Georgia Bell: most talented mid distance runner or most obvious doper at the Olympics. Which is it?

I dont think she'll ever come close to her 3.52 ever again. I wont be surprised at all if she never breaks 4.05.

I don't understand the diagram but today a Brit who couldn't break 16 for 5k 2 years ago ran a 2.11 marathon so the English genes may be better.

Who was this?

George James. He has been a runner for many years though.

Frankfurt Marathon, you can sleuth around

Like Shelby

I'm surprised that more isn't being made of this. I looked up his running results on the UK database, his 16.00 5k is on a very hilly course in fairness. But even so, running 2.11 is worlds away. There is nothing else in his history to suggest he's capable of anything like this. It does not pass the sniff test at all.

Your comment made me curious so I looked his history up as well and linked it below. He's done a lot more than just the 16:00 5K over the years and has been running for a long time, but he did make an enormous leap in recent years.

'A lot more'? Barely. He ran 2.14 at London this year, itself a huge anomaly in his running career, then 6 months later he lops 3 minutes off that. 'Enormous' doesn't begin to explain that sort of progression.

If anything his listing in the UK database makes it look more strange. He's been running for a long time because he had some youth times listed, though none of them suggest near elite talent level. And then besides that, there's barely any races. Look at people who have run similar times and they will have entries that have 100+ results in them.

His best results in the younger age groups. If, in UK, you go down the levels from National - Area - County - Club then at each of these levels he sat somewhere on the edge of club to county - and in Surrey I'd say County Level was above him. Whatever level of untapped talent he may have had hidden away for so many years, how that gets him in 2 years from a 16.00 (hilly) parkrun to 2.11 must be the most remarkable progression in UK long distance history. We don't know the training background but we could draw a contrast between this amazing 2 year advance and the 6 months from Feb to Aug 2022 where the Feb XC result looks about like the low 16 min park runs. And the result of
3MiLes 14:47 Wimbledon Surrey County AA Road Relays 4 Sep 21 is I think for a known short 3 miles though runners in Surrey clubs might know about this.

Would be interesting to hear from his training group and running partners on how they have seen this transformation.

Georgia Bell did win the Under 15 English schools 800m and her time at that age was faster than Keely Hodgkinson, Phoebe Gill and Jemma Reekie. What is interesting is how many other girls where faster than all of them but never progressed usually having given up the sport

Georgia was in the group of juniors when I just started training as a coach. At the time Georgia and one other girl were setting the pace on all the sessions and it was a mixed group. I was not the coach and the other girl looked like a future sub 2 800m. I did an 8 x 300m session and this confirmed my thoughts. However, the coaches were pushing her into longer distances, eventually she switched to sprinting the quit and took up football.

Anyway Georgia has the edge in training sessions as had better endurance. The point is she was always very talented.

Its not like she ran at a good level for years then suddenly improved. She took years off switched to duathlon won the world championships then returned and only went full time this year

I would still think the level of improvement too good to be true but there is no association with any dodgy agents or coaches. In her career she was a high flyer having attended Berkeley and working as a cyber consultant

That certainly sounds like Georgia has the natural talent to have reached the level she has done. Sounds like she actually has more talent than Keely. I am certainly less suspicuous.

What's a shame is that so many of her peers dropped out. Was Kelly Holmes not a role model any more? Hopefully with this current crop getting global stardom, the new generation will be inspired to keep at it and not switch to footy or cybersecurity

There never will be an unrealistic progression to some on these threads. There's always a justification - but it isn't doping.

Are we still on this topic two months later?!

Georgia Bell, while clearly an obvious doper in this year's Olympics, does indeed have some degree of athletic ability/skill/talent, and couldn't have run 3:52 on dope without that ability/skill/talent. But she doesn't come close to running 3:52 without doping.

Huh, interesting to see his profile. I ran in both of those Surrey League races he did in 2021-22, both were hard courses and crazy muddy. Based on where I was at the time, his 30:02 in Nov 21 (course was 8.7k, 190m elevation, very bad footing) is probably worth about 31-low / 31-mid for a fast road 10K. I know that doesn't get you to 2:11 but it's also a bit different than a 16:00 5k.

Every one of these runners have an unrealistic progression; I guess you assume every single one of them is on drugs.

I didn't read it because it wasn't my point, which was that to some fans there is NEVER an unrealistic progression.

Sure, the 16.00 at Mole Valley is clearly worth a lot more on a flat course. But as you say, that's still not in the same league as 2.11 (a 31.00 10k is broadly equivalent to 2.23 marathon).

Even running 2.14 in London and then 6 months later running 2.11 is crazy. What changed? If this was a pro then all kinds of questions would rightly be asked.