Riley made the team because he wore Alphaflys. Linden lost out because she didn't.

For anyone interested, the built-in spring mechanism for the next% is different than the 'air-spring pods' used in the alpha-fly's. My understanding is that the former relies upon a curve-shaped carbon plate that gets bent (i.e., flattened) during ground-strike, thus storing some spring energy, that is then released foot propels forward off the ground. The specific manner of integration into the shoe, and shape of that carbon-fiber plate, are critical to determining any mechanical assist it provides.

What is this about the shoes blowing out? Haven’t seen that but fill me in

It is conceivable current marketing objectives are to achieve/demonstrate optimal performance of the shoe regardless of who wears them.

the doped shoes wrote:

wejo wrote:

Do you want your athletes on a level playing field or not?

Didn't you see Tom Layden's (with SI at one time?) vblog commentary? He in essence says there is no 'level playing field', since it can be distorted with technology by those with the financial means to do so. His examples were oversize tennis rackets or oversize golf clubs. In essence, there has been a full-on jumping of the shark in the shoe world, crossing-the-line to now accept spring loaded spring-assist shoes.

Will you guys do a proper technical analysis and report, because comments on the boards indicate folks don't yet realize this important point.

@ ~1:55 "Is the playing field level?..."The playing field has never been level."

bloviating wrote:

Ha! There is no way Riley, an unsponsored runner got those shoes any earlier than when Nike was gifting them. Why weren’t his shoes deadened?

Haha, that's some grade A tin foil hat material. Let's give him something to work with. There's two stacks of shoes on opposite walls. He could tell us one pile was good, one pile (front wall) was deadened? But we need more info from the athletes. Were certain athletes given shoes from a different wall? Seems really far fetched. Start at 6:16. Please note I'm not agreeing with him at all. It's a ludicrous suggestion.

The year is 2020. Shoe controversy has covered the land. The scene is the trials in a former Olympic host city with pot hole ridden holes. Shoes are given away to quell the rumblings of unfair shoe performance. They don't want these shoes banned and must give them to everyone.

A no-name runner enters the secret shoe room. No photography allowed. They direct him to a row of boxes on the front wall to select his size.

"What about those shoes on the other wall?"

"Those shoes are for closers only"

Now he's angry. Somethings up. Why won't they let me touch those other shoes?

Before leaving, he surrupticiously swaps his front wall box with a back wall box. This must be the good stuff.

The next day, history is made. Top runners twist ankles and get trampled by the massive field. The other non branded athletes have bad days in their new shoes. The best runner saves his fitness for a more important ultra.

The no-name runner is 2nd.

How can you say that Riley would have finished 4th? Don't forget that he beat out 3rd, 4th and 5th, who were all wearing alphaflys too.

wejo wrote:

In general the scientists are saying people on an individual level may respond to the shoes and some may not.

This is incorrect. Of the four studies done on the VFs and Next%, only one (so far unpublished) has found cases where there were no improvements in running economy. And in that one, every participant still got faster running a 3k time trial in VFs compared to their usual shoe. In every other study, EVERY participant improved running economy. That is what makes the Nike shoes game-changers. There is a range within that, some see improvements of just 1.5%, others up to 7/8% so you have responders and super-responders but you don't have non-responders.

The problem for Molly Huddle is that the Saucony super-shoe isn't as good as the Nike's. She got no benefit from the Saucony but I would bet good money she benefits from the Next%. It looks from the outside that the Saucony Endorphin Pro has been designed around Jared Ward and it's not surprising he gets a lot of benefit from it (4.4% according to Huddle).

THOUGHTSLEADER wrote:

This thread is dumb. How many guys on the men's side were running in the Alphas? Maybe 75? How many athletes total were within 85 seconds of him? Just 3. Mind you every single one of those 3 was a Nike athlete who had access to the Alphas or wore them. The other guys within 2 minutes (Hehir, Albertson) all had competitive shoes.

Riley got 2nd because he had a damn good race.

False. He got 2nd because he had a damn good race and he had the shoes. Put him in a standard pair of racing flats and he's outside the top 10 and we aren't even mentioning his name. Might have been outside the top 15. We know Riley is a good marathoner in the super shoes. He's a super responder.

Thankfully in the men's race, most of the top men were in the shoes so there is less to wonder. If I'm Scott Fauble though, I'm always wondering. Same with Sisson.

Sisson canned it at 21 miles so she has no business wondering about anything. Fauble on the other hand...

Before the race, almost everyone thought this was a course where a 2:11 or 2:12 would be enough for the men. The non-Nike athletes were running around those times. Put every runner in Streaks or Takumi Sen and it's a different race with only Rupp still certain to make it.

And Des Linden definitely lost to the shoes.

When Des retires she will probably be more open about the fact that her career was screwed by the shoes. She finished 2nd in 2016 trials to the shoes. She probably would of medaled in Rio but the shoes. Now she misses out on being the first female American marathoner to make 3 Olympic teams because of the shoes.

At this point she has no other option but to collect Brooks money but if you get a few beers in her she will tell you what she really thinks.

The top men were wearing Nikes because they were the top men and always wear Nike. You are so ridiculous.You really think Rupp can't win without Nikes? He has how many US titles on the track? And Abdi has been great for 20 years. Tons of people in the race were wearing Nike shoes, yet these guys were at the front. You really think the few non-Nike shoes would have magically beaten them if Rupp/Abdi/Riley weren't wearing Nike shoes? Give me a break. Stop trying to take away from the achievements of these runners.

We have perfect evidence in the women's race that it's not the shoes, yet you ignore it. Emma Bates smashes her old PR this fall in Chicago after switching AWAY from the Nike shoes. We have a 10k world record set in ADIDAS shoes. I can go on and on with more evidence, but you ignore all of that and only cling to the results that can 'prove' that the Nike shoes are cheating and make people way faster.

Absolute speculative fantasy! Prove that Riley would have finished outside the top 10 without the shoes. You can't, because it's a completely ridiculous statement. Way to slam one of the best championship performances from a hardworking non-sponsored runner - I thought LR loved these runners as the real blue collar types??

I beg of you, please get off the shoe hysteria. It's a done issue. Move on. The shoes are legal and will remain that way. When the shoes come anywhere close to delivering back near 100% of the energy put in, let us know.

The reason Linden did not runner better and make the Olympic team was most likely due to training that was affected by her dealing with the flu midway through. Des, Josh, Walt, and others would not say the flu had a significant affect on her training to the public before the race and may not say it to the press after the race since many may say an athlete is just making excuses. With the flu she likely felt terrible for a week or more and was not able to train at prior level for an additional week or more. That will definitely set back one's marathon training progression.

The following is from the article:

So when Linden says, as she did at Thursday’s press conference, that some “posture stuff” prevented her from hitting her workout splits early in the segment, or that she dealt with the flu midway through, I’m not as worried about her as I would be with a less-experienced athlete. And everyone in the Linden camp — her coach Walt Drenth, her agent Josh Cox, and Des herself — has said her fitness has progressed nicely over the last few weeks.

https://www.letsrun.com/news/2020/02/analyzing-the-big-five-women-at-the-2020-us-olympic-marathon-trials/

I’m less sure about this. I’m a 130 lb, decent high school distance runner, and I vastly prefer them over spikes for 3200 and up.

Most on this thread are ignoring that we're dealing with science here.

You can make assumptions, but don't forget that Nike knows what they're doing. They DO have a super shoe that's better than anything else by a longshot, but given science, it can't work exactly the same for everyone.

Kipchoge is not wearing the same shoe that Rupp wears, and vice-versa.

The shoe also won't work for everyone, there are too many variables involved. If you're a Linden, under contract with another company, you're starting at less than zero. And hint: We're dealing here with 'force,' which is sort of a big deal in physics. Saying the women's race proves it's not the shoes is not saying much.

Saying a 10K road record in Adidas proves it's not the shoes isn't saying much either. In that case, you're dealing with 'time,' as well as force. There are a lot of moving parts here. The boom in performances that parallels the release of the fly shoes is not a coincidence.

Rojo, you've lost your mind in the shoe hysteria. Practically NOBODY was wearing a standard pair of racing flats. That is no longer a thing. Everyone has a shoe with a plate and a significant stack height/foam midsole. I'd urge you to look at Runner's World's analysis.

Thus, it is patently absurd to ask Riley to wear a pair of racing flats when nobody else was. A complete red herring.

Now, if you want to say put him in the Rocket X, the Next%, the Hyperion Elite or Saucony's shoes...that's absolutely fine, I don't think he would've come close to falling out of the top 5 (sub 2:11:29) in any of the competitor shoes. If you think he'd be out of the top 10, and losing 135 seconds you have jumped the shark. That means you think CJ Albertson would run 2:09:30 in alphaflys on that course? Come on.

Are others here really saying women and men are different to explain the Nike's shaky performance in the women's race? After we've seen clearly that's bunk with the HM World Records, Salpeter in Tokyo, Chepngetich (sp.) etc.

If you're Scott Fauble you got beat by 2 minutes and ran markedly worse than you did in Boston (just look at who he beat that day or ran close to). You saw your teammate in the same shoes win the women's race. You know it's on you and not the shoes for having a decent race and not your best day.

If you're Emily Sisson you ran 2:23 in your marathon debut. You couldn't hack it in Atlanta because the hills/wind were too much.

dude .... wrote:

Kipchoge is not wearing the same shoe that Rupp wears, and vice-versa.

The shoe also won't work for everyone, there are too many variables involved. If you're a Linden, under contract with another company, you're starting at less than zero. And hint: We're dealing here with 'force,' which is sort of a big deal in physics. Saying the women's race proves it's not the shoes is not saying much.

Saying a 10K road record in Adidas proves it's not the shoes isn't saying much either. In that case, you're dealing with 'time,' as well as force. There are a lot of moving parts here. The boom in performances that parallels the release of the fly shoes is not a coincidence.

You got the part about Kipchoge and Rupp's shoes wrong. They were both in the alpha-flys, the shoe with the springy air-pods up in the fore-foot. Watch their foot-strike mechanics, particulary Rupp's 'punching of the ground', up on his toes, at the end of the Trials race.

Another guy I think that would likely benefit from that type of shoe is Schrader, the guy that went out up-front early; examine his nice stride, up on his toes.

THOUGHTSLEADER wrote:

Rojo, you've lost your mind in the shoe hysteria. Practically NOBODY was wearing a standard pair of racing flats. That is no longer a thing. Everyone has a shoe with a plate and a significant stack height/foam midsole. I'd urge you to look at Runner's World's analysis.

First of all, discussing the biggest thing since drugs (steroids, EPO, etc) that has removed the 'purity' of competitive physicality from a foot-race, which is technology's encroachment on shoe-wear, is hardly 'hysteria'.

Secondly, just jamming more foam and/or a carbon plate in a shoe will not determine its effectiveness in energy storage and return.

Lastly, RW analysis (or other probably) is probably not going to get into the specifics of what is the physics behind the specific improvements in the shoes. But post a link if you think they have an analysis of value.