Where does Rupp come in your all-time greatest American distance runner list?

You are absolutely correct. Runners from the 60's and 70's did not have a fair chance to develop their full potential.

And it is fascinating that runners today can now have a lucrative career in running for 10-15 years past college even if this opportunity is only available for a handful of select and uniquely talented runners.

Who are the benefactors that you mention? Are they responsible for the change?

It is really silly not to understand the difference between an American born runner, an American raised runner and an American citizen.

If you immigrated prior to HS and you were raised in the HS running system in the USA and beyond and you have American citizenship, then you are an American runner even if you weren't born in the USA.

If you came to the USA after competing at the national level for another country, then in my opinion you are not an American runner for record purposes regardless of your citizenship.

As far as I know, nine of the ten on that list qualify as an American runner ...only Lagat does not qualify.

DaveW wrote:

If you came to the USA after competing at the national level for another country, then in my opinion you are not an American runner for record purposes regardless of your citizenship.

The laws of the U.S., and the rules of T&F, overrule your personal opinion. Any U.S. citizen who sets a record earns the record.

Silly boy, I proposed the laws of common sense. You can subscribe to whatever laws you want when it comes to T&F records. You can write them down any way you want. There is no governing body that can make you believe someone does or does not have a record.

So, DaveW, when are you moving to your own private Idaho?

People have questioned the validity of records from someone like Lagat for many years. I think Lagat is an incredible role model. But many would question if he had the right to run for one country and then put on a new jersey and re-write the records for another country.

I think he did more to improve running in the USA than he did to discourage it, but I think it is fair to say that he set the bar higher for any American raised runner to break American records and made it more difficult for them to be given credit.

The good news is than American runners now seem to be capable of breaking his records.

I don't know what private state you live in, but for you not to recognize this issue, I would guess that you live in the state of confusion?

DaveW wrote:

The good news is than American runners now seem to be capable of breaking his records.

Your personal bigotry is expressed very clearly.

I would rank Rupp 1st

never thought I would see a a white runner like him in my lifetime!....26:44 and 26:48....he did what I considered the impossible!....I am so PROUD of him and Sal....they gave me hope, I just hope they give other young americans the same hope!

not to mention all the other stuff he has done

Well why don't we just get rid of American records and just call them world records.

A man ran for another nation professionally, and you think it is bigoted to suggest that perhaps he should not also hold records in this country after changing nationality.

I don't think we want American tack and field to be populated by mercenaries. Why don't we patriate every one of the world leaders and go to the Olympics as the "real" champions. If we paid enough we could make that happen.

DaveW wrote:

I don't think we want American tack and field to be populated by mercenaries.

A U.S. citizen is a U.S. citizen. Are you white, DaveW?

DaveW wrote:

Well why don't we just get rid of American records and just call them world records.

A man ran for another nation professionally, and you think it is bigoted to suggest that perhaps he should not also hold records in this country after changing nationality.

I don't think we want American tack and field to be populated by mercenaries. Why don't we patriate every one of the world leaders and go to the Olympics as the "real" champions. If we paid enough we could make that happen.

You're clearly at least partially racist.

The USA is a country of immigrants. If you're white you're from European decent. Unless you Native American you aren't a "real" American. Should Billy Mills still have all the USA distance records? No.

This is a country of immigrants. We earned our citizenship. Some of us earned it by being born here. Some went through the citizenship process like Lagat did. Lagat is a proud American. This country has done a lot for him, he loves it here, he has a family here. He has done a lot for our sport. He showed the USA "an American can compete with the best in the world!" he also showed us "I'm American now, that means you have to run in the same ball park even to be competitive at the national level."

Competition creates greatness. Lagat provided that competition by raising the bar, and the rest of the USA responded. Lagat is an American. He's as American as you or I. If not more even. He's represented our country twice in the Olympics. He is an American role model and American hero. To be honest, that makes him more American than you or I.

NotAustin18 wrote:

Lagat is a proud American. This country has done a lot for him, he loves it here, he has a family here. He has done a lot for our sport. He showed the USA "an American can compete with the best in the world!" he also showed us "I'm American now, that means you have to run in the same ball park even to be competitive at the national level."

Competition creates greatness. Lagat provided that competition by raising the bar, and the rest of the USA responded. Lagat is an American. He's as American as you or I. If not more even. He's represented our country twice in the Olympics. He is an American role model and American hero. To be honest, that makes him more American than you or I.

If Lagat was a proud American, he wouldn't have hid the fact that he had American citizenship in 2004.

Instead, he decided to run for Kenya even though he was an american citizen.

Also, I suggest you read this thread Austin:

It will open your eyes about a lot of shady stuff that goes on in the sport.

Anyone putting Shorter or Prefontaine ahead of Rupp is an idiot.

These guys couldn't even successfully rabbit the first 5k of Rupp's 10k AR.

Prefontaine 5k PR 13:21

Shorter 5k PR 13:26.

Now I realize that Shorter did win an Olympic Gold and that certainly adds value, but come on people. If they were to race in their primes at any distance against Rupp. Rupp would smash them.

I didn't read the entire thread, but man, some of you have really got to get over your idolization and idealization of Pre. I mean, when is this going to end?

The Rocket. wrote:

Anyone putting Shorter or Prefontaine ahead of Rupp is an idiot.

These guys couldn't even successfully rabbit the first 5k of Rupp's 10k AR.

Prefontaine 5k PR 13:21

Shorter 5k PR 13:26.

Now I realize that Shorter did win an Olympic Gold and that certainly adds value, but come on people. If they were to race in their primes at any distance against Rupp. Rupp would smash them.

If Rupp ran in the times of Pre and Shorter than the technology for his mask would not exist or his gray area drugs. So therefore if Rupp ran against them in their times they would smash him because he would be on the sideline having an asthma attack. You can't compare times and if you try to you are an itiot.

drugged to the gills wrote:

If Lagat was a proud American, he wouldn't have hid the fact that he had American citizenship in 2004.

Instead, he decided to run for Kenya even though he was an american citizen.

Also, I suggest you read this thread Austin:

http://www.tracktalk.net/drugged-gills-t7931.html

It will open your eyes about a lot of shady stuff that goes on in the sport.

Yeah man I know about the shady stuff in the sport. Like my friend ran with Will Leer a few times, and Leer told him that NOP has a monthly supplement fee of $2000 per athlete. So they get this powder mixed in a drink during workouts and costs $2000 a month but won't disclose what it is.

As for Lagat, I think he's clean because Magness said that Lagat dopes but I think he believes that because of the false positive. That's my logic there. Also, a lot more people know about the NOP's dirty actions than Lagat. Besides the false positive, no reason to believe Lagat is dirty. Tons of athletes hate the NOP. Tons of coaches and athletes in the sport know they dope. Jack Daniels knows they dope. Steve Magness does. Schumacher's athletes know. Will Leer and Nick Willis know too.

Also, I was chatting with a guy who runs with Willis a lot, and in his own words "Willis is 110% clean. He legit gets riled up and cusses about how much he hates the drug cheats for stealing his prize money and medals because he has to try and beat them clean."

In my honest opinion, there is a certain limit in making a ranking of the best American distance runners and weighing too heavily on PRs.

Yes, Rupp's PRs are way faster than whatever Pre or Shorter Ran, or even Ryun.

However, I think the better way to look at is to see where a past runner's PRs compared to the competition in the world at the time or the WR at the time.

The reason I think this is because a runner chases/races an opponent, not necessarily the clock. If Pre was competing against Viren, he probably was worrying about how to get to 13:15. Getting to 12:50 wasn't even in the realm of possibility.

That said, Rupp has an Olympic medal, fairs comparatively well in world rankings and world competitions, has the versatile range of Pre, owns ARs, and is faster. Rupp is better than Pre.

Granted, this is a subjective list. I can see how a person could make a ranking putting Pre/Shorter ahead of present runners (Pre hardly lost to any American runners and was way more dominant in college); I can also see how it can be reasoned the other way around.

He's not in my top 5

Webb

Ryun

Solinksy

Ritz

Hall

GoldenMiles wrote:

What about Khalid, who still has the US marathon record? I know he's not US-born, but if you're counting Lagat.... Just haven't seen his name mentioned yet.

Was surprised it took page 4 to find Khalid mentioned. I was clicking through the pages just to see if anyone had mentioned him yet.