Oy. I'll give you a few minutes, and then I'm pretty busy, so I'll have to just wish you well.
I'm not 'amped up' in the least, but I do get annoyed at stupidity.
-Tuohy. she ran 15:03 on a warm night in Portland in the late spring, and she said she was feeling lousy after a week of finals, crappy sleep, etc. (and I tend to believe her, as she doesn't in the least seem to be a bulls***ter, or one who makes excuses).
Obviously, it's stupid to think her max fitness in the last year-plus is 15:15.
She was definitely in 14:50-something shape at her best last spring, and was probably pretty close to that at XC Nattys in November.
Last week at Nuttycombe, she ran 15 seconds faster than last year, despite horrible conditions that probably slowed times by a good 20 seconds, and didn't look to be going all out in doing it, and told us pre-season she's making a conscious effort to rein it in a little this year and save the max efforts for the big races.
It's very likely she's in sub-15 shape right now. At worst, she's gotta be very close to that.
-Valby. She runs two or three days a week, for Chrissake. No one in history has believed you can achieve optimal fitness for distance running by running two or three days a week, regardless of your volume of cross-training. Tuohy probably runs close to *triple* her volume, and also cross-trains a lot.
Valby came to running very late, and has spent a good part of the last couple years injured. This is why she's been on such a spectacular trajectory the last two years.
She was *under-trained*, and is only now beginning to show what she's capable of.
She ran 15:20s while coming off a nasty injury, and was *still* limping around the freaking track, in brutally hot weather, when she did it. If you think *that* shows her best fitness last year, you're truly an idiot. That race wasn't close to showing her best capability last year. She was clearly in substantially better shape than that in November last year, and she's very clearly in substantially better shape than that now.
I don't know if she's in 14:4x shape now, but the idea she's just in 15:2x shape is just moronic.
She was certainly close to 15-flat shape at her best last year, and she sure as hell looks better than that now (and maybe by a lot).
If a rapidly-improving runner was at, say, 15:05 at her best last year, and is now at, say, 14:52 or something, NO, that doesn't mean she's on EPO; it means she's *improving*.
Implying it does mean PEDs is just such an utter douchebag thing to do.
Based on what we've seen so far this fall, and comparing it with what we saw on the whole last year, it's a good bet if you gave them both a full taper right now, and then had them bust an all-out 5000 on the track, in good conditions, they're probably both under 15, and maybe by a bunch.
If they can stay healthy for a few months, they'll both prove that this winter and/or spring, and your assessments that they're only at 15:15 or 15:20 or 15:30 will look as stunningly dumb as they clearly are.
Have a nice day now.
