Few young runners, especially females, have long careers if they start running too hard too early. Parker Valby did not run at all until her freshman year (played lacrosse and swam). Heather MacLean joined the track team she was 16. Addy Wiley did not run seriously until her junior year (soccer and basketball) and not full-time until a senior. Two are Olympians and two have American records. The idea that you need to start accumulating miles when in 6th or 7th grade is ludicrous.
There is no more glaring example right now than Valby/Tuohy. Tuohy set a bunch of meaningless age records and was running full-time since at least 7th grade, and today she would be at best the #3 or #4 runner on the NC State XC team and is running barely any faster than she was as a sophomore in HS. Valby won 6 NCAA titles in 364 days, obliterated both the 5000 and 10000m records with barrier breaking times (1st sub-15, 1st sub-31), and made the Olympic team.
Well yes for the most part. The list goes on for athletes who started early and peaked early as in they never reached their full FULL potential rather they just ran a fast time at an age where its rare I.e 3:27 at 18 years old is rare but 3:26 at 24-25 is common. Running this fast time at 18 means you've hit or come close to your genetic ceiling especially if you started at ages 7-8. Hicham El guerroj started athletics practice at 16 but peaked around ages 24-25 (broke 1500/mile records around this time) while Jakob started training around 7-8 and probably won't ever touch 3:25. He's close to his genetic limit or probably touched it since he ran the 3:27.
Are you unaware that Jakob has run sub 3:27?
AND......... what is the potential of your compratiots Wigthman, Kerr, Mills and Burgin in your opinion?
Thinking about Cooper Luftkenhaus, Quincy Wilson, Jane Hedengren etc. They are in the 16-19 Age Group, Many say that means short careers, Though Their are Exceptions especially wit Ethiopans and Kenyans Examples Tirunesh Dibaba, Meseret Defar, Eliud Kipchoge were all Great for any level when they were 15-19, And There are A Few American Age Group stars I know of like Mary Decker, Raeven Rogers Etc who had a Long Career, But Everytime There is an age Group Star in the USA who gets a Ton of Hype, everyone starts saying they will burn out.
What are the odds of Runners like the 3 I mentioned who are doing Great things now of being a Top Athlete in 10 years when they will be 26-29? What is normally considered An Athletes Prime. Sprinters 100-400 are rarely above 30 (With Notable Exceptions) Distance Runners Normally can compete at a Higher level than Sprinters in their respective events.
I don´t think they will peak early BECAUSE they were top runners in an early age.
The problem is rather that it is quite difficult to break through to the SENIOR top level EVEN IF you was GREAT as a JUNIOR.
And some times the JUNIOR runners are great due to early physical development and that advantage will of course not last going into adulthood.
I will further say that serious training from an early age is almost a condition for being an All Time Great AND for having a long career. See Owett, Coe, Cram, Geb, Bekele, Farah, Kipchoge, Jakob and Kiplimo who all trained and performed well from at least their early teens and some much earlier (Geb, Kipchoge, Jakob).
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A certain group of posters on these pages has for years claimed with almost scientific certainty that you can´t train seriously for more than 5 (later 10) years before your body is worn out and you consequently peak. That theory was used to predict that Jakob would peak soon since he was in his mid teens. And the doomers were proved wrong year after year so it has been a standing joke to ask when the first annual "Jakob has peaked" thread would appear,
Similarly has our eloquent oracle Salvitore proposed the theory that a top runner can´t be in peak shape for more than 3-4 years. I would say that you can´t set reality on a formula. We should just accept that there are so many factors involved when predicting a young runners potential for a long and great career that we can only talk about probalities. There is no firm rule to guide us.
I would say- for MD and LD runners - that long term mainly aerobic training with correct mix of easy days and harder days should be a help to achieve long term improvement without burning out.
On the contary forced hard ANAEROBIC training from an early age can compromise your long time development.
No. Nearly every single elite young female distance runner burns out. Ping set world records at 10 to 12 years old. Cain was world.clasd as a teen. Lane was winning national championships in high school. Effraimson was an elite national class runner as a teen. Tuohy was the most dominant high school XC runner ever. Even Mu was the best in the world at a young age. But all of these women burned out. Most burned out bad and fast.
Thinking about Cooper Luftkenhaus, Quincy Wilson, Jane Hedengren etc. They are in the 16-19 Age Group, Many say that means short careers, Though Their are Exceptions especially wit Ethiopans and Kenyans Examples Tirunesh Dibaba, Meseret Defar, Eliud Kipchoge were all Great for any level when they were 15-19, And There are A Few American Age Group stars I know of like Mary Decker, Raeven Rogers Etc who had a Long Career, But Everytime There is an age Group Star in the USA who gets a Ton of Hype, everyone starts saying they will burn out.
What are the odds of Runners like the 3 I mentioned who are doing Great things now of being a Top Athlete in 10 years when they will be 26-29? What is normally considered An Athletes Prime. Sprinters 100-400 are rarely above 30 (With Notable Exceptions) Distance Runners Normally can compete at a Higher level than Sprinters in their respective events.
I don´t think they will peak early BECAUSE they were top runners in an early age.
The problem is rather that it is quite difficult to break through to the SENIOR top level EVEN IF you was GREAT as a JUNIOR.
And some times the JUNIOR runners are great due to early physical development and that advantage will of course not last going into adulthood.
I will further say that serious training from an early age is almost a condition for being an All Time Great AND for having a long career. See Owett, Coe, Cram, Geb, Bekele, Farah, Kipchoge, Jakob and Kiplimo who all trained and performed well from at least their early teens and some much earlier (Geb, Kipchoge, Jakob).
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A certain group of posters on these pages has for years claimed with almost scientific certainty that you can´t train seriously for more than 5 (later 10) years before your body is worn out and you consequently peak. That theory was used to predict that Jakob would peak soon since he was in his mid teens. And the doomers were proved wrong year after year so it has been a standing joke to ask when the first annual "Jakob has peaked" thread would appear,
Similarly has our eloquent oracle Salvitore proposed the theory that a top runner can´t be in peak shape for more than 3-4 years. I would say that you can´t set reality on a formula. We should just accept that there are so many factors involved when predicting a young runners potential for a long and great career that we can only talk about probalities. There is no firm rule to guide us.
I would say- for MD and LD runners - that long term mainly aerobic training with correct mix of easy days and harder days should be a help to achieve long term improvement without burning out.
On the contary forced hard ANAEROBIC training from an early age can compromise your long time development.
An early start doesn’t make any difference. Kessler, Hocker, Young, Nuguse and many others did not have one. Ryun didn’t start running distance until he was a sophomore in HS. If Ingebrigtsen had followed the typical path of Americans of starting with moderate training in middle school, he would be every bit as good and probably wouldn’t be having problems with his Achilles tendons.
There was a big study of youth soccer players that tracked a few thousand kids to see what sort of club soccer experience lead to kids turning into pro players. The kids who were selected out at a young age for elite level teams had a very low success rate for turning into a pro player and a very high rate of quitting the sport just when they should have been on the cusp of maturing into a pro athlete (mid teen years). A much higher success rate was found among kids who moved up through the ranks of club soccer very gradually and were not picked for elite teams until they were much older.
I think there are two things that factor into youth burnout. First, kids who have a lot of natural talent and achieve a lot of success at a young age are often kids who were able to excel at their sport very quickly and without a lot of peaks and valleys/plateaus, etc. When they inevitably get to a point where any further improvement will come in very small increments and the volume of work and time needed to see those improvements is much larger than anything they have seen before, the athletes are not ready for this inevitability and they cannot accept the shift in the balance between the effort put into the sport and the results that come from those efforts.
Second, the sport can easily become a "been there, done that" for kids who reach an elite level at a young age. My son plays competitive golf in HS. His coach is one of the top coaches for junior golfers and has lots of kids who have gone on to Div I and a few who have played professionally. Over the years, he has had several kids who quickly made it up into the national level junior competition before high school and were well on their way to being recruited for Div I golf. But they just ended up quitting. They felt that they had already gotten everything they wanted out of the sport and needed a new mountain to climb.
Well yes for the most part. The list goes on for athletes who started early and peaked early as in they never reached their full FULL potential rather they just ran a fast time at an age where its rare I.e 3:27 at 18 years old is rare but 3:26 at 24-25 is common. Running this fast time at 18 means you've hit or come close to your genetic ceiling especially if you started at ages 7-8. Hicham El guerroj started athletics practice at 16 but peaked around ages 24-25 (broke 1500/mile records around this time) while Jakob started training around 7-8 and probably won't ever touch 3:25. He's close to his genetic limit or probably touched it since he ran the 3:27.
Maybe I don't understand your post, but in all of history there have only been four men who have broken 3:27. Yet you are saying that 3:26 at 24-25 is "common"? Is this some sort of Mandela Effect, or am I in an alternate universe?
Not sure why any down votes but everyone listed here (with the exception of Tuohy, who is still an open book) had exceptional success early but not later in their careers. One glaring thing about this list stands out ...all women/girls. Without sounding sexist or weight shaming but tiny gals often fly faster than their peers when they are younger but then arent any better than them at all as they mature. Grace Ping is the ultimate example of this. Cain and Efframson definitely got right up to the pinnacle of the sport but then never pushed on to professional elite status as mature adults. Ping never got better once she got to high school! Plenty of gals were exceptional talents in high school but not in college (add Brie Oakley to the list) ...It happens to guys as well, but moreso due to injury than "body maturity"
I don´t think they will peak early BECAUSE they were top runners in an early age.
The problem is rather that it is quite difficult to break through to the SENIOR top level EVEN IF you was GREAT as a JUNIOR.
And some times the JUNIOR runners are great due to early physical development and that advantage will of course not last going into adulthood.
I will further say that serious training from an early age is almost a condition for being an All Time Great AND for having a long career. See Owett, Coe, Cram, Geb, Bekele, Farah, Kipchoge, Jakob and Kiplimo who all trained and performed well from at least their early teens and some much earlier (Geb, Kipchoge, Jakob).
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A certain group of posters on these pages has for years claimed with almost scientific certainty that you can´t train seriously for more than 5 (later 10) years before your body is worn out and you consequently peak. That theory was used to predict that Jakob would peak soon since he was in his mid teens. And the doomers were proved wrong year after year so it has been a standing joke to ask when the first annual "Jakob has peaked" thread would appear,
Similarly has our eloquent oracle Salvitore proposed the theory that a top runner can´t be in peak shape for more than 3-4 years. I would say that you can´t set reality on a formula. We should just accept that there are so many factors involved when predicting a young runners potential for a long and great career that we can only talk about probalities. There is no firm rule to guide us.
I would say- for MD and LD runners - that long term mainly aerobic training with correct mix of easy days and harder days should be a help to achieve long term improvement without burning out.
On the contary forced hard ANAEROBIC training from an early age can compromise your long time development.
An early start doesn’t make any difference. Kessler, Hocker, Young, Nuguse and many others did not have one. Ryun didn’t start running distance until he was a sophomore in HS. If Ingebrigtsen had followed the typical path of Americans of starting with moderate training in middle school, he would be every bit as good and probably wouldn’t be having problems with his Achilles tendons.
What do you think you are disagreeing about?1
I proposed that it seems ALMOST to be a condition to be an ALL TIME GREAT and having a long career to have trained seriously from a young age.
Then you that early training doesn´t matter and mention 5 runners who neither were ALL TIME GREATS OR HAD A LONG CAREER (for your first 4 runners mentioned we don´t know yet).
ALL TIME GREATS MEN are in my opinion at least the following
Peter Snell
Coe
Virén
Aouita
Geb
Bekele
Farah
Cheptegei
Jakob
To be an ATG you should normally at least have 2 international golds and some serious WRs.
Only Farah hasn´t got the serious WRs but I include him anyway due to his impressive harvest of international golds.
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I strongely disagree about Jakob. Do you really think he would be a 3:26, 3:43, 4:43, 7:17 and probably low 12:30 man if he had started training in highschool?
When he started in high school he was already 3:56 in the mile.
You claim that Hocker, Kessler, Young and Nuguse didn´t start training early.
I don´t think that is completely true.
Hocker reportedly competed seriously before high school (running 4:38 in the mile in 8th grade (at age 14?) so he must already have trained rather seriously at that time.
I think that both Nico and Hobbs competed rather seriously from early highschool so they must have trained seriously before that.
Only Nuguse and Ryun started rather late but we don´t know how succesfull Nuguse will be and Ryun - despite his WRs - didn´t win any international golds and had a rather short career at least at the highest level.
Kenenisa Bekele - still competing in his 40s, won set world junior records, set the masters wr in the marathon. He had high level performances from 1999 to 2024 - maybe he'll have another one in 2026.
You claim that Hocker, Kessler, Young and Nuguse didn´t start training early.
I don´t think that is completely true.
Hocker reportedly competed seriously before high school (running 4:38 in the mile in 8th grade (at age 14?) so he must already have trained rather seriously at that time.
I think that both Nico and Hobbs competed rather seriously from early highschool so they must have trained seriously before that.
Only Nuguse and Ryun started rather late but we don´t know how succesfull Nuguse will be and Ryun - despite his WRs - didn´t win any international golds and had a rather short career at least at the highest level.
Hocker running seriously in 8th grade was probably 20-25 mpw and not from training as a pro since age 11. My understanding about Young was that he was a chubby, 5’1 kid before HS and didn’t post any fast times until his Sophomore year. Nuguse is 26 and was .15 seconds off of the Gold Medal last year so we know exactly how fast he can be at his peak. Are you thinking that with Ingebrigtsen ‘s approach, he would run .16 seconds faster and snagged the gold? With Ryun, you’re taking results at face value. Without the altitude at Mexico City, I believe he would have beaten Keino and without the fall in Munich, he would have beat Keino again and would have won at least a silver. Hobbs PRs as a freshman were 2:25/4:54/10:33. Obviously, he was hardly training at all during that time.
My opinion about Ingebrigtsen’s early start is that he would be just as good without it and is lucky he didn’t break down years ago.
Thinking about Cooper Luftkenhaus, Quincy Wilson, Jane Hedengren etc. They are in the 16-19 Age Group, Many say that means short careers, Though Their are Exceptions especially wit Ethiopans and Kenyans Examples Tirunesh Dibaba, Meseret Defar, Eliud Kipchoge were all Great for any level when they were 15-19, And There are A Few American Age Group stars I know of like Mary Decker, Raeven Rogers Etc who had a Long Career, But Everytime There is an age Group Star in the USA who gets a Ton of Hype, everyone starts saying they will burn out.
What are the odds of Runners like the 3 I mentioned who are doing Great things now of being a Top Athlete in 10 years when they will be 26-29? What is normally considered An Athletes Prime. Sprinters 100-400 are rarely above 30 (With Notable Exceptions) Distance Runners Normally can compete at a Higher level than Sprinters in their respective events.
I think the answer is quite simple - it depends on what they are doing to run these amazing times at these ages.
The thing is, what is an "amazing" time for a young athlete these days has definitely been redefined over the course of the last 20-30 years to the point where it is basically impossible they aren't doing significant workload and intensities of training to get there.
Here is a great example of that. Back in 2001 Nick Willis ran 4.01.32 for the mile a few months before his 18th birthday. So 4.01.32 at 17 - that was seen as a phenomenal performance at the time. The thing was with Nick, he did that off minimal training, running his club meets on a grass track, playing rugby in the winter and certainly not training with established international runners. That was a 4.01 mile off pure talent. Not surprisingly Nick was able to have an international career almost 18 years long.
These days a 4.01.3 mile at age 17 is seen as kind of average. Jakob ran 3.56 when he was 16, Meyers 3.55 when he was 16. Fellow NZer Sam Ruthe just ran 3.58 at 15. But we also know that 16 year old Jakob was following the Ivan Drago blood lactic testing regime and training with his two older brothers who were both top established international performers. We know Sam Ruthe trains with Sam Tanner and runs big workouts because his dad posts them all over social media. I wrote this on another thread re Jakob, but sometimes we fall into this mistake of just writing off junior performances as just being "all talent" and believing that the odometer just gets reset when the senior career starts.
No, 10 x 400 in 58 seconds might not be as good as 10 x 400 in 54 seconds with the same rest as pure quantifiable workout, but the relative stress and difficulty of the 58's at age 16, 17 is almost the same or maybe even more difficult then the 54's at age 22, 23. That's what really matters.
Hate to say it, but a lot of kids running amazing times at young ages are doing so not just because they are talented, but because instead of training like teenagers they are training like adults and out bodies capacity for high intensity work is obviously not endless. The way things are today, amazing "talents" are trending down the path of shorter career as seniors/pros. Things like NIL money being thrown at kids with performances at extremely young ages is simply exacerbating the issue/trend too.
Thinking about Cooper Luftkenhaus, Quincy Wilson, Jane Hedengren etc. They are in the 16-19 Age Group, Many say that means short careers, Though Their are Exceptions especially wit Ethiopans and Kenyans Examples Tirunesh Dibaba, Meseret Defar, Eliud Kipchoge were all Great for any level when they were 15-19, And There are A Few American Age Group stars I know of like Mary Decker, Raeven Rogers Etc who had a Long Career, But Everytime There is an age Group Star in the USA who gets a Ton of Hype, everyone starts saying they will burn out.
What are the odds of Runners like the 3 I mentioned who are doing Great things now of being a Top Athlete in 10 years when they will be 26-29? What is normally considered An Athletes Prime. Sprinters 100-400 are rarely above 30 (With Notable Exceptions) Distance Runners Normally can compete at a Higher level than Sprinters in their respective events.
I think the answer is quite simple - it depends on what they are doing to run these amazing times at these ages.
The thing is, what is an "amazing" time for a young athlete these days has definitely been redefined over the course of the last 20-30 years to the point where it is basically impossible they aren't doing significant workload and intensities of training to get there.
Here is a great example of that. Back in 2001 Nick Willis ran 4.01.32 for the mile a few months before his 18th birthday. So 4.01.32 at 17 - that was seen as a phenomenal performance at the time. The thing was with Nick, he did that off minimal training, running his club meets on a grass track, playing rugby in the winter and certainly not training with established international runners. That was a 4.01 mile off pure talent. Not surprisingly Nick was able to have an international career almost 18 years long.
These days a 4.01.3 mile at age 17 is seen as kind of average. Jakob ran 3.56 when he was 16, Meyers 3.55 when he was 16. Fellow NZer Sam Ruthe just ran 3.58 at 15. But we also know that 16 year old Jakob was following the Ivan Drago blood lactic testing regime and training with his two older brothers who were both top established international performers. We know Sam Ruthe trains with Sam Tanner and runs big workouts because his dad posts them all over social media. I wrote this on another thread re Jakob, but sometimes we fall into this mistake of just writing off junior performances as just being "all talent" and believing that the odometer just gets reset when the senior career starts.
No, 10 x 400 in 58 seconds might not be as good as 10 x 400 in 54 seconds with the same rest as pure quantifiable workout, but the relative stress and difficulty of the 58's at age 16, 17 is almost the same or maybe even more difficult then the 54's at age 22, 23. That's what really matters.
Hate to say it, but a lot of kids running amazing times at young ages are doing so not just because they are talented, but because instead of training like teenagers they are training like adults and out bodies capacity for high intensity work is obviously not endless. The way things are today, amazing "talents" are trending down the path of shorter career as seniors/pros. Things like NIL money being thrown at kids with performances at extremely young ages is simply exacerbating the issue/trend too.
I don’t believe that middle-schoolers are training like adults. There’s nothing really to win or lose at that age, and results don’t matter until HS. If I was a middle school coach, I would try to limit them to 25 mpw and my goal would be to not screw up their future beginning with HS. By their sophomore or junior years in HS, any advantage gained from competing in middle school will be gone, anyway.
I think the answer is quite simple - it depends on what they are doing to run these amazing times at these ages.
The thing is, what is an "amazing" time for a young athlete these days has definitely been redefined over the course of the last 20-30 years to the point where it is basically impossible they aren't doing significant workload and intensities of training to get there.
Here is a great example of that. Back in 2001 Nick Willis ran 4.01.32 for the mile a few months before his 18th birthday. So 4.01.32 at 17 - that was seen as a phenomenal performance at the time. The thing was with Nick, he did that off minimal training, running his club meets on a grass track, playing rugby in the winter and certainly not training with established international runners. That was a 4.01 mile off pure talent. Not surprisingly Nick was able to have an international career almost 18 years long.
These days a 4.01.3 mile at age 17 is seen as kind of average. Jakob ran 3.56 when he was 16, Meyers 3.55 when he was 16. Fellow NZer Sam Ruthe just ran 3.58 at 15. But we also know that 16 year old Jakob was following the Ivan Drago blood lactic testing regime and training with his two older brothers who were both top established international performers. We know Sam Ruthe trains with Sam Tanner and runs big workouts because his dad posts them all over social media. I wrote this on another thread re Jakob, but sometimes we fall into this mistake of just writing off junior performances as just being "all talent" and believing that the odometer just gets reset when the senior career starts.
No, 10 x 400 in 58 seconds might not be as good as 10 x 400 in 54 seconds with the same rest as pure quantifiable workout, but the relative stress and difficulty of the 58's at age 16, 17 is almost the same or maybe even more difficult then the 54's at age 22, 23. That's what really matters.
Hate to say it, but a lot of kids running amazing times at young ages are doing so not just because they are talented, but because instead of training like teenagers they are training like adults and out bodies capacity for high intensity work is obviously not endless. The way things are today, amazing "talents" are trending down the path of shorter career as seniors/pros. Things like NIL money being thrown at kids with performances at extremely young ages is simply exacerbating the issue/trend too.
I don’t believe that middle-schoolers are training like adults. There’s nothing really to win or lose at that age, and results don’t matter until HS. If I was a middle school coach, I would try to limit them to 25 mpw and my goal would be to not screw up their future beginning with HS. By their sophomore or junior years in HS, any advantage gained from competing in middle school will be gone, anyway.
Our middle school team was doing closer to 10 a week! In high school I, as well as other weren't disciplined enough to do easy/aerobic running on our own, at least consistently so a majority of the weekly mileage was effectively intervals. Easy day's meant jogging a half mile from school and bust into a walk for a half hour and then jog back to school and I was burnt out.
My take is guys burn out is 75/25 physical to mental burnout with the ladies reversing those numbers. The shorter the distance, the shorter the career