.

http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=4166075

Chebii and Ryun were probably two of the best kickers of all time(although coming from different eras) and actually neither are known particularly for their fearsome kicks.

said88 wrote:

Bekeles 5000m WR is better than Komens 2 Miles WR - it's not even close. The 5k WR even is better than the 3000m WR from Komen (which obviously is better than his 2 Miles mark).

Except only 1 other person besides Komen has ever run faster outdoors than his INDOOR 3000m record world record.

The next fastest person outdoors is about 2 and a half seconds off his 7:20.67 world record.

Geb failed, El Guerrouj failed, Bekele failed

None of them could beat his outdoor WR, and only 1 faster than his indoor mark.

2 other athletes are within 2 seconds of Bekele's 5k world record.

The 3000m record is better than the 5000m record.

El Guerrouj definitely was capable of running faster than 7:23,09. He has had just one serious try at 3k, and this race was far from perfect. Still he was capable to fail by just 2,4s.

Just looking on the difference to the 2nd fastest on the all-time list is a little bit weak, don't you think so? For sure we should go much deeper (see my link) and we will get more useful data.

Larry David wrote:

The answer is:

C. Daniel Komen's 3000 record

Yes

I still believe the 3k > all distance events.

It's been 16 years and all of the best runners since then have tried it. Multiple times. In their prime. With well paid rabbits. And failed.

For ex: In 1999 - arguably El G's BEST year in terms of fitness. He ran 3:43.13, 4:44.79, and 7:23.09. Still failed at 7:20. The 56.9 for 5 laps (4:44) was run a few days AFTER the 7:23.09 so he was still in prime shape and not past his peak for the season.

If that dude couldn't do it - one would have to think it will be a long, long time before someone else can. Hence - the record is the best. Bekele/Geb just didn't have the strength to live with 58s for that many laps.

This really needs someone who is good at events between the mile and 5k. An odd mix of speed and endurance.

higher altitude runner wrote:

I still believe the 3k > all distance events.

It's been 16 years and all of the best runners since then have tried it. Multiple times. In their prime. With well paid rabbits. And failed.

For ex: In 1999 - arguably El G's BEST year in terms of fitness. He ran 3:43.13, 4:44.79, and 7:23.09. Still failed at 7:20. The 56.9 for 5 laps (4:44) was run a few days AFTER the 7:23.09 so he was still in prime shape and not past his peak for the season.

If that dude couldn't do it - one would have to think it will be a long, long time before someone else can. Hence - the record is the best. Bekele/Geb just didn't have the strength to live with 58s for that many laps.

This really needs someone who is good at events between the mile and 5k. An odd mix of speed and endurance.

Regarding El G's attempt at the record, did you even bother reading some of the other posts in this thread? It seems like you did not.

And the answer is ....

seriously .... comparing World Records? They're World Records for a reason .. no one, ever, has run faster over those distances (legally, etc). Trying to say one is somehow "better" than another is like saying red is better than yellow.

Listing one silly little (and completely arbitrary) criteria, like the stats linked to in a post above, as some kind of final and only arbitrator of which particular world record is "better" is ridiculous. How about the fact that Komen broke the then world record by nearly 5 seconds, in a race almost half as far as the 5000m?

They're world records, fer crissakes.

That said, Komen's 3k, like red, is better.

:)