When you stop and think about it, it's a bit strange that Europeans and Americans are always organizing races for East Africans to win. What do East Africans organize?
It really erks people that tall people play basketball, small people are jockeys, heavy people are sumo wrestlers etc. When Africans are involved broadly in sport, it has be made into an issue.
They threw up the occaisional star like Bikile and Kieno in the 60's when they had the advantage of being full-time athletes when the rest of the world were amateur part-timers and forced to retire by age 25 (22 in the case of Herb Elliott), but they were far from dominant, despite distance running being the only sport that any young sportsman could make money from, and the greatest stars from that period were non-African. Jim Ryun was better than Keino. Steve Ovett was better than Henry Rono even at Rono's distance of two miles.
Before 1988 or so, no Kenyan sniffed the top 300 marathon all time list, and there were more Japanese than Ethiopians in it. Only with the advent of EPO did Kenyans start to dominate.
So why bring genetics into it?
Why bring genetics into it? The East African advantage is environment. And bodyweight.
Environments select genes. Genes code for bodyweight.
There are white people who are built like East Africans
I haven't seen any.
There are and there may even be a few who have that build and are born and raised at altitude, but they probably think they are unathletic and have never even given running a try. Or they did and they don't like it. In East Africa, everyone who has the build gives running a try cause it's a viable lucrative field. It's like going to law school cause you're not sure what else to do.
Gidey hated running in school and got in trouble for not doing it (I guess, like a gym class?).But people kept pushing her into it. I mean, a lot of boys and girls have slight frames in America and they just dislike running but no one's going to encourage them to keep with it. And the Ethiopian typical build is not as birdlike as the Kenyan build, so I think it's accessible.
You ever see a white dude hurdle the entire water pit at the end of steeplechase?
Reigning world and Olympic champ in the steeple is a white guy. Hurdling the water pit makes no sense, it indicates lack of technique rather than some great accomplishment.
There are and there may even be a few who have that build and are born and raised at altitude,
There are people who were raised a altitude all over the world who don't excel at running. In fact even in Kenya 85% of the population is not Kalenjin and they don't excel at running. Only those coming from Kalenjin tribes excel at long distance running.
Build and altitude is not requisite for running success.
Most people in America with slim builds are not athletic -- they are drug addicts.
Because genetics are real. Science has shown (as has experience) that certain traits are adapted for certain activities. For example, it is easier for taller people to dunk a basketball. There are exceptions, but being tall is a genetic advantage when you are trying to touch things that are high up off the ground. Is this clear to everyone?
As phenotypes are reflected in certain populations around the globe, certain sub-groups of humanity have adapted to certain activities (such as heat retention or heat dispersal). These traits are not equally shared by all phenotypic groups. Groups with more of a certain trait (as a % of population) are said to be at an advantage.
Why is this even a debate on this website? Does anyone have a hard time understanding this? This is like the third thread this month about "is talent real" or "does body-type matter" and so on. It sort of seems like a "duh" level question for people to be asking (unless the OP is a kid).
Well thanks for the "duh" level science brofessor. Now explain why Jakob Ingebrigtsen doesn't fit your model?
Nobody said that there are no great white runners, you're trying to debunk a strawman argument. However, Jakob currently sits at 8th all-time in the 15th. All 7 guys in front of him are from Africa. There are fast white and other non-African runners, but significantly fewer. Despite having much less opportunities, Africa has an all-but monopoly on distance running, and genes have a huge role. The percentage of gene variants related to running fast is just higher in certain African populations than others around the world.
Sure, I can do that. Jakob and Centro and many other people are also suited to running fast. Ryan Hall for example, is well suited to the marathon. I never said only one sub-population on Earth is suited to running elite times. But within their communities, Hall, Centro, and Jakob are freakishly rare outliers. Kiplimo, on the other hand, is not a "total mutant" among his cousins and peers. In his society, there are many people like him (genetically speaking).
My observation was (and science has shown) that certain groups are over-represented relative to their % of the human population. For example, one ethnic group near the Great Rift might be over-represented in distance running (Kalenjin). They aren't the only people who are good at running, but they are MASSIVELY out-performing their odds, statistically speaking. They equal less than 0.1% of humanity but have 25% of the Olympic distance running medals, for example.
It would be so much easier for people to just read The Sports Gene and move on to more interesting topics. The science is easy to understand. Genes are real. Genes matter. Cultural groups share genes that are adaptive to their environment. Exceptions do exist as well. Is that clear enough?
This is not a scientific argument. How many tall people don't make it to the NBA? I would say the vast majority of them don't. Only few with the hunger and dedication do. Long distance running is no different.
But it is evident that height is an advantageous trait to NBA players, right? You can have all the hunger and drive you want to get into the NBA, but if you are 5'4" you are categorically unlikely to make it into the NBA. People who are extremely tall as a group are definitely more likely to play basketball, and a small percentage of them do play in the NBA. Compared to the population at large, the percentage of extremely tall people who play in the NBA is astronomically higher than the percentage of NBA players in the general population. i.e. you are more likely to find an NBA player in a group of extremely tall people than in a group of random people.
This is the same way Nike operated with east Africans. I'm not saying Nike picked up every single east African and tried to get them to train. But I'm saying they figured, because of the build of the average east African, they were more likely to find talented runners in east Africa than in places like North America, where people's builds differ greatly. It's not outlandish to say you will find more people per capita who can run 14:00 in a 5k in east Africa than in the United States.
Companies have always followed what statistics and science says will be the best bet for their money. This is what is happening here. Especially factoring in the reality that most east Africans wouldn't have an alternative prospect in life that would make them as much money as being a trackstar would, so these runners do have the hunger and drive to become the best... enter the doping discussion.
What separates very few tall people that make it to the NBA from the overwhelming majority of tall people in the world?
"Steve Ovett was better than Henry Rono even at Rono's distance of two miles."
Why is the two mile Rono's distance? Rono held 4 world records. 3K, 3K steeple, 5K, 10K, Ovett held 3 world records, 1500, mile and two mile. Rono broke the 10K record by EIGHT seconds and the 5K world record by nearly five. Rono had the world's fastest 5K in 78 and 82, and in 1982 had run 3 of the 4 fastest 5K times ever. He had the worlds fastest two mile....never...so why is that "Rono's event"?
Any person with running knowledge can realize that the 3k and 6k etc. WR holder might be expected to shine in a two mile a bit more than a miler moving up.
Genes combine with environment to produce behaviors. There are people all over the world who have genes like East Africans have, some even living at altitude. By far, most will never run and few of the ones who do will be serious and competitive about it and of those who do become serious and competitive most will not be in an environment where you need to become one of the best in the world to make a national team, stand out from the crowd enough to attract an agent and go to world class races, etc. They're in an environment where they can get those things with slower performances than an East African can. It may well be true that fast Africans have some sort of gene that makes them better runners than most, though no one has found that gene, but they'd rarely perform like they do if that gene, or whatever, was not developed in their environment. And they aren't the only people who have that gene or genes.
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They threw up the occaisional star like Bikile and Kieno in the 60's when they had the advantage of being full-time athletes when the rest of the world were amateur part-timers and forced to retire by age 25 (22 in the case of Herb Elliott), but they were far from dominant, despite distance running being the only sport that any young sportsman could make money from, and the greatest stars from that period were non-African. Jim Ryun was better than Keino. Steve Ovett was better than Henry Rono even at Rono's distance of two miles.
Before 1988 or so, no Kenyan sniffed the top 300 marathon all time list, and there were more Japanese than Ethiopians in it. Only with the advent of EPO did Kenyans start to dominate.
So why bring genetics into it?
How is Coevett wrong? Let me count the ways:
- He got Bikile's and Kieno's name wrong. Nice start.
- He is wrong to think that anyone would be fooled by "Steven Pinger".
- He is wrong to judge East African "dominance" by the 1960's performances of Bikila and Keino. Their "world dominance" really began in 1981 in World Cross Country -- notable a decade "before EPO".
- He is wrong to judge East African dominance by the marathon in 1980s. Their world dominance in the marathon really began after 2000.
- He is wrong to only bring genetics into it, as there are a half dozen other factors to consider.
- He is wrong to ignore many other factors, such as environment, and social and economic factors.
- He is wrong to place his faith in EPO. If EPO could do what he says, more athletes outside of Kenya and Africa would have tried it, and at least some of them worldwide would have succeeded, because testing was easy to beat before the ABP.
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