How many Olympians have been piss poor runners in HS?

You are dead wrong trackhead.

I thought you were the Ron Daws bio buff.

5:20 was his first high school mile, but he did get down to 4:47 his senior year then went backwards and didn't get faster.

Straight from "Self-Made Olympian"

"If im not wrong Peter Snell got 3rd in his school 800m in his senior year with a 1.59. Not a piss poor effort at all, but not an outstanding time many high school runners here wouldnt have achieved."

Unfortunately you are wrong. Peter Snell was an "unheralded" 1:51-1:53 800m runner. He was one of the better runners in his area, but not in their national meets until Lydiard got ahold of him. I don't know where you read 1:59 for his school, but couldn't have been Snell. New Zealand is and was a club system. He ran for a club in his home area.

I have the book "No Bugles, No Drums" and it is a great read if you ever get the chance to read it. You can hear about Lydiard and his "easy" running. Snell was doing runs regularly at 6 min/mile and under and he ran a ton of miles.

Pat made the US Olympic team for the 10K in '84 and '88. And he only won 8 XC National Title.

redmeansdead wrote:

Obscure? Jeremy Wariner, Derrick Brew, Otis Harris, Darold Williamson, Andrew Rock....these are not obscure runners. And it only "appeared" to be a reference to individual gold to you because you had no idea what you were talking about.

No, referencing a 400m runner then saying "Olympic gold" brings to mind instantly...wait for it...the FOUR HUNDRED, NOT a relay. I know who those runners are, and if you misconstrued my post to mean that I consider them obscure, I have 2 suggestions for you:

1. Learn to read.

2. Obtain a life that has a greater meaning than giggling like a school girl as you self-righteously denounce someone on a message board.

sorry -- it's been a while

When Jack Foster was high-school age, he was still 12-15 years away from starting running.

good link for this stuff....

http://www.cs.uml.edu/~phoffman/nats/slowmilers.htm

Steve Cram wrote:

[quote]big think wrote:

"As a teenager his father measured a 1,500 meter course in the woods on his property and timed Gunder on it. "

Yeah and I bet that was an accurate course!

Well if his father was chopping a minute off his time, I guess the accuracy of the course wasn't a big deal.

I don't know about that, but I can name a few guys who ran high mileage in High school, ran fast in H.S. and ran in the Olympics..Hmmmm who's Jim Ryun?..Gerry Lindgren? Stop being so jealous of people who aren't afraid to be great. What's all this talk about saving yourself for tomorrow? It's not going to kill you to dsevelop an aerobic base! Why not be good now and later?

thanks wrote:

No, referencing a 400m runner then saying "Olympic gold" brings to mind instantly...wait for it...the FOUR HUNDRED, NOT a relay. I know who those runners are, and if you misconstrued my post to mean that I consider them obscure, I have 2 suggestions for you:

1. Learn to read.

2. Obtain a life that has a greater meaning than giggling like a school girl as you self-righteously denounce someone on a message board.[/quote]

HAHA. No I read your post, trust me. The reason I ripped on you was because you tried to sound all high and mighty by saying something like "get your facts straight champ". But then when someone corrected you, you tried to justify it instead of just saying "oh, yeah my bad." AND you DID use the word "obscure" when referring to the act of recalling the members of a 4x4 team. I didn't make that up. Would you just accept that you sounded like a bonehead and quit trying to sound intelligent by saying things like "self-righteously denounce". In the meantime, I'll be giggling like a school girl.

Zat0pek wrote:

Don't forget Fred Tornedon.

9:40 in high school, and that was the first and only time he broke 10:00, at the state meet his senior year.

Ran 2:11 to win Twin Cities in '84.

We shouldn't forget the guy but the subject says "Olympian".

i never sayd then any american runner i sayd then many amercan runners.I am not in america againt the rest of th world.point is he was olympic talent just like pre was.

The Coach who cares wrote:

We shouldn't forget the guy but the subject says "Olympian".

But the original post says:

Have there been any truly not great runners in HS, that have gone on to the Olympics OR TO BECOME TRULY GREAT RUNNERS? Who are they and what kind of times did they run in HS?

(emphasis added)

I guess we could debate whether 2:11 is "truly great", but you won't find many guys that only once broke 10:00 for the duece in high school running 2:11, thus fitting within the intent of the original post.

Q.E.D.

Abraham Lincoln ran around the cabin 6 times in 3:14.6, which isn't very good (even for back then).

And he became the president...of the United States.

paz

Benji Durden (1980 Olympic team member).

Pre ran 90-100mpw in highschool and he did decent.

Marla Runyan was a 5'7 high jumper in high school and went on to finish 8th in the Olympic 1500m final in Sydney and 4th NYC Marathon (2:27:10)

I don't know why you took my posts as being an excuse to run lower mileage, but that is not at all what I was getting at. I was actually showing the benefits of high mileage. All I'm saying is that the reason these guys didn't run amazing times in high school, but ran amazing times later in life is because they DIDN'T do high mileage in high school but they DID do high mileage later in life and this caused the improvement. These seems to be the case with all of these until somebody gives me some examples to prove me wrong.

You can run high miles in HS, run a time, then continue the miles and improve later in life.

Running fast times off no training does not mean you're talented; responding to training is talent.