Decline of Distance running 1990s

very good

but it doesn't address matter that willis ran ramzi & asbel close, which indicates likely 3'30/3'31 ability that day

there weren't more than 2 or 3 other guys in the world not in that race who couda claimed similar ability

he was virtually certainly in career best shape that day

lksjadflkj wrote:

This is the correct answer. All the great non-African runners from the 70's and 80's wouldn't be competitive in the slightest given today's competition.

Nonsense. A 1:41 or 3:29 Coe, a 3:46 Cram, or a 3:29 Aouita would still be the men to beat for medals today.

lksjadflkj wrote:

Sprintphone wrote:

The decline was due to the explosion of African runners. It's easier to win gold medals and win big city marathons if you take (most) of them out of the picture.

The absolute incrediable depth of the East African countries obliterated European and American runners, and it still is to this day.

This is the correct answer. All the great non-African runners from the 70's and 80's wouldn't be competitive in the slightest given today's competition.

If you're making that argument based on times, none of the great Africans of the 1970s and 80s would be competitive either. Yet they were replaced by subsequent generations of runners who went faster while westerners were not.

Exactly. Agree totally. - i was probably saying this before Chris was :)

Brit abroad wrote:

Great quote by Chris Barnicle on the home page.

My opinion is that the decline in Britain was down to the sucess of Seb Coe and the percieved methods used by his father Peter Coe. The relatively low mileage high intensity approach was used by Coe but as we now all know the mileage wasnt as low as originally documented. Warm ups/downs and recovery runs weren't counted and the reported 60 mile weeks were in fact 80 - 90 miles.

The British Milers Club started and preached this gospel and everyone followed with high lactate track sessions 3 times a week with a couple of 5 milers thrown in between.

Some may disagree and say it was the emergence and dominance of the africans during this time.

What are your thoughts....?

EPO played absolutely no contributing role, either directly or indirectly, on the track. No test in the last 15 years ever showed that.I could prove it to you, but why don't you do your own research to substantiate my claims.

A different time & place. wrote:

I didn't say anything about who did or didn't use PEDS, I just stated that EPO was a contributing factor to some outrageous performances and drug tests have proven that over the last 15 years. EPO had a direct impact on the way the records and times changed overnight in the mid 90's. I'm not going to start naming countries and regions of the world wear drug-use is more prevelent, but I think people have a pretty good idea if you do your research.

EPO played absolutely no contributing role, either directly or indirectly, on the track. No test in the last 15 years ever showed that.

This is an unsuccessful attempt at irony or black humour?

UK coach;

good comments but you butchered your main point. Brother Colm's quote is that 13 year old girls are training 3x a day!

Obviously not all, but his point is simply that we have no real concept of how much harder they are training.

WRT Coe, it is an easy mistake to focus on his speedwork and lower mileage, but somehow he always maintained his famous 7x800 workout and I agree with Horwill (particularly for a 1500m guy) that 7x800@ 3k-5k pace with short rest is more than enough.

A different time & place. wrote:

2008 Outdoor 1500 yearly list:

http://www.iaaf.org/statistics/toplists/inout=o/age=n/season=2008/sex=M/all=n/legal=A/disc=1500/detail.html

People often parrot things that they heard somewhere on ESPN, without checking the real data. The truth is that Africans wouldn't be able to progress in the 800/1500 m without EPO. Until 1995, the times stagnated and in the 800 m, they actually had rather a declining tendency. In fact, I think that already Morcelli's WR in 1992 was drug-aided, because it was only few months before the Chinese tortoise women showed up on the scene and some other African men also started to run ridiculous times. But everything broke loose in 1995.

not a fan of seb wrote:

Exactly. Agree totally. - i was probably saying this before Chris was :)

Brit abroad wrote:

Great quote by Chris Barnicle on the home page.

My opinion is that the decline in Britain was down to the sucess of Seb Coe and the percieved methods used by his father Peter Coe. The relatively low mileage high intensity approach was used by Coe but as we now all know the mileage wasnt as low as originally documented. Warm ups/downs and recovery runs weren't counted and the reported 60 mile weeks were in fact 80 - 90 miles.

The British Milers Club started and preached this gospel and everyone followed with high lactate track sessions 3 times a week with a couple of 5 milers thrown in between.

Some may disagree and say it was the emergence and dominance of the africans during this time.

What are your thoughts....?

Aouita and EL G are both on record as stating that Coe's training methods heavily influenced what they did in their peak years. I think I'm right in also saying that Lagat runs low mileage too. Didn't seem to affect their ability to run great times. How is it that they can interpret the Coes' methods with success while all Brits have apparently failed to do so?

It's not Coe's fault that standards in the UK have dropped, apart from the fact that he (along with Ovett & Cram) set such high standards that most athletes (British or not) have had trouble matching their exploits.

The reason the UK has had no one of note in over 20 years is either due to lack of talent or the lack of someone with the drive to succeed, and probably a combination of the two. It's all well and good taking one aspect of Coe's training and copying it to an extent, but unless it is to the same intensity and covers all aspects of other work he was doing in the gym, etc, then you're not going to get the same results.

Sports physiologist wrote:

A different time & place. wrote:

2008 Outdoor 1500 yearly list:

http://www.iaaf.org/statistics/toplists/inout=o/age=n/season=2008/sex=M/all=n/legal=A/disc=1500/detail.html

People often parrot things that they heard somewhere on ESPN, without checking the real data. The truth is that Africans wouldn't be able to progress in the 800/1500 m without EPO. Until 1995, the times stagnated and in the 800 m, they actually had rather a declining tendency. In fact, I think that already Morcelli's WR in 1992 was drug-aided, because it was only few months before the Chinese tortoise women showed up on the scene and some other African men also started to run ridiculous times. But everything broke loose in 1995.

And why did the American men start to run faster in the last few years? Oh, I forgot! High mileage made it´s return to the American´s training. You really are a bunch of hypocrites. You have one set of explanations for the Americans, and another for the Africans.

HRE wrote:

I think that's because there are so many people who want to believe that you can run really well without running a lot.

HRE nailed it. It's natural for people want to take the easier approach if they have any reason to think it might yield a favorable result.

*****

Offtopic: Maybe this is why so many people believe in god.

*****

So let's say somebody claims two runners ran an equal time with one doing 140mpw and the other doing 70mpw. Naturally people are going to try and repeat this off 70mpw. Even if for every ten guys doing 140mpw you get a guy doing it off 70mpw, everyone wants to think they can be the guy to do it off 70mpw.

These are the same guys who claim they just weren't "talented" enough to make it big time. BS.

Sports physiologist wrote:

The natural maximum in the 5000 m is 12:50 something, and in the 10 000 m, I seriously doubt that anybody ran under 26:45 without EPO. Actually, it still may be a huge overstimation, because in 2000, when the first anti-EPO test was introduced, the best times dramatically declined to mere 27:00.

Fizzyologist, you are an idiot. Natural maximum? That is just pure stupidity, natural limits are hundreds of years in the future, and way way faster than todays fastest times.

These are the same guys who claim they just weren't "talented" enough to make it big time. BS."

So anyone that runs 140 mile weeks is an Olympian?? There is such thing as talent moron.

Look at the best of the best, their training isnt much different from others, it's just that when optimal training is combined with optimal talent= awesome results.

you are an idiot

koskei ran 1'42.2 back in '84

that epo ???

konchellah/ereng won the globals in '87/'88, the former running a fantastic solo 1'43-flat which had coe stating this guy was a threat to his wr if he replicated that form on the circuit

the latter ran low-1'43 & despite the big gold is considered one of the greatest unfufilled talents the 800 has ever seen - go watch his magnificent 800 indoor wr where he seemed to be dawdling for much of the race & then just turned on the afterburners like a 200m guy to destroy barbosa & break the wr

as for 1500, the epo-less kenyans still won 1500 gold in '88 & were consistently in top 5 behind likes of bile/aouita/morceli in late '80s/early '90s

eh ?

africans were in top 3 of yearly lists every year from '90 - '95 with range of 1'43.1 - 1'43.5 each year

the only problem was there was no superstar those years - apart from ben koech who i saw on tv run an effortless 1'43.1 as a 19y ole & shouda progressed easily to low/mid - 1'42 guy

however, kenyans still took gold/silver in '92 with non-superstars - their best was still best in the world

nonsense

he ran 3'28.8 which took 0.6s of a wr that had was long overdue for breaking & shoudn't even have been the wr in mid-'80s if maree hadn't already got the fatigue of a 3'32 race in his legs just 2/7 before his epic 3'29.77

moron

you do remember yobes running sub-27 back in '93

what do you call that - chopped liver ???

'Brother Colm's quote is that 13 year old girls are training 3x a day!'

I was actually thinking that from memory then thought it sounds a bit much - you are right, I read that quote in Train Hard Win Easy

Sports physiologist wrote:

A different time & place. wrote:

2008 Outdoor 1500 yearly list:

http://www.iaaf.org/statistics/toplists/inout=o/age=n/season=2008/sex=M/all=n/legal=A/disc=1500/detail.html

People often parrot things that they heard somewhere on ESPN, without checking the real data. The truth is that Africans wouldn't be able to progress in the 800/1500 m without EPO. Until 1995, the times stagnated and in the 800 m, they actually had rather a declining tendency. In fact, I think that already Morcelli's WR in 1992 was drug-aided, because it was only few months before the Chinese tortoise women showed up on the scene and some other African men also started to run ridiculous times. But everything broke loose in 1995.

Makes sense! Though I don't think Morceli's 3:28.8 is that unbelievable. I think Cram & Coe had been capable of that. What did com as a surprise was his 3:27.3 in 95. Something strange sure did happen in the space of a couple of years around 95, thats for sure.

An unsupported claim was made that times became outrageous since 1995, and that tests for 15 years have proved it.Maybe it was a subtle attempt to draw out real evidence of a single test that showed EPO contributed to one single outrageous performance.Anyone can make any bogus claims, and ask the readers to do the research.

Sports physiologist wrote:

This is an unsuccessful attempt at irony or black humour?

And why did the American men start to run faster in the last few years? Oh, I forgot! High mileage made it´s return to the American´s training. You really are a bunch of hypocrites. You have one set of explanations for the Americans, and another for the Africans.

Because American men started jumping on the epo bandwagon. That's why.

Sure, Rupp ran some weeks higher than 80 and some weeks lower than 80. But 80/week (or a bit less) is the accurate figure.

And truth is that's *the most* he needed to get those times, not the least.

So here would be the moderate mileage US distance team if we went off of 2010 average weekly mileage:

800

Symmonds 60/week

Wheating 50-60/week

1500

Lagat 70/week

Manzano 60/week

Steeple

Huling 60/week

5000m

Lagat 70/week

10000m

Rupp ~80/week

H-Marathon

Ritz ~80/week (promptly injured trying 110/week)

Team alternate: Webb 60-70/week (w/ many weeks 0-35/week)