nitpick wrote:
Wavelight matters a lot too and I think its importance is being discounted both in terms of (i) higher max performance and, more importantly, (ii) much greater likelihood of performing near one’s ceiling in any given time trial style race. So people can run a bit faster now than without it (absolutely perfect pacing sans wavelight is just not possible), and, in paced races, people are way more likely to run really fast, because pacing is perfect say 75% of the time in a real TT now (maybe sometimes they just don’t follow the lights or something) vs. near-perfect maybe 10% of the time previously. Just look at any pre-wavelight WR (or SB) splits to post-wavelight splits and this will be very obvious, especially at ~3k and up
Overall I’d guess the shoes are worth a few seconds at most at 5k. Which means Jakob’s 2mi is even crazier than it seems
I know this is a popular idea, but no, the PB conversion going to the perfect pacing of the lights (which no one actually follows perfectly) from the excellent pacing of a skilled pro without lights should not count for more than a second over the course of a mile.