What is your scientific reason why kids are all of a sudden getting WAY faster in distance running?

A. More kids are running

B. We are over the Runner's World promoted "less is more" philosophy of the 80's that destroyed distance running in the USA.

I tell the kids who sign up for my team that they're going to get all kinds of advice from hobby joggers who think that because they run 1/2 marathons in 2:00 on 20 miles a week they know how to coach distance runners.

That was the philosophy in the 80's and into 90's.

The coach who preceded me (I was his assistant) had parents complain that he over trained their kids when they were running less than 30 per week.

Maybe the flynn effect applies to athleticism as well

number ln e wrote:

[quote]hum and drum wrote:

More boys running 8:50's but nobody running sub-8:45.

Handful of boys running 4:05-4:10 but nobody getting close to 4.

That comes from more mileage not more talent.

This ^^^

I def agree that more mileage has been the cause of this sudden increase in top performances, because back then, run harder, not smarter was more prevalent (or at least that's how we say it from today's perspective) back then, because they didn't have a ton of things to enhance an optimal performance and didn't have a ton of technology... Now running science has gone so far and carried on to so many athletes/coaches that kids are starting to train smarter and run higher mileage earlier, so yes, you have the kids that would have been 4:15-4:20 now at 4:05-4:10 and the 9:05-9:15 type kids at 8:50-9:00, BUT whether we have breakout kids that are sub-8:45, or 3:58-4:02 is really dependent on.... nothing really... The fact that we have them every now and then is just a coincidence and it doesn't say anything about the time period because they're outliers, the fact that we have tons of kids 4:05-4:10 and 8:50-9:00 grabs are larger population to make a conclusion from...

Probably an increase in the Yukawa coupling to the newly discovered Higgs boson due to some locally perturbed dark matter density fluctuations.

My comment was specifically directed at 2014.

But, since you bring up prior years, 4:02-3 isn't really close to running sub-4, particularly for kids who never show exceptional 800 speed, which covers just everybody you mention.

Of all the HSers you mention from 2011-12, Kidder is the only American really stands out for his collegiate performance, and that's a more important indicator of real talent development.

At the moment, I believe Kidder is the only American collegian to run sub-3:40 outdoor in 2014. Not exactly an indicator of a brave new world.

You're just drawing an arbitrary line and saying "running a very fast time is more common, sure, but why don't we see all-time-great times?" They're rare by definition, but they're getting more common at the same time. No one ran under 8:45y from Trautmann (1986) to Ritz (2000). Since then, off the top of my head, Rupp, Forys, Centrowitz, Fernandez, Joe Rosa, Verzbicas, and Cheserek have done it. Maybe some others. (Fernandez (8:34), Verzbicas (8:29), and Cheserek (8:39i) all broke 8:40, over a 5-year period, which had previously happened once, 29 years before Fernandez.) That is not a coincidence.

hum and drum wrote:

More boys running 8:50's but nobody running sub-8:45.

Handful of boys running 4:05-4:10 but nobody getting close to 4.

That comes from more mileage not more talent.

As for the girls, the records and top lists are soft, so, again opportunities for those willing to put in the work.

At the college level, no American kid has run faster than 1:46, 3:38 or 13:32 in the year 2014.

Those are times from 40-50 years ago.

A Canadian kid ran under 1:46

Sophmore Brendon McBride ran 1:45.25

I count 8 of the top 16 from 1997 to the present on the miler list. 1997, just two or three years after the internet became prevalent, was when the resurgence started with Sharif Karie, Gabe Jennings, and then or a couple years later, Jon Riley and Andy Powell and Sanchez. Then there was the big three of Webb, Ritz, and Hall, whose pr's today are 3:46.9 AR, 12:56 former AR, 59:43 AR/60:00 World Half Bronze/2:04:58 (2:06:17 legal)/2:07:47.

All of the Americans you list graduated HS at least six years ago, except for Joe Rosa. That hardly corresponds to the thread title about "all of a sudden."

And Rosa himself is a classic example of someone who did a ton of mileage in HS. The posts you responded to pointed to that as the underlying factor for the better performances that do show up in the most recent years. More so than any exceptional talent.

Ritz/Webb/Hall are ancient history at this point.

The Original Poster's message is being missed.

There is no question that there are more HS boys and girls who are running fast times. Among the boys, while we don't have any Ryun-types, there are many more sub-Ryun types than ever before. While with the girls, they are breaking records and we are seeing Ryun-type females.

The oddity is that this bulge of runners began with Lukas V, Ritzhenheim, Alan Webb - and like them, the majority of these very fast HS runners did little in the NCAAs and even less professionally.

Just look at 2014 NCAA - noone has yet to break 3:38 in the 1500.

What this tells me is the bulge is being propped by PED use that is easier to detect in college and the pros. This is why these phenoms of the HS world drop off in the NCAAs or college.

PED use among HSers is prolific. X-country teams get EPO before conference and county championships.

PED use among HSers is prolific. X-country teams get EPO before conference and county championships.

That is an outrageous suggestion, which is easy to make anonymously. Too many people would have to be complicit in such a plan-kids are not the most reliable at keeping stuff secret. I call total BS on this assertion.

Old fast chump wrote:

The kids are getting much faster, and don't tell me its the internet or some kind of horeshit like that. Somethings going on.

Look at their faces and you will get the answer.

Montoya should've gone sub-4

Yes, this question should be more about the girls. We are in a golden age of girls high school distance running.

Chow mein.

The chemical properties that make up the silky noodles contain more vitamin 1A! If you have noticed lately, many children are turning a yellowish shade of grey. This is the result of the Asian culture reproducing due to the constant pressure of fellow teenagers and Asians becoming the dominant race of the world.

There is greater US depth at every level than there has been for a long time. With numbers comes more chances at a breakthrough. Some build on being an 8:40s / low 4:00's guy, others never improve much.

If you look at '07-08 HS runners there is a variety of success. Fernandez might have had the most talent but Centro, Derrick and Jager have the best careers so far.

If you look at last year's class you have to hope McGorty or Saarel stay healthy. Others like Montoya and Leingang seem a little behind now (I am not cou ting cheserek b/c I think this is a US discussion)

The Rosa, Gedyon, Moussa, Oshier, LV class had mixed results for various reasons.

Unserved wrote:

Umm no...

Webb didn't run on dirt tracks. After HS he would be looking for a real job.

Are you unaware that when Webb ran his 3:53, he placed highly competing against a field of professionals?

GENETICS wrote:

Every now and then, a greater amount of talent enters the sport than usual, leading to a few years of higher levels of performance than most people are used to. The loons who occupy the ranks of coaching fraternity are quick to claim credit ("it's because we stress core training now!"), but in reality the recent rise in performance solely a result of chance, and the trend will reverse in a few years.

Exactly. Why did Sweden have a ridiculous amount of tennis stars in the 80s/90s? It certainly wasn´t because anything the Tennis Federation did, or new training methods or drugs. We do things exactly the same now, but Swedish tennis right now is a complete joke.

Case 2: high jumping. Why do we, all of a sudden, have all these guys jumping around 2,40? In a few years, we will be back to the days of Stefan Holm, when you won Golden League meetings if you jumped 2,32.

You're right that the top ranks show elements of randomness, but seventeen years of much greater depth than in the previous two decades shows a systematic change with higher mileage and intensity, maybe more participants, more opportunities for top runners to race each other outside of local and state competitions, and the information available about training and racing on the Internet. That doesn't mean that every year will be a great one. But this resurgence will not end until, say, some heart attack study shows that intense running is dangerous and low mileage is necessary. You won't get a Jim Ryun until you get the kind of training that he did, but there have been numerous sub 4 candidates in recent years. As for the college times, it is obvious that you need to get in a rabbited race to run 3:35 or better unless you are Kiprop or Kiplagat.