Parker Valby is the most talented girl in the country

No. Armstrong was a doper and it didn’t catch him.

This is a good post.

The important thing to realize is that these "anorexic" girls are never successful in the long term. They may run some fast races but will eventually crash and burn out. Yes, they may run faster temporary due to being light, but extreme caloric and nutrient restriction would eventually impair their ability to train and improve. When in negative energy balance cupped with being underweight,the body does not calories and nutrients to support both health and performance. Conseqently endocrine, metabolic and immune function become compromised. Ammenohrea, feeling cold all the time, stress fractures and/or osteoporosis/osteopenia are huge red flags of female athletes underfueling.

Another important point to consider is that most female professional runners were of a healthy weight in college, yet they still dominated. You definitely don't have to resort to an ED to run at your best. In fact, it will definitely derail your success in the long term. The anorexic girl only has being light as an advantage. Otherwise, her bones are brittle, immune system is weak and ability to recover and absorb the training stimulus is compromised due insufficient caloric/nutrient intake. She will eventually get sick and injured and thereby get slower. Meanwhile, the healthy runner who can successfully train much harder than ends up faster.

Yes ^ the massive physical (and arguably worse mental) effects for a fleeting amount of success is the worst bit to look at.

In this case, Valby was able to come 2nd in the Outdoor 5k champs which is a major high of course. Honestly though, if someone were to confront her and ask if the broken bones, time spent obsessing over food, and eventually time spent hating the sport was worth it... would she say 'winning' and fast times were worth it? Sadly, we already know the answer.

I had an injury over summer so listened to the podcast she did earlier this year after NCAA outdoors, and I remember she admitted to quitting the team at UoF for a while during indoor/after cross country for a bit after she got injured because she just hated running that This chase for winning at any and every cost shouldn't be celebrated at all imo, let alone in college athletes :(

Pump the brakes on the two-horse race line. The tough, hilly Stillwater course is an equalizer. Valby now slots in with 4-5 other potential Natl champions.

The saddest thing is the only one this short term benefit really benefits in the long run are NCAA coaches who have contracts and promotions based around performing on the timescale of NCAA seasons. I don't think any coach consciously wants to jeopardize the long term health and running future of their athletes, but there is a big incentive to look the other way given how NCAA hiring and the need to prove yourself through tangible success on a relatively short term basis goes. The temptation to turn a blind eye to shortcuts is too great.

For an athlete that is truly good enough to be a pro eventually, a couple seasons of breakthrough through caloric restriction followed by years of broken bones and injury cycle is a barrier to achieving their long term potential, and may even jeopardize their ability to become a pro in the long run. Long term success in distance running requires compounding training over years of aerobic development. Failing to provide the opportunity to stack brick by brick and making the body more brittle during key bone ossification years is absolutely a barrier to success further down the line in terms of the ability to absorb training physically as well as setting an athlete up for habits that are sustainable for long term success mentally and physically. Those who end up being pros having dealt with eating disorders in college do so despite having an eating disorder, not because of it.

Very few NCAA athletes are good enough to be pros, however. For everyone else, you might say that the window of athletic success is narrow--why not achieve athletic potential now, even if it is not the greatest for long term running success? Well the issue with that is that eating disorders at worst can cause long term infertility, can lead to osteoporosis that can be irreversible if not remedied soon enough, and can lead to a life time of health issues. Is two seasons of success at age 20 worth gambling someone's long term health forever? For what?

For a coach whose career is dependent on scoring NCAA points, maybe. For an athlete, never.

Someone needs to let valby know it’s ok to eat a burger or two!🤷🏼‍♂️

Parker Valby’s senior year season ended in March 13, 2020 due to Covid

Stop commenting on your perception of a college athlete's weight. The fact is that healthy, functioning women without eating disorders from East Africa dominate women's running, or at least we do not know that they have eating disorders and they don't look like several pros who are much talked about for that here. This obsession with weight is unhealthy and it does not help the long-term success of runners either. As for improvement, what's more likely, to improve during a longer stretch of consistent training than you've had in years, at age 20, or to drop 26 seconds in the 5000m in a year after a full four year campaign under your mom as coach at NC State? That's Elly Henes's progression. In neither case is there reason for suspicion. We're talking about running times between 46 seconds and over a minute off of the world record.

Or maybe they both reflect the same thing. The rate and rapidity of improvement, the drasticness of the progression, this is what you look at. Pros often have a "Bowerman bounce" in their first year. It is playing the game. Now if you have the same type of progression in college....

Predicating suspicion based on proximity to supercharged doping wr times obscures the issue.

I’m totally creeped out by 14 pages of gossip about me by random incels.

As a freshman, she tried out for the cross country team.
Her natural talent as evident from the start.
"As soon as she started running, we knew we had something special for sure,” said Taylor.
Over time, she discovered her passion for the sport.
"It makes me at peace, running is what I love and what I love to do,” said Valby.
Valby’s mental approach set her apart.
"It’s just a work ethic, track is really mental,” said Taylor. "She just has the ability to just push through and turn off her mind, and run through and a lot of kids don’t have that, especially at that age. So that was really the one identifying quality that she had that separated her from everybody else.”
In her first year, she became one of the top runners on the team, and she hasn’t slowed down since.

Valby has been a “natural” since her freshman year in high school.

You pathetic touhy fans on here that keep throwing shade on Valby’s accomplishments are going to make it all the more enjoyable when touhy and you go home devastated.

"She became a conference champion, and then a district champion, regional champion and then, you know our dream here has always been to have a state champion and she accomplished that last spring,” said Taylor.

That’s state champ of Florida, touhy losers.

While I agree with you whole heartedly with your main point... how, pray tell, could the sport be set up for women to be competitive while healthy?? make everyone who races take a body fat test just before they race?

So your argument that Valby’s trajectory ‘came out of nowhere’ is stupid. She has been on the trajectory of a ‘generational talent’ since the time she came to the sport as a freshman in HS. It takes training time (including setbacks) to develop thoroughbred talent. Rather than appreciate it for what it is, the pathetic ‘tuohy’s’ on this board throw out doping accusations, and resort to calling the build of a true thoroughbred as just a fast horse with an eating disorder.

It’s about that time the Brojo’s step in and start banning the ‘touhy’s’ that keep going over the line here.

What? ‘Delusional’ they won’t ban your arse? Keep it up, sparky, and we’ll find out soon enough.

Astro, give it up about Parker. It's getting real creepy.

:)