What are the US men missing in marathon training????

Crossfit

Genetics.

You cannot overlook the fact that distance running in the US has so much competition with other sports. The US is wealthy enough where high schools fund numerous sports, such as football, basketball, baseball, soccer, xc, track and field, volleyball, field hockey, lacrosse, softball, golf, tennis, crew and ice hockey. The skilled athletes go off in different directions.

Secondly, with a general lack of depth in distance running, American runners can still be successful on the track for a prolonged career. Ritzenheim and Tegenkamp have been on the elite level nationally for close to a decade. If one of them loses a few seconds in the 5k or 10k due to age, they are still among the American elite. There is minimal incentive to go to the marathon unless they really want to be on the roads. Conversely, there are so many sub-27:00 Ethiopian and Kenyan runners, the financial incentives are for them to get to the roads to have more opportunity to make money. If they lose any speed on the track due to age, they are an afterthought. I also think that American shoe sponsorship favors track performances over road performances.

I would also think that being young and having the ability to recruit different muscle fiber groupings would be advantageous to a marathoner. Because of the depth, many Kenyans are going to 1/2 marathons and marathons when they are in their early-20s. They are at peak physical strength and have not lost any fast-twitch muscle fibers due to age. Americans are waiting until their late-20s, early 30s.

Its been mentioned before. But I think part of it is the cultural difference in terms of adult lifestyle. In America after college you get a job and work a 9-5 5 days a week. Now, its hard to do that and run before and after work for 120+ miles a week while having a functional marriage and kids. That is why most people give up running after college.

In Kenya there are few jobs. Look at the discrepancy between average yearly income between the USA and Kenya. In Kenya it is $730 with most earning less than $1 a day. With so little concern over working, Kenya doesn't lose as many of its competitive runners to the work force as the USA does. Some Kenyans don't start running until much later in life, like Kimetto, while in America he never would have run because he would have a job and a family instead.

They are missing quite a few things....a humble upbringing (no I don't mean running to and from school - that has been proven a myth in most cases).

Imagine your relatives had been killed and there was seemingly no future for you unless you ran as fast as possible. The fear of death or of being poor will make almost anyone a good runner.

Too many US college kids are middle or upper class with no worries with regards to their future. Jobs waiting in Daddy's firm after college...a car on graduation (from high school a lot of the time, not even from college)...a girlfriend from the same class background....never having to deal with the "poor" and downtrodden...life is grand. Where is the motivation for North American runners to succeed?

Not to mention they get stuck with people like Salazar and other coaches who say when and where they can race. By the time they hit marathons they are done...too old. Ritz should have been doing marathons a long time ago. He's done....too old.

agip wrote:

Numbers numbers numbers wrote:

The biggest factor is numbers, as in number of people trying to run the marathon at a top competitive level.

Because with numbers you can identify the most talented outliers, and once you identify talent you can train that talent.

You can't take the tiny pool of American college runners who decide to keep training for a couple of years before moving on to "real life" and have very good odds of identifying enough top marathon talent to compete with the East Africans.

to me this is the key - if we had 100 million 15 year olds trying out for the USA Marathon team...I have no doubt that we would be right up with Kenya and Ethiopia.

We have the raw talent, but never find it...

If we had 100 million 15 year olds trying out for the USA Marathon team we would have a total population of at least 7.5 Billion - slightly more than the entire world population today. With that, I would hope that we could compete with the Kenyans (total population = 44 Million or 0.06% of our swollen ranks).

Haha, I opened this thread to say that Nate should be coaching marathoners so that they can do the specific work properly to not run out of glycogen in the last 10K.

nj wrote:

...again and again we see guys crashing the last 5k to 10k...they need to do long work at or very close to race pace to teach their bodies to burn more fat.

Jobby Hogger wrote:

The infrastructure in the US is flawed for young distance runners. Too much emphasis on the amateur NCAA which burns out many athletes before they can start earning money from the sport.

A lot of athletes would benefit from taking a more long term professional approach to their running career rather than killing themselves to earn points for their college every week.

I don't know if you have been to a college track meet lately very few meets are scored anymore. Maybe one token dual meet and a bunch of time trials is the norm these days.

..............................Talent

Math Counts wrote:

Numbers numbers numbers wrote:

The biggest factor is numbers, as in number of people trying to run the marathon at a top competitive level.

Because with numbers you can identify the most talented outliers, and once you identify talent you can train that talent.

You can't take the tiny pool of American college runners who decide to keep training for a couple of years before moving on to "real life" and have very good odds of identifying enough top marathon talent to compete with the East Africans.

to me this is the key - if we had 100 million 15 year olds trying out for the USA Marathon team...I have no doubt that we would be right up with Kenya and Ethiopia.

We have the raw talent, but never find it...

If we had 100 million 15 year olds trying out for the USA Marathon team we would have a total population of at least 7.5 Billion - slightly more than the entire world population today. With that, I would hope that we could compete with the Kenyans (total population = 44 Million or 0.06% of our swollen ranks).[/quote]

Yes, number is right and I want to add organized numbers in many, many, serious competitive clubs—at least one per city competing each other to attract and hold college grads.

Tom

I would say the OP is correct. Look at the Kenyans! They don't weight train. Why would they want an ounce of muscle on their body.

A big part of this is just our culture. Running is a way of escaping poverty in many third world countries. Here in the USA we value violence and aggressive sports. Not as many people feed into running. Football comes to mind. Here runners are not looked up to and as someone said...it is not cool. Now, running is kind of in ..but not the focused running. The running that is in is the type where some shirtless guy or women in a sports bra runs along the beach.

Genetics is also a big factor. Humans are genetically meant to run and walk...but with convenience Americans have evolved into not so efficient runners. The Kenyans tend to have better biomechanics than Americans. This holds true all across the board. More efficient running and again...they take running very serious as a nation. We simply do not!

jjjjjjjjj wrote:

which school, primary or secondary or both? Anyway, Tergat's an outlier.

Most Kenyans and Ethiopians have thousands of miles of running on dirt prior to Americans starting.

primary mostly. I did it myself as a kid

maybe American runners just need more swag

Has anybody mentioned the one thing Ritz said his training was missing?

Speed work.

He had a sore foot for the last several months which limited his ability to do faster workouts and kept him off the track completely.

http://www.flotrack.org/coverage/250881-Bank-of-America-Chicago-Marathon-2013/video/721962-Dathan-Ritzenhein-fights-leg-trouble-in-the-closing-miles-places-5th-at-2013-Chicago-Marathon

US did better than Japan in Chicago.

Like him or not, we need Rupp in a marathon...and soon!

So genetics is why Paula Radcliffe has the women's wr by almost 3 minutes? I must say shes the whitest east african Ive ever seen.

About 5 top US marathoners are cultivated effectively at any given time. Maybe its 15, but its a very small #. Some will falter on the day, others will be at the wrong point in their career, and still others will be skewed by competing economic alternatives. All of these factors exist in the context of a generally disinterested US public. These are the realities for elite US marathoning.

Nearly all Kenyan and Ethiopians will engage in running socially and in youthful competitions early in life. All will be well apprised that success in this capacity is one of the few routes to transcend abject poverty.

Actively allow a large pool of the most notable individuals to train and compete and harvest only those ready at the date of event. Provide little or no support based upon past merits. Allow those few individuals ready at the time of an event compete and test their limits globally.

Instead of 5 career or partial career athletes you have a farm system readily able to harvest from dozens to hundreds of well prepared, highly motivated athletes that have overwhelming financial incentives and cultural support for their efforts.

With or without genetic differential the East African advantage because of how much talent is developed to its maximum potential. If a renaissance like the Circa 1970 running boom were to emerge and thousands of Americans played their hand in the venue the statistical likelihood of a US winner would begin to neutralize the disparate economic realities for US and East African runners. Only At that point it becomes more reasonable to parse out the genetic advantage arguement.

Para