Is Daniel Komen's 3000m world record insurmountable?

ex-runner wrote:

Subway Surfers Addiction wrote:

Geb had plenty of opportunities to break it and never got close.

El Guerrouj gave it everything and was primed for that and wasn't even close.

Bekele wouldn't have been able to run faster than El Guerrouj at that distance.

No way Mo is running 7:21.

The reason the record is 7:20 is Komen was on alot of sauce and he was perfectly designed to run slightly slower than 1500m pace for a few minutes extra.

Come on, El G was close. One and only one attempt with much less than perfect pacing (only got him a bit over 1500m) and he runs within 2.4s of the time. First time running the event and he pops a 7:23. That's damn close. Cram in the commentary said he will for sure get it if he tries again.

I don't think he even broke 7:30 again did he? He won Indoors WC in, I think, 2001, and I know he ran 7:34.high in 2004.

His WR attempt was in 99 and he didn't retire til after Athen 2004. So in five more years he never even got close to it. Nor did his 5000m performances indicate anything like 7:20 fitness. Komen broke 7:30 five times in a year and a half, lol.

The only way he'd ever run 7:20 was if Komen had paced the race for him, and he could draft the entire race until 200m to go. Worked for Geb. :)

He didn't try again though did he. Had other things to focus on such as Olympics and World's which Komen seemed to avoid in his career.

And I think he also realised that there was no point in wasting time and energy in trying to break this slightly more obscure track record when he already had the mile and a sh*t load of money. Champs are more important.

ex-runner wrote:

He didn't try again though did he. Had other things to focus on such as Olympics and World's which Komen seemed to avoid in his career.

He didn't avoid the 97 Worlds when he won a gold medal in what was one of the most impressive championship 5000m wins ever.

He missed 96 OG when he came 4th in the Kenyan Trials.

Whoa hold up there Kimosabe - while I agree with you that El G was the most likely candidate let's just get our facts right with his 7.23 effort. He didn't run 7.23 with a super fast last km - he barely broke 2.30 (2.29.56) as he went through 2000m in 4.53.55 and only broke 2.30 thanks to bludgeoning out a 59.67 final lap

So actually in order to run 7.20 you almost certainly want to run back to back 2.27's and finish with 2.26 final km - almost exactly what El G did. Maybe the first lap was too fast which definitely hurts but he was still right there with the record a possibility at 2000m - something that almost nobody else in history could lay claim to (I haven't seen another 3000m with someone right on that 4.54.0 2000m limit).

Komens record is in the Flo-Jo zone - it's not being broken by "unassisted" human being

Oh and one more thing - that old Rieti track (prior to the re-surfacing in 2005 and 2012) was almost certainly short. It's part of European athletics folklore which may have aided Komens seemingly otherworldly effort

There is no world record that is unbeatable. All records will be beaten in future when better training systems and talents and so on will come. Komen`s 3000 record is on a distance that is not so often done at the world top running. And we have to remember he "only" ran 3.29 at 1500 .....there will be faster runner in future.

With DANCAN-system into the future....

Salvatore Stitchmo wrote:

Oh and one more thing - that old Rieti track (prior to the re-surfacing in 2005 and 2012) was almost certainly short. It's part of European athletics folklore which may have aided Komens seemingly otherworldly effort

It won't be short, every world record has to be officially measured something like four or six times for ratification (heck Guinness might also measure it). It may be illegally hard. What is likely the case is at times you can have a right-to-left wind (tail wind down the back straight) but no head wind up the home straight because of the stand. But this doesn't explain Ovett's 3:30.7 in 1983.

SUPERIOR COACH JS wrote:

There is no world record that is unbeatable. All records will be beaten in future when better training systems and talents and so on will come.

While this may be true in the abstract, 10.49 is probably the most difficult one to get.

It had it all, including an equipment malfunction. To recreate all those qualities at one time for one extraordinary athlete is extremely unlikely.

Sprintgeezer wrote:

SUPERIOR COACH JS wrote:

There is no world record that is unbeatable. All records will be beaten in future when better training systems and talents and so on will come.

While this may be true in the abstract, 10.49 is probably the most difficult one to get.

It had it all, including an equipment malfunction. To recreate all those qualities at one time for one extraordinary athlete is extremely unlikely.

Sprintgeezer, are you sure? Some of those field event records are very distant. The women's 400m WR may even be better. Wasn't FloJo's 10.49 due to a faulty wind gauge? EPO-era times are now all out of reach, 1k to 10k.

So Komen's IAAF page lists a 7:41.16 indoor 3k in Gent, Belgium, in 2013 when he was 36 years old. If so, he was just the best ever, period.

Did this actually happen or might it have been a mix-up with a Daniel Kipchirchir result?

SUPERIOR COACH JS wrote:

There is no world record that is unbeatable. All records will be beaten in future when better training systems and talents and so on will come. Komen`s 3000 record is on a distance that is not so often done at the world top running. And we have to remember he "only" ran 3.29 at 1500 .....there will be faster runner in future.

With DANCAN-system into the future....

That doesn't make any sense coach! Why have the following records not been broken and are still standing strong for decades? ?

Kratochvílová (800) 1983...FFS!

El G (1500) 1998!

Paula (marathon) 2003

So, there you go coach...what say you?

Subway Surfers Addiction wrote:

Sprintgeezer wrote:

While this may be true in the abstract, 10.49 is probably the most difficult one to get.

It had it all, including an equipment malfunction. To recreate all those qualities at one time for one extraordinary athlete is extremely unlikely.

Sprintgeezer, are you sure? Some of those field event records are very distant. The women's 400m WR may even be better. Wasn't FloJo's 10.49 due to a faulty wind gauge? EPO-era times are now all out of reach, 1k to 10k.

I believe the faulty wind gauge is what he's referring to as "equipment malfunction", hence the impossibility to recreating the scenario.

The men's 400m hurdles wr is a tough challenge.

vivalarepublica wrote:

So Komen's IAAF page lists a 7:41.16 indoor 3k in Gent, Belgium, in 2013 when he was 36 years old. If so, he was just the best ever, period.

Did this actually happen or might it have been a mix-up with a Daniel Kipchirchir result?

Had to be a mixup. Komen didn't run that, he hasn't run anything serious in decades.

Subway Surfers Addiction wrote:

The men's 400m hurdles wr is a tough challenge.

I was watching some Kevin Young videos and he is a freak of nature in the vein of Usain Bolt. The dude towered over the competition and he took less steps between the hurdles. The guy was an absolute beast.

Everyone seems to be a "coach" these days wrote:

SUPERIOR COACH JS wrote:

There is no world record that is unbeatable. All records will be beaten in future when better training systems and talents and so on will come. Komen`s 3000 record is on a distance that is not so often done at the world top running. And we have to remember he "only" ran 3.29 at 1500 .....there will be faster runner in future.

With DANCAN-system into the future....

That doesn't make any sense coach! Why have the following records not been broken and are still standing strong for decades? ?

Kratochvílová (800) 1983...FFS!

El G (1500) 1998!

Paula (marathon) 2003

So, there you go coach...what say you?

Well.....their records can stand for some more decades. The point is that they will be broken sooner or later into the future....

...probably not under my lifetime ....but I hope to be "father" to the new world records at 5000- marathon....time will show :)

vivalarepublica wrote:

Subway Surfers Addiction wrote:

The men's 400m hurdles wr is a tough challenge.

I was watching some Kevin Young videos and he is a freak of nature in the vein of Usain Bolt. The dude towered over the competition and he took less steps between the hurdles. The guy was an absolute beast.

Didn't he also hit the last hurdle and celebrate the last 10m?

thank you guys for bringing Daniel Komen up - I've always said (since 1999 ha ha) that Daniel Komen has a very tiny edge over Geb and Bolt for the greatest runner in recorded history - people for years said the sub 4 minute mile was not possible - well here it is 2018 and the sub 4 minute mile is still NOT POSSIBLE for 99.99% of humans - anyone who runs (past or present) a mile in less than 4 is in a very very special class of elites- so here we have Daniel Komen the only human to run 2 miles in less than 8 minutes - to me he's my choice for greatest runner in history - in second place by a fraction would be Bolt for his 19.19 200 then Geb because he almost broke 8 but is highly ranked because he ran super fast from mile through marathon - had Bolt broken 19 then I'd give Bolt greatest runner of all time - as you can tell I choose not to participate in the sprinter/distance paradigm - the reasons are a whole different topic - well on the other hand maybe not - the question being is DK's 3K WR insurmountable? - NO - distance coaches need to be more proactive - find guys that are 200/400 guys that are elite but always finishing 6th, 7th , 8th - guys that are very speedy but just not quite good enough to be 200/400 champion - the coach is going to have to be like a used car salesman in selling the idea to this 21.0 200 guy to become a miler/3K/5K guy - some would argue that these guys can't do distance - but if you want to see sub 7:20 in the 3000 you're going to have to get a guy with tremendous speed and move him up - the battle is( not) if or not it's possible for the sprinter to do distance, but actually selling the guy on the idea and in a very tactful manner get the guy to accept he's not going to be a sprinter champion but he COULD be a 3000 champion 2 or 3 years down the road - and last but not least more top track meets need to have more "regular" 3000's and less steeplechase 3000's - the answer to the question is one of "culture" not physical - the "physical" is available, the "culture" is not.