Runners, is this Redditor larping (6’3 196lb man goes from 25 min to 16.34 5k in 6 months)

He said he's a ~16:30 guy.

highhoppingworm wrote:

I am 35 and went to > 30 minutes to 16:40 in 5 months and 16:15 in 10 months.

Why is this so unbelievable? People get really out of shape and then they get in shape...

Really? Are you hiding something, like former competitive running background?

This guy DEFINITELY is lying for social media points. He either did not run on the treadmill and just posted the times, uses gear or both. The fact he does not even think his 5k (run en-route on a 6-mile treadmill run that stayed fast for 1.5 miles after the 5k) stands out tells me he made a lot of this up to sell his story.

I see a LOT of people do these things. This guy painfully obviously plays the role of a humblebrag, deliberately showing unnatural highlights of his life and acting like he does not know these stand out when people fawn.

I agree, no way to go from 25 to 16 in 6 months

Besides, I checked up his supposed prs and his 1:26:24 half marathon and 38:07 10k were on the same date!!

And his 10k can’t be part of his HM, do the pace calculations

Yes!!!!!

I thought I was the only one who saw that

Brofessor wrote:

highhoppingworm wrote:

I am 35 and went to > 30 minutes to 16:40 in 5 months and 16:15 in 10 months.

Why is this so unbelievable? People get really out of shape and then they get in shape...

Really? Are you hiding something, like former competitive running background?

This guy DEFINITELY is lying for social media points. He either did not run on the treadmill and just posted the times, uses gear or both. The fact he does not even think his 5k (run en-route on a 6-mile treadmill run that stayed fast for 1.5 miles after the 5k) stands out tells me he made a lot of this up to sell his story.

I see a LOT of people do these things. This guy painfully obviously plays the role of a humblebrag, deliberately showing unnatural highlights of his life and acting like he does not know these stand out when people fawn.

I'm willing to give him a bit more benefit of the doubt. I think reddit is just clueless on how inaccurate his "5k" is, and seem to think we're being pedantic by not considering treadmill times "real"

What they don't realise the distance isn't from the treadmill, but from the watches indoor function that estimates your stride length. These are usually massively off especially at higher speeds, like >10%. I wouldn't be surprised if he actually ran the time but only covered 4.5k or so.

dashdave wrote:

I agree, no way to go from 25 to 16 in 6 months

Besides, I checked up his supposed prs and his 1:26:24 half marathon and 38:07 10k were on the same date!!

And his 10k can’t be part of his HM, do the pace calculations

Yep, that's the nail in the coffin. In order for that to be true, we would have to believe that he somehow ran a solid 38 minute 10k, was in good form, then all of a sudden falls off a cliff and completely bonks (impossible in a half marathon anyways) and starts running barely sub 8 minute miles to tack on 48 minutes over the next 10k and change to finish the half marathon.

Impossible, and it confirms that you can't really believe anything this phony Redditor is posting.

No a snowball's chance wrote:

Let's be real here- for the average person 16:34 is incredibly special. The percentage of people who can run that time right now in the US is probably less than 3%. To go around masquerading that it took you less than 6 months to achieve that is disingenuous at best. It might not hurt you directly, but shouldn't dishonesty be at least called out?

Look at local 5k results. Way less than 3% of entrants run that fast, and that is people who are self selecting because they like to go out and do a 5k.

The general population that can run that fast is probably more like 0.1%

When I was training for the decathlon, I could deadlift about 550 and run about 4:50 (dec PR for 1500 was 4:26). But the difference between me and that guy? My mile PR was 40 seconds faster, set when I was training only for distance (and when my deadlift was probably about 250 pounds....). I would have been about 18 minutes in the 5k during my decathlon days, a good 3 minutes slower than my distance runner days.

So I think this guy is lying mostly because of the 5k claim. It isnt "that" hard to gut out a sub 5 mile if he was just naturally a talented runner and never knew it. But the 5k time takes way too much aerobic engine for me to believe. It is far harder to "fake" your way through a 5k than a mile.

He might not know he is lying, it could be

I’m not hiding anything. I was a jumper who ran the 400 in relays (open a few times) and played soccer. I didn’t exercise really at all from 22-34 and then picked up running again last summer.

This guy may be lying but I do think letsrun folks typically overvalue the amount of specific training a naturally talented person needs to do in order to run times that lower end varsity high school male cross country runners can accomplish. I would wager that any large public high school has a handful of kids who could run under 17 minutes on 20-30 miles a week of running. If I extrapolate that out to a fully grown male 16:30 for someone that could had D1 type talent seems pretty reasonable to me on very little mileage/specific training.

Theory #1: maybe this guy has D1-level talent and never knew it.

Theory #2: maybe he's not aware of how inaccurate his watch is indoors.

Theory #3: he's completely full of sh!t.

I'm going with #3.

highhoppingworm wrote:

I’m not hiding anything. I was a jumper who ran the 400 in relays (open a few times) and played soccer. I didn’t exercise really at all from 22-34 and then picked up running again last summer.

This guy may be lying but I do think letsrun folks typically overvalue the amount of specific training a naturally talented person needs to do in order to run times that lower end varsity high school male cross country runners can accomplish. I would wager that any large public high school has a handful of kids who could run under 17 minutes on 20-30 miles a week of running. If I extrapolate that out to a fully grown male 16:30 for someone that could had D1 type talent seems pretty reasonable to me on very little mileage/specific training.

I think you and this guy live in the top 1% or so of talent. This dude weighs a lot and ran 20:xx just 2 months before 16:34. Going from 260 to 185 in 6 months and 20:xx to 16:34 in 2 months from no competitive running background seems closer to a D1 All-American talent than 'athletic guy'.

I am guessing he did run those times with lots of 'assistance'.

Weighs a fair bit, benches 172.5kg despite being 6’3 195lbs with a fair bit more fat he could shift (he’s lean but he’s not 10% body fat or anything), deadlifts 210kg for cardio and has a 270kg 1rm built off a high volume accumulation routine he’s run simultaneously with dropping 25lbs and running 40+ miles per week for the first time in his life.

And, judging by his improvement curve he’s just getting started on both the running and deadlifting - if he ran a 12 week peaking cycle god knows what he’d be deadlifting.

If this is all true then the real question is why he’s spending his athletic prime impressing people on the internet.

My high school had ~150 people on the cross country team and was in the top classification in sports (largest schools). Most teams in this class had at least one runner with a PR well under 17:00. The state champ for boys typically ran 15:00-15:30 range. These times were on XC courses (we didn't have 5k in track). However, having a whole varsity team that regularly ran ~16:30 would have put you in real strong contention at the state meet unless your #1 was relatively slow. That kind of depth even in the top class was pretty unusual.

I'm curious on how this compares to others experiences in high school.

After reading through a good bit of the thread, my take is that this guy (and his supporters) pretty much fit to a T every other person who this forum has ever busted for cheating. First off, he comes off as like the humble cool guy, "just trying to help and motivate people bro." Then he gets questioned and you see his rage come out:

"you all are a bunch of pathetic weaklings"

"you're just jealous because you can't run that fast."

"Go fxck yourselves"

Meanwhile his supporters are all:

"he's such a good guy"

"he's been a trusted member here for so long, has helped so many people"

"why would he cheat? What does he have to gain? He doesn't care what you doubters think, he's just trying to motivate people"

It's like the same story on repeat. Sure he wasn't selling anything, but I wouldn't be surprised if this was all meant to be a build up to "buy my cool program for only $250!" My only takeaway is that people are dumb and believe what they want to believe.

Sit and kick wrote:

Theory #1: maybe this guy has D1-level talent and never knew it.

Theory #2: maybe he's not aware of how inaccurate his watch is indoors.

Theory #3: he's completely full of sh!t.

I'm going with #3.

I once ran in a 10k that the RD measured to 6.2, but instead of 6.2 miles, she used 6.2km. Im guessing this guy could have done the same. Ran and saw 3.1 on the treadmill or his watch and didn't realize it was only 3.1km...

The mentality has been cultivated on fitnesscirclejerk by a few prominent members. There’s some truth to it - there’s a culture of mediocrity particularly when it comes to fitness and what’s achievable - but they’ve got their followers and in this case they’re off base.

Whether nsuns himself is lying or simply misinformed with treadmill calibration etc (I know nothing about that) I don’t know, but on the advanced running thread he mentions he had extremely average athletic talent growing up despite playing lots of sport.

runnerPI wrote:

The mentality has been cultivated on fitnesscirclejerk by a few prominent members. There’s some truth to it - there’s a culture of mediocrity particularly when it comes to fitness and what’s achievable - but they’ve got their followers and in this case they’re off base.

Whether nsuns himself is lying or simply misinformed with treadmill calibration etc (I know nothing about that) I don’t know, but on the advanced running thread he mentions he had extremely average athletic talent growing up despite playing lots of sport.

He might simply be misinformed, but I dont believe it. He says he runs a lot on the track aswell. For a guy that is so focussed on his training and progress (and a know it all), how can he not see that his treadmill times are way faster? He just likes to boost about himself for fake internet points.

I also find it funny how he presents to have such a busy schedule, yet he spends all day on reddit commenting.

Lmao, this entire post's comments are gold. People saying that deadlifting alone can make you a great runner, and more.

https://www.reddit.com/r/fitnesscirclejerk/comments/ght0ch/rejerk_advanced_running_debates_unsuns_running/?utm_term=34242363984&utm_medium=comment_embed&utm_source=embed&utm_name=null&utm_content=footer

These self proclaimed high achievers all seem to spend a huge amount of time on reddit.

toozy wrote:

These self proclaimed high achievers all seem to spend a huge amount of time on reddit.

You have no idea. I used the site for a moment and tried to comment on some biochemistry specifics I knew, and a dude like this with a big profile had built a huge following and destroyed any opinions challenging his completely made-up, largely explicitly disproven canon.

No idea what attracts people to compete for these insane authority positions over the misinformed. I see it everywhere. They just like the power, I suppose.