People have no idea how mediocre this is. Probably about 1/2 of 2:10 marathoners could beat this with a few 3 hour training runs in their regular program. That said, good for him.
Do i think 2:06 Ryan Hall or Olympic bronze medalist* form Galen Rupp would have any problem running 5:45 for 50 miles? Absolutely not and they were somewhere a bit above the middle of sub 2:10 guys. This got overwhelmingly downvoted but the reality is it's probably well over half....
Someone made an initial thread about this - I think the main issue people have with this besides it not being a very common distance for people to run and the difficulty of it still kind of being an unknown is that most people just don't like Charlie and the image he puts off. Seems like he doesn't have a great reputation among most runners. His insta definitely puts off "I'm trying my hardest to look cool" vibes, and from what I've heard he has daddys money and doesn't really need to work and can just train instead. Regardless he definitely still works hard, but not every sub-elite can train as a job and have endless money to spend on supplements, race nutrition for practice, and recovery tools.
His dad is a gym teacher in a poor town in Minnesota where he grew up, population like 2000 people. So, get your facts straight.
At Minnestoa, it appears that he was a solid runner, but certainly not national class, and absolutely not world class.
Actually, he’s better than world class.
At this distance he is the best the world has ever seen.
Whether we appreciate the achievement or not, think others could do better (but haven’t), or otherwise want to diminish it, the fact is that as of today, he’s the best ever.
The record has only come down three minutes in 44 years. And that’s with super shoes. So good for this guy, but for the state of competitive ultra running in general it’s not looking so hot.
The record has only come down three minutes in 44 years. And that’s with super shoes. So good for this guy, but for the state of competitive ultra running in general it’s not looking so hot.
That's because 50 miles is not a distance people race on roads.
100k is the distance which has the most races and competitions unfortunately not in the US. And I would think that some runners who went out to fast had similar 80k splits in 100k races at the moment they blew up.
The state of competitive ultrarunning is looking okay. You just need to know where to look.
At Minnestoa, it appears that he was a solid runner, but certainly not national class, and absolutely not world class.
Actually, he’s better than world class.
At this distance he is the best the world has ever seen.
Whether we appreciate the achievement or not, think others could do better (but haven’t), or otherwise want to diminish it, the fact is that as of today, he’s the best ever.
It was not an elite level performance. A win/WR at that distance has minimal cachet to a world class runner, it’s a disruption to training and an injury risk. There’s also very little financial motivation.
We're not in the 1900s anymore. There are now full time professional ultra runners. Jim Walmsley and Courtney Dauwalter to name two who are probably doing better financially than majority of the 2:10-2:12 marathoners in the US. Someone mentioned the prize money for this 50 miler was 3k, that's a better payday than the dude who ran 2:12 for 10th place this year at the NYC marathon. I mean look at the running news lately, this dude has been the hottest thing in running in the last few days. What do you think sponsors care about? They care about what catches the eyes of the masses.
At this distance he is the best the world has ever seen.
Whether we appreciate the achievement or not, think others could do better (but haven’t), or otherwise want to diminish it, the fact is that as of today, he’s the best ever.
It was not an elite level performance.
All the rest of what you wrote aside, let's just deal with this sentence:
"It was not an elite level performance."
It is literally (and I mean that word literally) the single greatest performance in human history at that distance. You literally cannot get any more elite than "the greatest ever."
We can woulda, coulda, shoulda and might all day long about what would happen if there is more financial incentive. And on that I totally agree. Run this race next year with $1,000,000 top prize and his record would be obliterated.
But hypotheticals don't matter. Real times, in real races, by real people setting real records is what matters.
His performance defines "elite" as far as this distance goes.
The record has only come down three minutes in 44 years. And that’s with super shoes. So good for this guy, but for the state of competitive ultra running in general it’s not looking so hot.
If you want to think about the state of competitive ultra running doing it by looking at results at 50 miles might be the worst way to do it. Is it run anywhere outside the US? Maybe there are one or two in the UK where they theoretically use the Metric System but have all their road signs in miles. If things stay as they are it would not surprise me if the World Record and the US Record are one and the same until the sun goes nova. If someone outside the US gets the fifty mile record it was probably en route to a 100 km. And even in the US, ultras are now usually run on trails, over mountains, etc. Most of these courses are not going to get someone an ultimately fast performance over any distance.
We're not in the 1900s anymore. There are now full time professional ultra runners. Jim Walmsley and Courtney Dauwalter to name two who are probably doing better financially than majority of the 2:10-2:12 marathoners in the US. Someone mentioned the prize money for this 50 miler was 3k, that's a better payday than the dude who ran 2:12 for 10th place this year at the NYC marathon. I mean look at the running news lately, this dude has been the hottest thing in running in the last few days. What do you think sponsors care about? They care about what catches the eyes of the masses.
Do you know what they are actually making?
I would love to know that. It's probably not as much as some think it is.
All the rest of what you wrote aside, let's just deal with this sentence:
"It was not an elite level performance."
It is literally (and I mean that word literally) the single greatest performance in human history at that distance. You literally cannot get any more elite than "the greatest ever."
We can woulda, coulda, shoulda and might all day long about what would happen if there is more financial incentive. And on that I totally agree. Run this race next year with $1,000,000 top prize and his record would be obliterated.
But hypotheticals don't matter. Real times, in real races, by real people setting real records is what matters.
His performance defines "elite" as far as this distance goes.
Greatest does not equal fastest. Comrades is just a few miles longer, hilly (gains over 3,500 feet even in down year) and the top runners there run about the same pace as Charlie did at Tunnell Hill. Hopefully Charlie can find a way to get there.
We're not in the 1900s anymore. There are now full time professional ultra runners. Jim Walmsley and Courtney Dauwalter to name two who are probably doing better financially than majority of the 2:10-2:12 marathoners in the US. Someone mentioned the prize money for this 50 miler was 3k, that's a better payday than the dude who ran 2:12 for 10th place this year at the NYC marathon. I mean look at the running news lately, this dude has been the hottest thing in running in the last few days. What do you think sponsors care about? They care about what catches the eyes of the masses.
Maybe, but there’s going to be a lot less money for the next guy and not enough to support even 5 guys.
As for sponsors, they want to market their products and ultras are not televised and have few spectators.
You didn’t respond to my comments about disruption of training, injury risk and lack of prestige. Based on the lack of competition, it seems that when the day arrives, a 2:10 guy is going to choose retirement over moving up to ultras.
The only thing I’ve learned from this thread is that the mediocre-just-go-longer crowd think that depth doesn’t matter.
This is equivalent to the beer mile world record in the first year that it gained a touch of buzz, when the normies were trying to break 5. When 4:5X was a world record, it 1. Wasn’t elite & 2. Was the fastest time anybody has literally ever run in that event in the world.
Ultras are niche. They’ll probably continue to be niche. And if anybody would be willing to post $150k for a 50mile world record, it’s getting broken by 30 minutes within a year. That’s why I don’t care about this run by the ego kid
The only thing I’ve learned from this thread is that the mediocre-just-go-longer crowd think that depth doesn’t matter.
This is equivalent to the beer mile world record in the first year that it gained a touch of buzz, when the normies were trying to break 5. When 4:5X was a world record, it 1. Wasn’t elite & 2. Was the fastest time anybody has literally ever run in that event in the world.
Ultras are niche. They’ll probably continue to be niche. And if anybody would be willing to post $150k for a 50mile world record, it’s getting broken by 30 minutes within a year. That’s why I don’t care about this run by the ego kid
An excellent post. At first I thought you were engaging in hyperbole when you said the 50 mile record could be 30 minutes faster within a year with enough incentive. You were not and if enough money were at stake the record could well be around 4:15. It would take a great marathoner type to do it but truth matters here. You and I are outnumbered in this thread and I have nothing bad to say about Charlie, as I just know so little about him. And I give him credit for his effort, but his talent level is just not that great. He is a grinder, at best it seems a 2:15ish marathoner, which is not bad.
Outside Magazine and Runner’s world have written articles. It is not like he’s being unrealistic here. Running 50 miles is a higher risk for injury and harder mentally, and surely there is less prize money but also massive potential to be one of the first to do something. That’s why Camille Herron keeps setting records and probably makes a decent amount of money from sponsors.
“I’m a 2:16 guy and that’s a good marathon, but it’s not great,” Lawrence said. “There are a lot of guys who have run 2:09, 2:10, 2:11 and 2:12, and I think they could run very good 50-mile races and 50Ks, too, but it’s more than just running longer. I’ve learned that it’s very much between the ears when it comes down to it, because you’ve got to play mental games and convince yourself that it’s not that much farther and that you can hold a certain clip for the remaining miles.”
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