El G, Lagat, Ngeny (3:43.3 mile). Morceli - 3:27x and 3:44x. You might add Komen over the 3k-5k. Kiprop 3:26.6 later.
These runners are mostly all still faster than the best today (with the exception of Ingebrigtsen over 3k) and yet they didn't have the benefit of superspikes. If the shoes aid performance then those athletes would be even faster than they ran - and conversely, the best today would slower than their recorded best if they ran in the old spikes. That's what the "shoes" argument logically requires.
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In a lot of ways, Simpson was a superwoman. Her 3:59 looked like an outlier performance, but then she backed it up by winning a world championship 2 years later, and backing that up with a number of medals in the following years. I don't know what spikes she was wearing when she ran 3:59.
Interestingly, 2009 was around the time the original Nike Victory was released, and we started to see an increase in 3:55-3:57 indoor mile times during this period. Waldrop's 3:55 record stood until this era, before guys like Batty and O'hare started chipping away at it.
With the current era, it is hard to determine all the factors leading to the improvements. Are Gary Martin and Ethan Strand actually 6+ seconds better than everyone who ran before 2010? Is a recently graduated Adam Fogg 5+ seconds better than the entirety of NCAA runners prior to 2010?
When you have 30 runners per year running faster than anyone ran in NCAA history up through 16 years ago, a number of factors are at play. Spikes, bicarb, running at fast tracks in fast paced races, different training, etc - all of these play a role. Even with increased interest, I don't think the talent pool has been a huge factor in the improved times. I imagine if all the NCAA runners in history between 1965-2010 were put in today's competition (with maybe a year to adjust to training), we'd see huge numbers running between 3:47-3:54.
I don’t know where your 6 seconds comes from, but none of the 2010 guys could have finished in 7th in an ultra competitive NCAA XC championship, like Martin did.
Huge numbers running 3:47? Since the advent of super spikes, there have been three. Even though there was far fewer elite runners in 2010, if they were beamed to 2026, there would be a huge number of 3:47-52 guys? They really were supermen.
As you listed, we’ve got:
Super spikes
Bicarb
Fast tracks in fast paced races(there have such races since forever)
Better training
You left out pacer lights and altitude.
If people are allocating 4-5 seconds for the spikes that means the other variables can provide no benefit. If not, we could have a total improvement of something like 10 seconds.
You are focusing on 2010 as a singular year - I'm referring to all of NCAA history leading up to 2010 (the indoor mile record was 3:55 for decades).
Martin's best indoor mile is 3:48.xx - I am asking if you think he is actually 6 seconds better than all the NCAA runners in history prior to 2010.
You say no stud miler could have done what Martin did by getting 7th in NCAA cross country. How about 1997 NCAA XC? Top 4 were Meb Keflezighi, Kevin Sullivan, Bernard Lagat, and Adam Goucher. Even taking into account that Lagat didn't really make his huge leap until a little while later, I'd call that a stacked race. So, what I'm saying is that I am equally impressed by Kevin Sullivan's performances as I am by Gary Martin's, and I would be shocked if Sullivan didn't break 3:50 in college if he came around in this era.
I don't think the majority of that difference necessarily comes from the spikes - they play a role, for sure, but probably 1-3 seconds per mile depending on the runner (it is well documented that shoe gains are variable on a case by case basis).
It's not the carbon plate, but the whole shoe which improves running economy. This is not important for short sprints which use non-oxygen sources of energy.
Efficiency has a specific meaning in physics, as a fraction of the energy used to do the desired work versus the total energy.
This law of diminishing returns appears everywhere and always has done.
There is nothing that supports the law of diminishing returns will apply in a shoe that favours slower speeds. Unless you're talking about gumboots.
But who says the "shoes seem to operate according to the principles of diminishing returns"? That was your idea to support, and now you say nothing supports it.
The study I saw observed greatest economy improvements occurred at speeds between 14-18 km/h. Nothing says that the energy return has to be static or linear. If I had to speculate, and I really don't, it probably has to do with the time it takes for the foam to rebound after compression, and how well that is synchronized with the running gait cycle between initial ground contact and toe-off.
El G, Lagat, Ngeny (3:43.3 mile). Morceli - 3:27x and 3:44x. You might add Komen over the 3k-5k. Kiprop 3:26.6 later.
These runners are mostly all still faster than the best today (with the exception of Ingebrigtsen over 3k) and yet they didn't have the benefit of superspikes. If the shoes aid performance then those athletes would be even faster than they ran - and conversely, the best today would slower than their recorded best if they ran in the old spikes. That's what the "shoes" argument logically requires.
Each one of those guys was doped to the gills on EPO. Not far fetched that if they maintained the same level EPO use and you added super spikes. they would be even faster than they were.
It doesn’t manner how someone trains. If a runner is 800/1500m or 1500/5000m, he’ll never be good at 10000m or the roads. No one has a range of 1500m through to the marathon. Lutkenhaus is 400/800m and is not going to run 40 mpw and become world class at 1500m. It’s the same thing for moving down in distance. Mantz isn’t going to change his training focus and make an Olympic or WC 1500m team in the 1500m.
In sports, athletes focus on what they’re good at.
Mo Farah ran a couple 3:28s, which was #6 fastest at the time in 1500m, and he didn't focus on 1500m. With a 2:05:11 PB in the marathon, I'm sure he would have won some decent prize money in road races.
If you are poor and the goal is to earn money, the choice is not going to focus on your best event, but focus on the events that will earn you the most money. The choice is going to be whether you train for many years for the 1500m on the track, and earn less money than a plane ticket and hotel and meals, or train for road races that pay prize money for a top-5 or top-10 finish. You don't have to be the best road racer to earn decent money in smaller events.
it's obviously correct unless youre dumb enough to think the previous generation is 4 seconds more talented than the current.
the easy answer is that the increased efficiency benefits less talented runners, but those at the very top are already blessed by god with peak efficiency in similar ways to the newer spikes having little affect on sprinters
I don't stand by 4 seconds for these top runners, but I would agree with the rest.
I guess if no one is contesting it, these consequences and conclusions must be true, or at least undisputed.
Congratulations, you won this argument.
If you aren't contesting it then you are conceding it. So El G, Lagat and Ngeny in supershoes are faster by several seconds over the best today over 1500/mile.
I didn't realize I was participating in your pesonal thought experiment to the point of either disputing or conceding any part of it.
I wouldn't say "several seconds". One of the studies I linked to showed an improvement/speed curve where El G's improvement at his WR speed would have been less than 0.5%, or less than 1 second.
It doesn’t manner how someone trains. If a runner is 800/1500m or 1500/5000m, he’ll never be good at 10000m or the roads. No one has a range of 1500m through to the marathon. Lutkenhaus is 400/800m and is not going to run 40 mpw and become world class at 1500m. It’s the same thing for moving down in distance. Mantz isn’t going to change his training focus and make an Olympic or WC 1500m team in the 1500m.
In sports, athletes focus on what they’re good at.
Mo Farah ran a couple 3:28s, which was #6 fastest at the time in 1500m, and he didn't focus on 1500m. With a 2:05:11 PB in the marathon, I'm sure he would have won some decent prize money in road races.
If you are poor and the goal is to earn money, the choice is not going to focus on your best event, but focus on the events that will earn you the most money. The choice is going to be whether you train for many years for the 1500m on the track, and earn less money than a plane ticket and hotel and meals, or train for road races that pay prize money for a top-5 or top-10 finish. You don't have to be the best road racer to earn decent money in smaller events.
You picked the one outlier over the last 50 years. I don’t think are too many Mo clones in the U.S.
I don’t know if there’s much money to be made on the road, but regardless, a runner cant change his range. A 1500/5000m can train until the cows come home and still not be good at 10K and farther. If he did fancy speed training instead, he couldn’t run a fast 800m either.
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It doesn’t manner how someone trains. If a runner is 800/1500m or 1500/5000m, he’ll never be good at 10000m or the roads. No one has a range of 1500m through to the marathon. Lutkenhaus is 400/800m and is not going to run 40 mpw and become world class at 1500m. It’s the same thing for moving down in distance. Mantz isn’t going to change his training focus and make an Olympic or WC 1500m team in the 1500m.
In sports, athletes focus on what they’re good at.
Correct. 1500 runners are not marathon material. That's why they run the shorter distances. And as you say, marathon runners aren't 1500 runners - unless they like being beaten.
Mo Farah ran a couple 3:28s, which was #6 fastest at the time in 1500m, and he didn't focus on 1500m. With a 2:05:11 PB in the marathon, I'm sure he would have won some decent prize money in road races.
If you are poor and the goal is to earn money, the choice is not going to focus on your best event, but focus on the events that will earn you the most money. The choice is going to be whether you train for many years for the 1500m on the track, and earn less money than a plane ticket and hotel and meals, or train for road races that pay prize money for a top-5 or top-10 finish. You don't have to be the best road racer to earn decent money in smaller events.
You picked the one outlier over the last 50 years. I don’t think are too many Mo clones in the U.S.
I don’t know if there’s much money to be made on the road, but regardless, a runner cant change his range. A 1500/5000m can train until the cows come home and still not be good at 10K and farther. If he did fancy speed training instead, he couldn’t run a fast 800m either.
Rupp had decent range, running 3:34 for 1500m while training for 10000m. So did Lagat.
But we weren't talking at all about the US. We were talking about East Africans and the choices before them after the money dried up on the track. If they cannot make money on the roads, the alternative is not to run the 1500m, just because that's their best event. They can no longer make money there either.
They stay at home with the cows. Or they go to the USA universities or army.
I'm also not talking just about 800m/1500m. Again, look at the outlier Sir Slo Mo. He would be, and was, unable to compete before 2010. But then he historically dominated 5000m and 10000m with historically slow times, unable to get within 15 seconds (5000m) and just squeaked under 30 seconds (10000m) of the world records. This is because racing at the track was no longer the important event for his potential competitors, so they trained for different important races. But Saint-Denis 2012 and Brussels 2018 showed us that faster competitors were always there, just not training to race Mo at the track. And certainly not training to break world records.
El G, Lagat, Ngeny (3:43.3 mile). Morceli - 3:27x and 3:44x. You might add Komen over the 3k-5k. Kiprop 3:26.6 later.
These runners are mostly all still faster than the best today (with the exception of Ingebrigtsen over 3k) and yet they didn't have the benefit of superspikes. If the shoes aid performance then those athletes would be even faster than they ran - and conversely, the best today would slower than their recorded best if they ran in the old spikes. That's what the "shoes" argument logically requires.
This point has been made over and over in the last several years and the shoe worshippers still don’t get it. If super spikes are worth 5 seconds per mile, Nick Willis is a 3:25.00 guy lol.
Super shoes reduce injury, help recovery, and importantly which no one seems to talk about, they make running more fun. People are training more and harder with less physical fatigue but also less mental fatigue. When a no-name kid runs sub-4 in high school, the 4:05 kid is motivated to train harder, which motivates the 4:10 kid to train harder, which motivates the 4:15 kid to train harder, etc. So now the kids who were previously quitting running due to injury and burnout are sticking around, and the fields become deeper than ever before. Every person who complains about the shoes needs to put on the shoes and go run.
Correct. 1500 runners are not marathon material. That's why they run the shorter distances. And as you say, marathon runners aren't 1500 runners - unless they like being beaten.
El G, Lagat, Ngeny (3:43.3 mile). Morceli - 3:27x and 3:44x. You might add Komen over the 3k-5k. Kiprop 3:26.6 later.
These runners are mostly all still faster than the best today (with the exception of Ingebrigtsen over 3k) and yet they didn't have the benefit of superspikes. If the shoes aid performance then those athletes would be even faster than they ran - and conversely, the best today would slower than their recorded best if they ran in the old spikes. That's what the "shoes" argument logically requires.
Each one of those guys was doped to the gills on EPO. Not far fetched that if they maintained the same level EPO use and you added super spikes. they would be even faster than they were.
And you think today's athletes aren't doping? Howman (formerly head of WADA) disagrees. He says the dopers are getting away with it today.
Correct. 1500 runners are not marathon material. That's why they run the shorter distances. And as you say, marathon runners aren't 1500 runners - unless they like being beaten.
Rod Dixon says you are an idiot.
The fact you are able to name him shows he is the exception that proves the rule. List all the other 1500 runners who have done what he did. Or the marathon runners who succeeded in the 1500. It is hard to believe that on a running site there are those who don't understand why athletes specialize.
If you aren't contesting it then you are conceding it. So El G, Lagat and Ngeny in supershoes are faster by several seconds over the best today over 1500/mile.
I didn't realize I was participating in your pesonal thought experiment to the point of either disputing or conceding any part of it.
I wouldn't say "several seconds". One of the studies I linked to showed an improvement/speed curve where El G's improvement at his WR speed would have been less than 0.5%, or less than 1 second.
You are an evasive bullsh*tter. The claim on the thread is that the shoes give an advantage of 5 seconds over a mile. I explained what that means if it applies to the best athletes pre supershoes. But you avoid that because it makes the claim an absurdity.
The studies do not show the shoes would give El G a half second advantage and slower runners a 5 second advantage. It is all guesswork.
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