UTMB: JIM WALMSLEY AND AMERICAN RUNNERS GO HOME DEVASTED!!!!1

Jurek had his pacer mule for him at Western States. Ask his pacer what he thinks of jerk-off. Badwater and Spartathlon are not competitive races.

Boucher Needles wrote:

Major props to Jurek for making the sport something people can do professionally (and winning any 100 miler seven times is amazing), but if he were running now, he’d be more competitive with the top females rather than males. A whole different level of runner has taken to ultrarunning in the U.S. no disrespect, just fact. It’s the same evolution in every sport.

Jurek's best time of 15:36 from 2004 would have won in 2016 and 2017. Jurek in his prime would still be a podium threat in the current WS100 competitive climate.

Network Engie wrote:

Boucher Needles wrote:

Major props to Jurek for making the sport something people can do professionally (and winning any 100 miler seven times is amazing), but if he were running now, he’d be more competitive with the top females rather than males. A whole different level of runner has taken to ultrarunning in the U.S. no disrespect, just fact. It’s the same evolution in every sport.

Jurek's best time of 15:36 from 2004 would have won in 2016 and 2017. Jurek in his prime would still be a podium threat in the current WS100 competitive climate.

15:36 would have won WS from 2006-2017. Jurker’s a legend.

And Jurker’s pacer Dustin Olson was always a bit of a nut. He got jealous when Scott got famous yet Dusty never really trained to be a competitive ultra runner despite immense talent.

Piano_Man87 wrote:

Network Engie wrote:

Jurek's best time of 15:36 from 2004 would have won in 2016 and 2017. Jurek in his prime would still be a podium threat in the current WS100 competitive climate.

15:36 would have won WS from 2006-2017. Jurker’s a legend.

And Jurker’s pacer Dustin Olson was always a bit of a nut. He got jealous when Scott got famous yet Dusty never really trained to be a competitive ultra runner despite immense talent.

15:36 will always be a very legit threat to take the W most years. In today’s climate, Jurek wouldn’t be a 7x straight winner of WS though. He has won an array of races: WS, HR, Badwater, Spartahalon, that’s forever legendary. I feel like in all athletics, we desire the nostalgia of what once was, and while the track guys bring an element to the 50k, 50 miler range, the 100 miler is still it’s own unique beast.

jerky jurek. wrote:

Badwater and Spartathlon are not competitive races.

While often true about Badwater, Spartathlong has seen significant competition over the years. Jurek has the fastest time by someone not named Kouros (and that includes folks like 6:18 100K runner Valmir Nunes). IMO, Jurek's Spartathlon wins are perhaps , certainly among, his most impressive race wins.

not a championship runner. wrote:

He’s 1 for 7 in major competition, yet he can win time trials against himself in America. His record speaks for itself. His nerves get to him when he faces competition.

This.

Also what did it achieved outside US? One win at Tarawera 100 in 2017 and some minor races in Spain. That's it.

He's better not show at Comrades, he will finish buried by local speedsters.

«C'était étrange en réalité. En quittant La Fouly dans la descente, j'étais derrière lui et j'ai senti qu'il avait les appuis un peu moins fluides qu'avant. Globalement, je voyais que j'étais plus facile que lui. Dans la montée vers Champex, j'étais devant lui avec à peu près 40 secondes d'avance. J'ai juste maintenu mon rythme, mais Zach a fait l'effort de revenir et de se remettre devant moi. Je n'ai pas trop compris sa logique. Il ventilait vachement, il était de toute évidence largement amoindri. Après Champex, il y a quand même encore cinq heures de course, il faut garder du jus ! Je suis resté derrière lui, ce n'était pas le moment de s'affoler. Et en fait, j'ai l'impression qu'il s'est juste cramé», commente le Français.

Taken from an interview of winner Xavier Thevenard in L'Equipe

Rough translation:

"It was strange in reality. When leaving La Fouly in the descent, I was behind him (Zach Miller) and I felt he was running with a little less fluidity than before. I saw that I was easier than him. During the climb to Campex, I was in front of him by around 40 seconds. I just maintained my rhythm, but Zach made an effort to come back and then pass in front of me. I didn't really understand the logic. He was breathing heavily, it was clearly seriously 'diminished'. After Champex, there was still five hours to go, it was necessary to keep some juice! I stayed behind him, it was not the moment to panic. In fact, I had the impresssion, he had burnt himself out," said the Frenchman.

Sorry, but this is classic Zach....

I think there is video of this portion of the race. It reminded me of when you are on on an easy training run and pass someone (let's just say it someone less fit then you) and 30 seconds later you hear footsteps and heavy breathing.

Mizuno fanboy wrote:

Do we even know why he DNFd?

Nobody knows who's posted so far, but that doesn't stop the idle conjecture.

People in the comments section of irunfar.com are reporting Walmsley wasn't fully recovered from his training, that his legs weren't quite there since the beginning of the race.

It reminds me of something I've heard: more training isn't better, better training is better.

Anyway, let's see what he has to say. He's definitely taking his time...

This is why it’s hard to be enthusiastic about ultrarunning. Jim Walmsley goes out too hard and dies. Zach Miller does the ‘hobby jogger on the trail’ thing. Basically, you have top athletes who race like hobby joggers in their first 5k. The mindset and athlete pool within the sport just aren’t at a highly competitive level yet. Maybe in another 10 years.

SteelTownRunner wrote:

jerky jurek. wrote:

Badwater and Spartathlon are not competitive races.

While often true about Badwater, Spartathlong has seen significant competition over the years. Jurek has the fastest time by someone not named Kouros (and that includes folks like 6:18 100K runner Valmir Nunes). IMO, Jurek's Spartathlon wins are perhaps , certainly among, his most impressive race wins.

I will admit I didn't always appreciate Jurek when he was competing but looking back his career is really impressive. And guys like Walmsley and Miller could actually learn a lot from the way Jurek prepared and raced. No one was better a peaking for an event and executing a race strategy.

While Jurek may not have had a raw talent of some of the top runners today he got more out of his talent than any ultrarunner I can think of. I agree his Spartathon wins are impressive, yet he was also a great trail runner and set the course record at Hardrock - two events that are complete opposite in every way, from weather to terrain.

According to his interview he was running 140 miles a week with 50,000 feet of vertical leading up to this race. And he wonders why he didn’t have a whole lot of pop in his legs?

I think that Jim is a special athlete who can win any race 50 Miles and over. But he has not figured out how to train for UTMB, or any really long, really steep race. He needs to get over himself and start training appropriately.

How about 110 miles and 40,000 feet of vert? It’s still obscene weekly volume. The purpose of training is to be able to recover stronger. Not to beat yourself into submission.

It's ignorant to be so demanding of people doing a 100 mile race in the mountains. Even though it has happened to some extent, one shouldn't expect the same kind of repeat dominance like in simplistic races like those that occur on the track.

If some simpleton can't enjoy a sport without a super dominant star , with leading athletes who win, or fail equally and sometimes miserably , then they should stay away from ultra's.

Needs to get over himself wrote:

According to his interview he was running 140 miles a week with 50,000 feet of vertical leading up to this race. And he wonders why he didn’t have a whole lot of pop in his legs?

I think that Jim is a special athlete who can win any race 50 Miles and over. But he has not figured out how to train for UTMB, or any really long, really steep race. He needs to get over himself and start training appropriately.

How about 110 miles and 40,000 feet of vert? It’s still obscene weekly volume. The purpose of training is to be able to recover stronger. Not to beat yourself into submission.

I follow him on Strava and was surprised at how much more he was doing in that buildup. The mileage/vert don't give the full picture, either -- for three weeks he was doing 30+ hours of running per week with three or four 6+ hour runs. I wonder if he was able to eat enough with that much time on his feet.

The really bad part of that is that he is so gifted. He doesn’t need to do that.

Krupicka didn’t have much for speed at all. So he needed to put in volume to compete. Walmsley is so fast. Maybe to everyone on these boards a 4 minute miler is average but they aren’t where I or anyone else comes from.

Oh well. With low mileage he has a chance to win. With adequate mileage he is the favorite. With what he did, he looked shot 20 miles into the race.

Hopefully he comes back next year and 3rd time will be a charm.

Needs to get over himself wrote:

According to his interview he was running 140 miles a week with 50,000 feet of vertical leading up to this race. And he wonders why he didn’t have a whole lot of pop in his legs?

I think that Jim is a special athlete who can win any race 50 Miles and over. But he has not figured out how to train for UTMB, or any really long, really steep race. He needs to get over himself and start training appropriately.

How about 110 miles and 40,000 feet of vert? It’s still obscene weekly volume. The purpose of training is to be able to recover stronger. Not to beat yourself into submission.

Well, he did say in that interview that he had three weeks of that, and each week took an hour less (33, 32, 31 hours or something like that). That sounds like positive response from his body at the time doesn't it? It's not like it was way beyond far beyond what he had done before successfully. It's not like he hasn't run 120-130 miles a week with a ton of climbing. Obviously everyone has a limit that is different, and it changes for each person at different times as they get fitter or run down. Sure you'll always win in a hindsight criticism, but that's obviously not fair.

I handled 140 miles a week with a lot of climbing (but not that much) fine in college, and got faster from it eventually. I was a nobody with a lot less ability than Walmsley. I don't see how anyone can pinpoint a single mileage/climbing limit that no person can cross. If you are seeing good gains for your type of competition from a lot of mileage and climbing, it's smart to see how far you can take it before getting body feedback that you've found your limit. Obviously you don't want to go over, but you need to push that limit as long as you are still making gains from it, so going over is a hazard of the game. It's even necessary to go over the limit once in a (long) while, so you know the limit and learn the warning signs for next time. He sounds smart and calculating (in a good way) to me. He'll back off a bit sooner, not go as far, taper longer, or otherwise adjust next time.

Anyone who heard him say 140 miles and 50,000 feet of vertical should have been blown away. That wasn’t hindsight. It is easy to criticize later, but 50,000 feet of vertical in a week is huge. With 2 shake out days, that’s 10,000 feet of vert the other 5 days. 140 road miles is a completely different animal. Not even close to the same volume.

And I think it’s pretty obvious his body didn’t perfectly adapt.

I don’t have a right to criticize because he is the gladiator in the arena, not me. But from the outside looking in, it seems like he would benefit from someone reigning him in a little bit. He has the Flatbush long stuff figured out. But the steep hard mountain stuff he doesn’t. Not close.

Needs to get over himself wrote:

Anyone who heard him say 140 miles and 50,000 feet of vertical should have been blown away. That wasn’t hindsight. It is easy to criticize later, but 50,000 feet of vertical in a week is huge. With 2 shake out days, that’s 10,000 feet of vert the other 5 days. 140 road miles is a completely different animal. Not even close to the same volume.

And I think it’s pretty obvious his body didn’t perfectly adapt.

I don’t have a right to criticize because he is the gladiator in the arena, not me. But from the outside looking in, it seems like he would benefit from someone reigning him in a little bit. He has the Flatbush long stuff figured out. But the steep hard mountain stuff he doesn’t. Not close.

Where is your hard limit then? Like I said, I did 140+ mpw when young with a lot of climbing. That was about 30 years ago, so I don't know the amount of climbing, but likely more than 20,000 ft (always going up and down canyons) and this was just for the heck of it in college - I wasn't training for anything. You'd probably have to dig into his past training on strava to see what he handled well to really make a good determination rather than pull something out of a hat. But he obviously knows what he's done in the past, and my impression, following him, but not really looking carefully, is he's had a lot of big weeks before where 140 miles/50K ft isn't a huge leap.

Karel Saabe: Past several weeks of 129 miles/35K feet, 333 miles/81.5K feet, 363 miles/89.5K feet, 371 miles/61K feet, 365 miles/97K feet, 276 miles/91K feet. He was supremely fit at the end of his hike, doing an amazing Presidential Traverse and Carter-Moriah Traverse in one day.

I did an 18 mile, 9,000 foot day in the mountains, mostly off trail a couple months ago on crap fitness. I'm pushing near 50, and I did 13,000 ft climb on average and 60 miles per week this summer in the worse shape of my life. From my experiences past and present and some extrapolation, 140 miles/50K ft is impressive, but not a obvious overstep without the benefit of hindsight.