Devastating Femur Stress Fracture for Simeon Birnbaum

Coaches should teach proper running mechanics. Ancient coaches don't understand modern science and are fearful of learning new techniques. Read the literature and you will see that increase cadence can improve foot strike if heel striking, etc. 1980's literature is not going to cut it. Read modern peer reviewed publications to keep up with the science.

Sorry Rojo - going to call you out on this one.

First, a 19 year old male getting a femoral stress fractures is ABSOLUTELY not a common injury, hard stop. Tendonitis? Sure. But not this.

Second, stop calling posters armchair experts. You act like no one on this message board ever ran in college, ever trained hard, ever knew or experienced stress fractures, etc.

Third, "blaming the coach" is completely warranted here. Simeon did not have a history of injuries in HS. Jerry is well known for high volume, intense workouts, which essentially EVERY athlete he's ever coached has indicated, publicly, are not tailored to an individual. There's no reason to think that he's deviated significantly from this approach at UofO.

Reported as duplicate.

This thread should be merged with the "REALLY bad College Coaches" thread

I don't think Ritz was naturally inclined to injury. He ran big mileage combined with high quality throughout high school and stayed very healthy. Ritz only started getting injured when he went to CU and started getting in 100 mpw in singles. In high school he did doubles several days/week. I recall him saying that every day at CU he did a continuous run of at least 12 miles.

Going to have to disagree here, Cochise. Ritz was injured tripping over his dog once and ripped a tendon in his foot. He was injured alot absent his L-Carnetine injections. He had to use the alter-g treadmill a lot as well. He was a great runner but he freely admitted he was constantly riding the line between injury and fitness

Never understood the fuss here. An ethical coach shouldn't know what that is. You guys expect him to know everything on the doping list?

Oh it disgusts you? What disgusts me is that Jerry's own professional athletes are leaving him en masse because he won't yield on his training and is injuring them, and yet he's given access to young talent to break them before they even have a chance to get started.

Also, saying a femur stress fracture is 'not really a big loss as he wasn't making the Olympic team this year' is wild rojo.

Were you at Cornell? Just you never seem to mention it.

Yes, the femur is a large, strong bone but we don't know where in the femur the fracture is. The femural head sits in the acetabulum of the the illium (pelvis), then the femoral neck connects to the shaft. I would speculate that the neck is probably the site of the fracture.

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"The timing really is terrible with the olympics being this year"

Always hilarious when people sneak stuff like this into posts as a "flex" as if they actually had a chance.

I’m curious - in what interviews did Simeon mention cutting weight? I didn’t think I’d heard him say that so that’s very concerning. Pair that with Jerry’s ridiculous philosophy and that’ll do it. Such a shame.

I saw some anecdote/quote from Adam Goucher, alluding to Ritz and Torres trying to lose weight, when they were already quite thin. If that was true, then that might have played in to Ritz's injuries, in college and later. We know a lot more about that now than 20 or 25 years ago.

Many elite athletes cut weight leading into a big race. They run into trouble if they don't put the weight back on in the off season or if they are doing it for reasons other than maximizing their performance.

Many greats who have had long successful careers have talked about this. Nick Willis, Centro, Meb, Lagat.

He knows the most common PED that the Kenyans are getting busted for, I guarantee you. He just lied about it.

I guess we can’t say he didn’t follow through with “make the team or bust.” He just happened to bust.

Seriously though, I’m glad there’s been some pushback on the posters above. It’s easy for me as a 31 year old impartial track fan to say that Birnbaum making this Olympic team was a wildly ambitious goal. But can we fault an 18 year old kid, the first and only American to run sub-4 at age 16, who ran 1:47 & 3:37 in high school, for having big dreams for his first year at Oregon? It would be weird if he didn’t. In fact, having “delusional” aspirations is a fairly common trait among the most successful athletes.

I hope he gets back on track next year. He’s one of the most exciting U.S. talents in recent memory and it would be a shame if he can’t make good on his promise. He’s certainly still got plenty of time.

My hunch is, that the buck doesn’t stop with the coach.

I believe wholeheartedly that you plan further out based on how talented the athlete is. Sure I bet he wanted to make the Olympics this year, but realistically the goal is 2028, so I'm sure freshman year at Oregon is not a high priority for Schumacher compared to the long-term plan for him (the obvious example is Nico Youngs perfectly timed growth)

Still, you have to give the carrot to the donkey at some point. This isn't grant fisher entering BTC at age 23 where they raced twice a year as a pro. This is an 18 year old that needs to get his feet wet in the college racing scene before the pro plans. Let them have fun. Just my thoughts

Jerry’s athletes can’t stay healthy without nandrolone.

-Lukas Verzbikas was severely injured cycling

-German Fernandez won an NCAA title, but I agree he underperformed overall

-The Young twins JUST got to Stanford

-Drew Hunter: 3:34, 7:39, 13:17, 27:38. Not really a bust just not Olympic level

-Brodey Hasty just set a 5k PR and was a key player in multiple NCAA cross country championships

-Aaron Sahlman just got to NAU, give Mike Smith a year or two with him, Colin’s doing really well

-Aidan Troutner has still run sub 4/7:44 in the 3k. Beyond his NXN race he was only like a 4:10 guy in high school so still a decent progression.

-Casey Clinger has two top ten finishes at NCAA xc, a runner up finish at indoor nationals, and a 13:17 5k PR

You chose some really weird examples, because most of these guys have had pretty decent careers or are freshman still. Not developing into Grant Fisher/Nico Young level doesn’t make an athlete a bus. Everyone you listed is either a multiple time all American, a freshman, or Lukas Verzbikas, who was in a really tough bike crash