Ryan Hall 1:03:53

The best scenario I can imagine is Ryan experimenting with a very hard week during the NYC Half. Sub-5 for 13.1 is not a bad tempo during a uniquely hard week.

runmore wrote:

I kind of like Jack Daniels view of "fluke" races. In one of his videos he says that the "fluke" race is not a fluke at all. The runner has just shown what he is capable of. Anything less then that level is a problem that should be investigated.

I realize that many of you are not competitive athletes so there is an understandable disconnect going. What you are saying is that anything less than the extrmem outlier performance is a problem? Dp you really believe that athletes are capable of running PRs every time out "or there is a problem"?

Your PRs are your "fluke" races by definition. They are the ones when there is a confluence of factors all in alignment: fitness, opportunity, venue, weather, competition, etc. There is no problem if you can't set a PR in every competition period.

True. 4:53s are slow for him, but again we don't know what he did the week leading up to the race.

The guy appears to be healthy, but pehaps the seven fast marathons that he has run so far has taken a toll on him?

There are some so called experts that have stated a marathon runner only has 8-9 all out marathon efforts in them.

There are exceptions of course, but maybe he is on the down side.

I hope not, but it has been three years since his 2:06...

I guess by that reasoning then one bad race shouldn't be something to worry about is it may also be an aberration. I wonder if he has come out said anything about the race that might shed some light on the performace.

He ran well in Houston and had a subpar performance here. It could have been for a lot of reasons. I am wondering Malmo if you ever had a similar experience and then had a good race? I know that I have, but your experience with elite running might be more relevant here. But I guess I am just wondering, if he ran 62 something at houston and still ran sub 5 pace here (close to 4:50) with Boston still a ways out, can more rest or fine tuning bring him around? It seems like he and many others have done so a lot of times with respect to half's and then coming back and running full marathons due to the notion that they were training through. I am still inclined to wait and see.

broken arrow wrote:

True. 4:53s are slow for him, but again we don't know what he did the week leading up to the race..

4:53s were slow for me, and I've run exactly TWO minutes slower than him for a HM. So it wouldn't matter if he swam across the English Channel the week of the race, 1:03:53 is so god-awful slow that he would have to be dragging his feet on the ground Fred Flintstone style to do it --- unless he's simply not fit, or sick, or injured.

Darnell wrote:

Insanity is repeating the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. That seems to be the case with Ryan. His workouts and training always seem to be the same and now the results are about the same. Sure there is value in the repitition and monotony, but after a while you've got to mix it up a bit. He should definitely not be afraid to train for some shorter races.

I'll bet he was doing considerably faster training prior to his half marathon AR. Maybe not the month before, but definitely in the 1-3 years before.

That was not the impression I got. It seems to me that what he is doing DIFFERENTLY is causing his slower times, like changing coaches. It seems like that wasn't a good idea, and I have to admit I was uneasy when he decided to do that. I think he should look for someone to coach him, now, but I don't think he will, and there's no guarantee of success even if he does.

It all depends on what he has been doing in training leading up the race. You assume he is peaking.

I believe the downward trend started before he switched coaches.

malmo wrote:

broken arrow wrote:

True. 4:53s are slow for him, but again we don't know what he did the week leading up to the race..

4:53s were slow for me, and I've run exactly TWO minutes slower than him for a HM. So it wouldn't matter if he swam across the English Channel the week of the race, 1:03:53 is so god-awful slow that he would have to be dragging his feet on the ground Fred Flintstone style to do it --- unless he's simply not fit, or sick, or injured.

The point of this post (and Malmo's expert analysis) is that a runner of Hall's caliber should be able to run 1:03:53 as a long tempo on two or three days rest.

Half-marathon times are not the best predictors of marathon performance, this has been hashed out on other threads, so worrying about Hall based on ONE race is silly. There are people who have gone sub60 a month before their marathons and blew up, and there are others who have gone way off what you'd expect and then ran great marathons. So it's a bit pointless to say he's doing poorly when 1. no one knows his training and 2. no one knows what happened race day. Khannouchi ran 1:05 in his leadup to one of his Chicago wins, and also ran 1:02+ before his 2:05 WR (basically running at his WR pace). The point is that athletes of Hall's character have off days or may train through stuff and give the impression that things are suboptimal. Even races at 1:04 may happen. Right now any "expert analysis" is purely idle speculation.

I would be much more worried for Ryan Hall in his Boston marathon if he ran 60 min half instead of 63:53

Thank you Malmo for your assessment. I have to trust what you are saying as running a 1:01 Half Marathon is a monster performance that is beyond my comprehension.

malmo wrote:

4:53s were slow for me, and I've run exactly TWO minutes slower than him for a HM. So it wouldn't matter if he swam across the English Channel the week of the race, 1:03:53 is so god-awful slow that he would have to be dragging his feet on the ground Fred Flintstone style to do it --- unless he's simply not fit, or sick, or injured.

And how fast did YOU run for 26.2 off of that 61-minute half marathon, malmo? Care to share?

malmo wrote:

Your PRs are your "fluke" races by definition. They are the ones when there is a confluence of factors all in alignment: fitness, opportunity, venue, weather, competition, etc. There is no problem if you can't set a PR in every competition period.

Kind of reminds me of how people look at a slate of someone's PRs and point out that the person has a "weak" distance based on the slowest relative performance. Say someone has 13:15/28:00/1:01:30/2:10:00. Great, we have a guy who somehow underperforms at 10K and the marathon but not in between. So now our man pops a 27:30 and *really* sucks at the marathon, or nails a 2:08:00 and is left with an inability to circle 25 laps of a track effectively. In the end there's always going to be a "weak" mark, because erasing it almost always exposes another "weakness" that was formerly neutral or an asset. It's like a game of Whack-a-Mole for Internet numbers geeks and armchair beainfart-factories.

By the way, conditions at Boston were very favorable last year, and times were fast across the board. So that's another would-be strike against Hall's performances in recent years.

Obviously it would have made NO sense for Hall to try and win the NYC half, or even lay down a fast, competitive time. He is pointing towards Boston. He doesn't want to leave his hoped-for Boston victory at NY.

By the same token, I'm unnerved by his tweet, which suggests that something is indeed going wrong here.

I'm with those who will nevertheless wish Hall well and wait and see what he brings to the table at Boston.

I'm willing to buy the explanation that he ran the half as part of a hard training week, and that his tweet is part of that plan, the sort of "Whew!" that somebody offers up when they knew they were going to deliver a subpar performance (thanks to training) but want to make their sponsor feel that they got good value for the appearance $$$ they shelled out. NO sponsor wants to feel that a top runner just punched it in. So there's an incentive for Hall to say, "Hey, I sweated hard out there, just didn't have it, yada yada yada."

That's the best construction I can put on the whole thing.

Boston will certainly provide answers. If Hall turns in a fast time, and of course if he wins the thing, he'll turn out to have been a genius who knew exactly what he was doing. If he turns in a sub-par performance yet again--well, no "explanation" can help him.

Ryan talks a little about the performance here...

http://www.universalsports.com/blogs/blog=blockheadblog/postid=525788.html

chrismiller262 wrote:

Ryan talks a little about the performance here...

http://www.universalsports.com/blogs/blog=blockheadblog/postid=525788.html

He said 4:50 pace feels easy for him, and he wants 4:48 pace at Boston (2:05 high). This does not seem reasonable to me. He only managed 4:53 pace on Sunday, and it looks like anything slightly faster than 4:50 will kill him. Boston will not have perfectly even paces. He needs to handle some slow miles and fast miles, if not for surges, at least for the hills. It looks like he's ready to blow up at the first sub 4:40 mile, and he does not plan to do any speedwork.

The lead pack dropped Hall early in the race on the hills of Central Park, and a few posters on other threads said the opening mile or two was rather "pedestrian" for this caliber race. To get dropped that early and to look so miserable when he passed me on the West Side Highway, especially with the favorable tailwind, points to Hall being in trouble.

A 13 mile Tempo run, let alone at marathon pace, should be easy for him right now regardless of taper or no taper. Distance running is definitely hugely mental, but there's a point at which delusion enters the discussion when convincing yourself all is ok while the plane is in a fiery tailspin.

I can only imagine how tough it would be to coach yourself, train alone, think things are going ok, and then go run a tune-up race and get smoked. His confidence must be obliterated. I don't think Hall is finished, but don't you need some reference points in training? He seems to think that the key to success is tempo runs.