Footlocker/Brooks: Reina's 14:36 in not legitimate

Solinsky was never an Olympian.

It seems to me that there is no real point in comparing times across the years at Balboa if the course has changed as frequently as posters here are suggesting. Can you really call Reina's time the current course record if its no longer the same course? No - Reina has the 1985 course record. If its not the same course anymore, its not the same record.

Unless someone can make a timeline of the course changes throughout the years, there's no point in comparing from year to year.

About 20 years ago, I was at Dan Empfield's house and many of you do not know who he is, but he is very innovative, in many Hall of Fames, and designed the triathlon wetsuit and time trial bike. He is truly legend and outside of the box thinker. He is also a massive high school track and field fan. He laid out a line graph to show the progress of American boys 1600 and 3200 times over the years and decades. He dug for the most data he could get his hands on. For each year and decade he labelled them by what training shoes were offered by the major shoe companies. I do remember this...his data showed when heavy, higher heeled training shoes such at the thick Air Max with the dense and heavy EVA they used at the time were introduced, times slowed. I remember one trend over so many years where only 9 boys broke 9 in the 3200m. That happens most years in the "B" heat at Arcadia now. At that time, he attributed it to throwing mechanics off of runners and they shortened achilles tendons. He knew there was really no way to go back and get proper quantitative data, but there was a trend with such shoes. You guys have to understand, this is the way Dan thinks. As the heel height in such shoes started to drop, the times picked up again and with greater depth. I remember him using Alan Webb's timeframe in high school as a reference point to demonstrate not just his success, but the number of kids getting faster. Other reasons he attributed for slow times were the training and he is spot on for this one. In the coaching code at the time, very few coaches ran their athletes over 30-35 mpw and most of it had to be LSD (some of you do not even know what that is). And you were not to abuse your athletes and run few or any hard workouts out of season. I would say that has changed quite a bit. I have not spoken to him in years, but will try and track that graph down and post it. I fear it is in an Excel spreadsheet that will not open with more current versions.

What most people don't understand is that until relatively recently it was very rare for high school runners to make coordinated attempts at fast times. There were no rabbits. There were very few races where everyone came together with the purpose of running fast.

Even the meets that came together, Golden West or Texas Relays, weren't set up like the PR festivals of today. The point was to be Golden West or Tx Relays champion. It wasn't let's go to Arcadia and all run sub 8:40. Or let's have a festival with a rabbit and go for it.

Add in the super shoes and a 8:5x is worth a whole lot faster today when kids have a half dozen perfectly set up opportunities to run a fast time.

Eric Mastalir ran 4:04/8:44.95 (8:07 through 3k), while Mark Mastalir ran 4:04/8:51 (8:10 through 3k), just to give an idea of how much competition Reina had at Footlocker.

Add John Trautman 8:05 national record that year who was back in 15th

Reina was a beast. Record legit. He and Davis (who should have the record but decided to celebrate early and run backwards 150 yards out) could race with anyone, anywhere from any generation in HS.

In defense of Reina; a few things:

1. The race was really fast, and Reina did not have to push the pace.

2. Reina beat Trautmann by a considerable margin. Sometimes the best way to figure out the quality of a XC performance is who you beat.

3. In reference to Reina's track credentials; at that time running sub 4:10/9:00 was the standard. It wasn't until the early 2000s when sub-4 attempts and sub-8:50 became in vogue. Typically, athletes train and compete at the level required to win.

Trautmann was sick

The closest person to Reina was a 4:13 miler.

Or at least closest throughout the race

It's really hard to imagine what weird axe you have to grind here, but you've already said this and it was already pointed out that it was false. 2nd place was a 4:04 miler and his slower identical twin ran 4:04/8:44/14:01. Move on, brother.

Mt Sac is a super brutal course, soggy, hot, dusty. It's disgusting. The NXN finals flat golf course is a joke

I think you're right:

https://lynbrooksports.prepcaltrack.com/ATHLETICS/TRACK/TFN/1986tfn.htm

Both slow by today's standards.

QFT

One of the issues (besides the number of races today's generation is putting in) is that today's generation may be used to running on hard pack, well groomed conditions (see McAlpine Park, Wake Med Park). Go to grass and dirt, pace is slow, uneven conditions,...sounds like a slower race.

Sure but let's not forget that nxn just had a 4:26/9:14 kid in 2nd place. And he was like 4th at brooks. We aren't talking about fast runners...

And Lukas Verzbicas would have beaten all the earlier generations. He owned cross country while rarely pushing himself to his limit. Sub 4 miler, 8:29 two miles on track, and King Ches, who also would likely have beaten the prior generations, never beat Verzbicas. King Ches won 17 NCAA titles running.That is unlikely to be broken.