HRE wrote:
Lydiard told me that every year as the European season was approaching, Ron would get calls from many meet directors wanting him to run in their meets. Ron would always agree providing that the directors sent him a full fare, refundable, round trip, plane ticket from Melbourne to the airport closest to their meet. The cost then was around $1,000. Ron would get maybe twenty of those each year, cash in all but one, and pocket the refunds.
Hey, that's cheatin'.
Living in the Past wrote:
Boring discussion & excuses wrote:
Although many people do think Clarke was feeble minded as you're suggesting,
this thread is about how great his training was, and by implication Lydiard's, at the time,
and that the training would still be awesome today.
What does Arthur Lydiard have to do with Ron Clarke?
Vincent and Cook were competing in NZ and Lydiard's athletes beat them so badly that Vincent and Cook asked about the training.
They took it back to Australia and Clarke joined in with them.
Aerial video of Caulfield racecourse.
a pain in the weltschmerz wrote:
Vincent and Cook were competing in NZ and Lydiard's athletes beat them so badly that Vincent and Cook asked about the training.
They took it back to Australia and Clarke joined in with them.
However, Clarke did NOT do Lydiard training.
Kind of ... wrote:
a pain in the weltschmerz wrote:
Vincent and Cook were competing in NZ and Lydiard's athletes beat them so badly that Vincent and Cook asked about the training.
They took it back to Australia and Clarke joined in with them.
However, Clarke did NOT do Lydiard training.
By that standard, neither did Vincent or Cook. The Caulfield group all did the same thing except possibly for the Thursday runs Clarke and Clayton did but I think even on those a lot of them went along but were a ways behind.
SJWHippie wrote:
HRE wrote:
Lydiard told me that every year as the European season was approaching, Ron would get calls from many meet directors wanting him to run in their meets. Ron would always agree providing that the directors sent him a full fare, refundable, round trip, plane ticket from Melbourne to the airport closest to their meet. The cost then was around $1,000. Ron would get maybe twenty of those each year, cash in all but one, and pocket the refunds.
Hey, that's cheatin'.
Interesting gray area. You could accept "legitimate" expense money and the term was not clearly defined. Ron considered the loss of a few weeks salary a legitimate expense and the cashed in tickets compensated him for that expense.
I agree, Clarke did not do Lydiard training. I remember reading that Lydiard advised Clarke to add some interval training, but I haven't read about Clarke doing the hill phase.
Good summary of Ron Clarke's training progression:
As a kid, I admired Ron Clarke and felt bad when he had that collapse at the Mexico City Olympics.
He always seemed a real gentleman. When looking on youtube at the final lap of the '64 Olympic 10000m final, I was surprised at the apparent shove given to Mills. Kind of disappointed me. Maybe there was more to it than I know, so I certainly don't want to be wrongly accusing anybody of anything.
HRE, did you ever talk much to Clarke about that race?
We didn't talk about Tokyo. He said he underestimated Mills, had a chance to drop him, should have but didn't. Said it was probably for the best as it was such a great thing for Mills. He regretted running in Mexico because it damaged his heart .
HRE wrote:
Clarke told me that he was too heavy to run marathons well. I replied that Clayton was big and Ron replied that Clayton was both taller and lighter than he (Clarke) was. He gave me the specific inches and pounds differences but I don't remember them now. I believe that he ran three marathons seriously in his prime but the only specific one I can recall now was Tokyo. He also did another marathon or two after his retirement.
If he was running today, with all the attention and money that you can get in the marathon, he might have run more of them seriously. If so, it's hard to believe he wouldn't have gone significantly faster than 2:20 but it's unlikely he'd have agreed that he could run under 2:10.
nice stealth name dropping there. feel good?
HRE wrote:
We didn't talk about Tokyo. He said he underestimated Mills, had a chance to drop him, should have but didn't. Said it was probably for the best as it was such a great thing for Mills. He regretted running in Mexico because it damaged his heart .
"Had a chance to drop him?"
Hindsight is 20/20. Mills "may" have gone with him. If he could have gotten away, he would have, but he didn't. Doesn't matter what level you are, it's always easy to say that AFTER a race.
HRE wrote:
He regretted running in Mexico because it damaged his heart .
Clarke was not fit in Mexico City. He didn't prepare the same as he had the previous two years.
He ate a crappy diet and that's what gave him the bad heart.
He never ran as well in 68 and 69 as he did the previous two years because he was less fit, and also becoming more and more unhealthy. Blaming the altitude for his bad heart was an excuse for his failure and total nonsense.
Total nonsense`` wrote:
He never ran as well in 68 and 69 as he did the previous two years because he was less fit,
In 68 he ran a 27-49 10k at Crystal Palace in the middle of a hurricane and lapped Dave Bedford several times in the race.
I'm sure you know what Clarke ate and also know more about his heart than his doctor did.
slickwillyoh wrote:
HRE wrote:
Clarke told me that he was too heavy to run marathons well. I replied that Clayton was big and Ron replied that Clayton was both taller and lighter than he (Clarke) was. He gave me the specific inches and pounds differences but I don't remember them now. I believe that he ran three marathons seriously in his prime but the only specific one I can recall now was Tokyo. He also did another marathon or two after his retirement.
If he was running today, with all the attention and money that you can get in the marathon, he might have run more of them seriously. If so, it's hard to believe he wouldn't have gone significantly faster than 2:20 but it's unlikely he'd have agreed that he could run under 2:10.
nice stealth name dropping there. feel good?
What was stealthy about that?
Not buying it wrote:
HRE wrote:
We didn't talk about Tokyo. He said he underestimated Mills, had a chance to drop him, should have but didn't. Said it was probably for the best as it was such a great thing for Mills. He regretted running in Mexico because it damaged his heart .
"Had a chance to drop him?"
Hindsight is 20/20. Mills "may" have gone with him. If he could have gotten away, he would have, but he didn't. Doesn't matter what level you are, it's always easy to say that AFTER a race.
Someone asked me if I ever discussed the Tokyo 10,000 with Clarke and I answered. It's not uncommon to review races and see where you made mistakes, missed chances, etc.
Not buying it wrote:
HRE wrote:
We didn't talk about Tokyo. He said he underestimated Mills, had a chance to drop him, should have but didn't. Said it was probably for the best as it was such a great thing for Mills. He regretted running in Mexico because it damaged his heart .
"Had a chance to drop him?"
Hindsight is 20/20. Mills "may" have gone with him. If he could have gotten away, he would have, but he didn't. Doesn't matter what level you are, it's always easy to say that AFTER a race.
Barry Magee said the air pollution in Tokyo was horrible and Halberg had breathing problems in the 10,000.
slickwillyoh wrote:
HRE wrote:
Clarke told me that he was too heavy to run marathons well.
(...)
...it's unlikely he'd have agreed that he could run under 2:10.
nice stealth name dropping there. feel good?
So it's a thread about Ron Clarke's training, and one poster actually met and talked to the guy about his training. You should feel glad that HRE is willing to share some of the insider knowledge he got by talking to Clarke directly. instead of calling that "name dropping"...
Please HRE, keep the comments coming, don't be scared away by the trolls, we need more of your insights here!
HRE wrote:
I'm sure you know what Clarke ate and also know more about his heart than his doctor did.
Yes of course you do, and you know that you're making up nonsense - so of course you would say that.