Top 5 all time waste of talents in T&F?

Blah wrote:

I think you are overestimating how much talent Ryun had if you think he could solo a 3:45 on a cinder track given that I don't think anyone ever could solo a 3:45 on a cinder track. I doubt Ryun had that much more talent than El G, Morceli, Coe,...

You do have a point here. The British miler closest to Ryun in terms of early talent is probably Steve Cram, who ran a mile in 3:57.4 when he was 17 years and nine months old.

Ryun ran 3:55.3 in June 1965, when he was 18 years and two months old. So Ryun's potential was close to Cram's, which means that you're right that I was overestimating his talent. Instead of 3:45 on a cinder track, he could probably have run 3:46 on a synthetic track.

All Ducks wrote:

Steve Prefontaine

Jim Hill

Dave Mack

Dub Myers

Add John Zishka and Chris Hamilton to that list. Lotta talent burned out at Oregon in the 80s.

Was the answer you?

I didn't read past the first couple of posts on page one. This thread is mean as hell. These are people from OUR running community. Shame on all of you who called people out as failures. Go notice the plank in your own running times before you point out the speck in your fellow runners'.

Cold and heartless. See your own name here and find out how that feels.

Rudy wrote:

Henry Rono: The things he did were amazing, but I can't help what *wonder* might have been.

Steve Magness

Tim Danielson

Obea Moore

Darrell Robinson. One class of drugs got him to one place, another class put him off the deep end....

There is enough doubt about the circumstances of Pre's death to keep him off the list. Was Ivo Van Damme a "waste"?

What about Colin Costello?

went to Arkansas as the new great Irish hope in the 1500

and the European Junior Champ in 2005

irish junior record holder also

I'm surprised no one mentioned Zola Budd. I believe he retired at the age of 22 considering her success up to that point she probably could have been one of the best ever had she continued on with running.

chris nelloms

obea moore

william reed

jowanna mc mullen

i agree with obea moore and probably gabe jennings as two good ones from the past 15 years or so.

but in general, i'm not sure that i agree with the other examples of top high school talent that didn't pan out in college or beyond college. there are a number of reasons why some people excel at the high school level and, for many of them, it is not a surprise in retrospect that they showed little, if any, improvement in college or after that.

for example, although i didn't follow granville's career closely, it's not particularly surprising to me that someone with a physically mature body could run his best lifetime effort at 800 meters at age 17 or 18. i don't think it's anywhere near a given that he had the ability to run, say, 1:44 low. at the same time, it is somewhat surprising he wasn't able to more consistently run near the top of the NCAA level in the 800 in college, so perhaps he did slack off a bit, but i don't know.

same thing for people like erin sullivan and julia stamps. they ran well in college, but they weren't world beaters. it's not that uncommon for that to happen to top high school female runners, so i'm not convinced that there was a waste of talent there.

honestly i think the biggest wastes of talents are going to be people that you've barely, or haven't, heard of. the guys who run 25 miles per week and run 1:48; or 50 miles per week and run 13:45-13:55. they don't make a big impression, or any impression, on the national scene and we, nor they, will ever know what could have been.

cornelius chirchir. world junior record holder for 1500m

Jerry Lidgren

Response wrote:

Who was the 800m runner at Tennessee (before Mark Sylvester) who won 2-3 NCAA Championships and then went away?

Actually Tennessee had a couple of unbelieveable guys during the 80's who couldn't keep their lives together to race at their ability level...

Jose "Tony" Parilla. Ran 1:43.97 to make the 1992 Olympic Team as a 20 year old. Won 3 outdoor NCAA Titles and one indoor. Made the 1996 Olympic Team and ripped his Achilles up before the Games and never fully recovered.

He was pretty nasty, I watched him run down all kinds of people at Penn on sprint medley. I also saw him run a great 1200 on distance medley, he had 45 open 400 speed to go with it.

Strange though- he had the shortest legs for someone so fast.

Elzie Coleman.

Earl Jones won an Olympic medal and had the American record for 800 for awhile. He was awesome.

Rodey Haley

Ryan Hall

William Reed

Earl Jones

_________________________________________

The above was my original list.

Earl Jones was a good miler also, career cut short by car accident.

I did, in the link I provided earlier: "He returned to competition in January and in short order ran a 3:56.4 mile in San Diego, equaling the world indoor record. Last month, prepping for his rematch with Liquori, he posted a time of 3:55.8 at the Kansas Relays, the fastest mile that he or anyone else had run in three years."http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,944433,00.html

Living in the Past wrote:

Can you please identify the race where Ryun set a world indoor mile record?

As for his "spotty" performances, you obviously weren't following his career in 1971 and 1972, otherwise you'd know what I mean. The same year he dueled Liquori in Philadelphia, he finished last in a mile at London's Crystal Palace, running something like 4:10 or 4:11 to finish behind Dave Bedford of all people. Throughout '71-72, Ryun would run a mile in 4:10 or even 4:14 one week to finish dead last and then run 3:57 the following week to win handily. I'm not joking. The fact that he ran 3:52.8 is a part of that pattern.

Now, back to this "world indoor mile record" that you claim he set. Tell me about this (I don't think you can).