That's your problem right in your logic: If someone goes out hard they are not just going to see them go away. They'll tuck in right behind not letting gaps form. You're the one assuming they will let the front runner go away.
The dinamics are different from a time trial vs balanced competition
Sit and kick unless your name in kenenisa bekele if we're talking pro level
Jeff Albertson wrote:
What the calculator is telling you is that the guy running 62-62-62-54 has the potential to run 3:54. It would be foolish for that runner to let someone else be 3+ seconds ahead at 400m and nearly 7 seconds ahead at the 800m. That's not sitting and kicking, that's just not putting forth an effort.
I don't know where you found the 1 sec/lap figure for drafting, but if you are admitting that the sit and kick runner is capable of a 3:54, then his best bet is to be on the shoulder of the guy running even 58.xxs and kick by him for a 3:51.
Here is the article about how much drafting helps:
http://www.runnersworld.com/sweat-science/does-drafting-help-in-runningThe other thing to take into account which people seem to have been ignored up until this point is that there is an energy cost associated with the mental effort of having to set and maintain the pace of a race when running upfront. Sometimes it can be empowering, but when you are racing against similar quality athletes, it is also daunting. Add that to the wind resistance issue, and it is much harder to run from the front most of the time.
I said 3+ seconds/mile based on my empirical observations, the research says 4 seconds. I am so embarrassed to post mistaken information on an anonymous message board. /sLol at the posters who can't accept that a race is won, it has to be won in the style that they define (leading from the gun). This is like saying you don't respect a male runner who is less than 125 lbs, because a man is someone who is at least 160 lbs.. Time to throw out all the records which used rabbits and which were set by tiny little guys!
OCDRunner wrote:
Jeff Albertson wrote:What the calculator is telling you is that the guy running 62-62-62-54 has the potential to run 3:54. It would be foolish for that runner to let someone else be 3+ seconds ahead at 400m and nearly 7 seconds ahead at the 800m. That's not sitting and kicking, that's just not putting forth an effort.
I don't know where you found the 1 sec/lap figure for drafting, but if you are admitting that the sit and kick runner is capable of a 3:54, then his best bet is to be on the shoulder of the guy running even 58.xxs and kick by him for a 3:51.
Here is the article about how much drafting helps:
http://www.runnersworld.com/sweat-science/does-drafting-help-in-running
Also, even pace can be similar to "sit & kick" take in consideration an 800 race. What seems to be holding back is simply running even pace.
I'm not elite, but as a sit and kick guy, a major part of this equation hasn't been discussed.
When I'm running behind another runner, I have a huge psychological advantage.
First, I know I can run faster, so I can relax and wait to make my move. Since I know I can't be outkicked, there's no advantage to him being in front.
Second, even when hanging on is a near death experience for me, I know if I can make it to the last 100m, I will win.
Of course, to do this, you have to know how to kick. It's not just wait and pick up the pace. I train to kick. I do drills to improve my kick.
fisky wrote:
I'm not elite, but as a sit and kick guy, a major part of this equation hasn't been discussed.
When I'm running behind another runner, I have a huge psychological advantage.
First, I know I can run faster, so I can relax and wait to make my move. Since I know I can't be outkicked, there's no advantage to him being in front.
Second, even when hanging on is a near death experience for me, I know if I can make it to the last 100m, I will win.
Of course, to do this, you have to know how to kick. It's not just wait and pick up the pace. I train to kick. I do drills to improve my kick.
Yeah, to have a strong kick, one must practice it when they're at their worst feeling in certain workouts. Come race day you can pull the last weapon from your arsenal. I'm the same way, I know if I'm riding on someones shoulder up to the last 100m I will leave them behind. Haven't been out kicked in that situation yet so my confidence is always up there. Now if someone makes a strong kick in the last 800m I will sometimes let them go depending on how much they're pressing it things get iffy around the last 400m of a kick. If they're gut busting I might back off a tiny bit to let them slightly pull ahead and I'll see if they're slowing and then I'll reel back in and pass them. Sometimes I'll swap shoulders on them to mess with their minds depending on the road race.
Womack wrote:
Sit and kick works only for long distance runnuers who have high speed and not that good endurance or overall time (like Slow-Mo) and it works for them only when the runners who have good endurance and better overall time but less speed are stupid enough to play to their hands and run slow until the end. The condition for It is not good tactics of the fast runner, but stupidity of the better time slower kick runner. And you can pull this dirty trick only with stupid runners who don't give it all from the beginning, sometime becuase mentally and physically it's much harder to run a fast steady pace from the beginning. That's what Slow-Mo always does, and lucky for him, the other runners play to his hands all the time. On the other hand, you would never be able to pull cheap tricks like that on Almaz Ayana, she forces all the other runners to a fast pace leaving them no air for the kick.
Ayana won because she was much better than the others, idiot.
well,. wrote:
Womack wrote:Sit and kick works only for long distance runnuers who have high speed and not that good endurance or overall time (like Slow-Mo) and it works for them only when the runners who have good endurance and better overall time but less speed are stupid enough to play to their hands and run slow until the end. The condition for It is not good tactics of the fast runner, but stupidity of the better time slower kick runner. And you can pull this dirty trick only with stupid runners who don't give it all from the beginning, sometime becuase mentally and physically it's much harder to run a fast steady pace from the beginning. That's what Slow-Mo always does, and lucky for him, the other runners play to his hands all the time. On the other hand, you would never be able to pull cheap tricks like that on Almaz Ayana, she forces all the other runners to a fast pace leaving them no air for the kick.
Ayana won because she was much better than the others, idiot.
You plonker, You misunderstood the whole thread. Wainker
First off, since you are talking tactics, you must assume evenly matched runners.
If you go for it from the front you will win if you are clearly better than the other runners.
Buts since we are assuming even matches, you can't get away from the field if they are as good as you.
They will be able to follow every step and use the advantage of drafting to pass you in the end.
And if the other runners are better than you, you have zero chance of beating them by leading them.
The sit and kickers are not going to hang 5 seconds back in a mile race.
They will stay close. Your tactic will only make for a faster result, not a different finishing order.
And before anyone jumps in, I will say that Centro won by leading because the pace was slow which doesn't help with drafting.
If he lead at his 3:30 PR pace, he would have been smoked by the whole field on that last lap.
Running an even pace hard effort all the way is the best.
Wasting your race by waiting for others is a terrible strategy, only works if you're already much better, but fails most often when evenly matched.
I always ran hard, and often beat people much better than me, but rarely got beat by anyone not as good. I only recall once, when there was a big blister on my foot.
I watched that race live. He made some moves and positioned himself perfectly to ensure no body was coming around from the inside and he boxed in other runners at the 3 ish lap. Everyone was just letting him set the pace and didn't want to push any harder than they wanted to, but poor positioning by the rest of field costed them the race and Centro knew he had it by the 4th lap. Ironically the gold medal was i think 10/15 sec slower (or more?) than his PR i can't remember the exact times. I was happy that he won of course, and he showed the world how different tactics can win.
Centro's win was still a sit and kick.
He closed in 50 flat.
(he was 20 seconds slower than his PR)
Hard effort all the way wrote:
I always ran hard, and often beat people much better than me, but rarely got beat by anyone not as good.
No you didn't.
You did not beat anyone who was better than you by running hard, out front.
If they were better than you, they would have no problem keeping up and passing you.
Or maybe they had a bad day or they had a blister themselves.
Star wrote:
If they were better than you, they would have no problem keeping up and passing you.
Wrong because by the time they tried to pass me, I had already beaten them.
Star wrote:
Centro's win was still a sit and kick.
He closed in 50 flat.
(he was 20 seconds slower than his PR)
Personally I think a true sit and kick is staying in 2nd or 3rd doing nothing but wait untill the last lap or 200m to go or whatever. It is unusual in the elite sport.
There was more going on in Centro's win. He controlled the race which is different. He maintained pole position and covered moves made by dangers like Makhloufi.
In Farah's latest race he also did more than sit and kick.
I think this term is really being overused and used incorrectly to simplify any race with a fast finish.
Racing is complex and tactics are subtle.
Centro's race was certainly not going for it at an even pace, which is the comparison in this thread. (See subject line)
He didn't sit on the leader, obviously.
But he sat on the pace and kicked with a huge negative split.
His race was masterful.
Middle94 wrote:
Personally I think a true sit and kick is staying in 2nd or 3rd doing nothing but wait untill the last lap or 200m to go or whatever.
Centro ran the whole 1500 from in front, which was NOT a sit and kick tactic.