Official 2017 Fukuoka Marathon Discussion Thread

That Suguru OSAKO guy who finished 3rd has really smooth running form! I usually find the Japanese runners somewhat choppy and inelegant, but he seems to just be floating above the road. Even at the last stage of the race.

Great minds don't think alike wrote:

Ha! JS calls Moen FTW. Surprised Canova didn't call him an idiot for that.

Hahaha! On page 1 he predicted what would show up to be the result!! "Moen the big joker for the win , 2.05 is possible for him". That I call a real expert predictor !

recognizer of nice things wrote:

That Suguru OSAKO guy who finished 3rd has really smooth running form! I usually find the Japanese runners somewhat choppy and inelegant, but he seems to just be floating above the road. Even at the last stage of the race.

I agree. Suguru is so light and elegant, his springy stride really maxes out those new Nike shoes. He looked like he was running 2:03 while Moen looked like he was running 2:10. Form is a funny thing, but Osako is fun to watch.

YMMV wrote:

He looked like he was running 2:03 while Moen looked like he was running 2:10. Form is a funny thing, but Osako is fun to watch.

True! I had the exact same observation. Moen seemed to move "slowly" in the end when you watched him run solo, while Suguru seemed like he was flying.

Indeed a beast prediction by JS and a Superb race by Moen!!

"Sondre Moen is a big joker in Fukuoka. With recently sub 1 hour at half and strong for the marathon I predict he can run 2.05. Also one of my coached guys is in the race and good for sub 2.08 .......I guess he is not ready for the win yet, but it`s not impossible."

recognizer of nice things wrote:

YMMV wrote:

He looked like he was running 2:03 while Moen looked like he was running 2:10. Form is a funny thing, but Osako is fun to watch.

True! I had the exact same observation. Moen seemed to move "slowly" in the end when you watched him run solo, while Suguru seemed like he was flying.

Yeah, basically, I was watching Osako and saying "Man he looks like he is in the middle of a major 1500!" while with Moen it was like, "Huh, looks like he is pounding out an ultra". Partly it was that Osako had a side camera on him the whole time while Sondre was being shot from in front from a distance.

YMMV wrote:

recognizer of nice things wrote:

True! I had the exact same observation. Moen seemed to move "slowly" in the end when you watched him run solo, while Suguru seemed like he was flying.

Yeah, basically, I was watching Osako and saying "Man he looks like he is in the middle of a major 1500!" while with Moen it was like, "Huh, looks like he is pounding out an ultra". Partly it was that Osako had a side camera on him the whole time while Sondre was being shot from in front from a distance.

Yup, a whole lot to do with camera angles. But I think also due to Osako's awesome leg extension. He has a bit of that Bekele butt-kick thing going on, giving the impression that he is almost sprinting. I also noticed he lands very much under his center of gravity, and very lightly on his toes. Almost Rupp like, but somehow more elegant.

rojo wrote:

Did they just say that Osako is on 2:06 high pace? His PB is going to be 3 minutes better than Rupps. And there are people who think Rupp can't run 2:06??

I still don't believe that Galen can run 2:06. My prediction... he will be a 2:07? guy at the best. His anatomy is already starting to give away with the plantar fasciitis, and that's running at 2:09-2:10. It is only a matter of time before he attempts to go faster and kazaam, blow a foot for good and , like his coach, done for. Just for the record, I am not disputing he is good, I am not as fanatical as many in this forum are. I remember when Kannouchi became an American, everyone thought that was going to be our ticket to a medal. I remember saying in a forum, "it ain't gonna happen, his feet are burning out on him". Fan boys almost kill me. Look how that ended for Khalid.

i predicted his likely career pb was going to be 2"03/2"04, with a theoretical 2"03'17 for prefect even paced run on a track, but obviously that will be slower on the roads which cannot be completely flat

his 2"05'48 was run off jog to 30k with 1"30'08+ split which is 2"06'46 pace, so he kicked in a last 12.2k which was ~ 1'00 quicker than expected at 30k !!!

that last 12.2k included blistering kms :

that is 2"03'04 pace

that is is 2"03'29 pace run for a whole 5k !!!

but he was not also 100% during that push suffering from side-stitches, which is usually from inadequate/wrong fluid intake, according to iaaf report

so, that last 12.2k wouda been even faster if not for likely self-inflicted stitches from possible inexperience of maintaining correct hydration

conclusion : if 100% healthy thruout run & much faster pacing to 30k, for an even-paced effort he wouda been looking at IMO

~ 2"04-mid/high

Funny, the Japanese TV announcers covering Fukuoka, even Toshihiko Seko, really didn't seem to do their homework. They seemed completely ignorant of the fact that Moen had run a sub-60 half marathon recently and were therefore shocked that he brought down his marathon PR by so much. But then, the Japanese broadcasters in general -- with the possible exception of Tetsuhiko Kin -- consistently blow off the foreign runners in races in Japan.

Bobaloo wrote:

But then, the Japanese broadcasters in general -- with the possible exception of Tetsuhiko Kin -- consistently blow off the foreign runners in races in Japan

does that include Kenyans ?

calculo wrote:

Bobaloo wrote:

But then, the Japanese broadcasters in general -- with the possible exception of Tetsuhiko Kin -- consistently blow off the foreign runners in races in Japan

does that include Kenyans ?

Yes, it often does. World-beaters like Bedan Karoki will get some attention in the ekidens, particularly if they're blowing everyone's doors off and therefore can't be ignored. But I saw an Ethiopian who runs for a Japanese company win the national x-country championships, and the TV broadcaster didn't even bother to show him crossing the finish line. They were too busy focusing on the Japanese runners.

recognizer of nice things wrote:

YMMV wrote:

Yeah, basically, I was watching Osako and saying "Man he looks like he is in the middle of a major 1500!" while with Moen it was like, "Huh, looks like he is pounding out an ultra". Partly it was that Osako had a side camera on him the whole time while Sondre was being shot from in front from a distance.

Yup, a whole lot to do with camera angles. But I think also due to Osako's awesome leg extension. He has a bit of that Bekele butt-kick thing going on, giving the impression that he is almost sprinting. I also noticed he lands very much under his center of gravity, and very lightly on his toes. Almost Rupp like, but somehow more elegant.

I think shorter runners will always look like they're running faster anyways. Osako is 5'7" while Moen is 5'10"

Someone 6'4" would look like they're hobby jogging

Watching both Fukuoka and Chicago and couldn't help but notice that the streets of Chicago were pretty empty in terms of spectators. Towards the finish it was even more sparse. There were entire bleachers empty. There is no way they get the 2 million fans reported. However, Fukuoka was lined with cheering fans most of the way.

Seems like Chicago has lost some of its shine over the years.

Boston and NYC still draw the massive crowds, but Chicago is more like the Los Angeles marathon. Seems to be more of an inconvenience to the residents than anything else.

For once, your post is reasonable!

I wonder if the linear (base 2) relationship breaks down around the half marathon.

These "feel" like equivalent times, in the modern era of marathoning:

60:00 / 2:07:00

59:30 / 2:06:00

59:00 / 2:05:00

58:30 / 2:04:00

58:00 / 2:03:00

Let's even tighten it up a little to:

60:30 / 2:07:00

60:00 / 2:06:00

59:30 / 2:05:00

59:00 / 2:04:00

58:30 / 2:03:00

For this exercise, let's pick these times: 59:30 / 2:05:00

If we draw a line of fit from 59/400 pace for the 1500 to 59:30 HM, we get:

1500: 3:41

5000: 13:07

10000: 27:11

HM: 59:30

Every time the race distance doubles in length, the runner slows down by 2.28 sec /400m.

However, from 59:30 to 2:05:00, which empirically feel like equivalent performances in modern marathoning, the runner slows down by 3.41 sec/400, which is 50% more than the 2.28 sec/400m that the runner slows per doubling of the race distance from 1500 to HM.

As much as I like these lines of fit for shorter distances, I've been suspecting for a while now that the relationship changes around the half marathon distance. We know it must change somewhere. For example, we wouldn't expect ANYBODY to only slow down 2.28 sec/400 (~9 sec/mi) from 26.2 mi to 52.4 mi. The question is, where does it break down?

The decrease of speed among the various distances can't be considered a mathematic factor only.

While we can have clear bioenergetics and metabolic connection among the distances using, in different percentage, the same type of physiological mechanism (all the events athletes run at a speed faster than the LT), about marathon the main factor depends on another quality.

We know that the tank of glycogen can last, in hypothetical steady state, for about 1 hour, if the athlete runs in even way at the speed of his LT (of course, we speak about athletes well trained). In this case (distances from 5000m till HM), the most important factor, under metabolic point of view, is the POWER of the engine, and the athlete doesn't be worry about the consumption of fuel (glycogen). So, under methodological point of view, the final goal in order to become faster is to increase the power of the engine, maintaining the level of Aerobic Power and increasing the ability to work in the lactic area.

When we speak about marathon, instead, the problem is HOW TO CREATE THE ABILITY TO MIX FATTY ACIDS AND GLYCOGEN, reducing at Marathon Pace the consumption of super (glycogen) and increasing the consumption of diesel (fatty acids). In many cases, athletes who have a clear trend till HM don't have the physiological possibility to use the most important fatty acids in the best way, since their muscle fibers cannot be oriented in that direction, and the coefficient of decrease becomes higher.

For athletes well trained, and with specific attitude, we try to build a coefficient of 95% of the HM speed.

This means, for example :

61' (2'53"46 / km) in Marathon becomes a pace of [2'53"46 + 5% (8"67)] 3'02"13 (2:08:07)

60' (2'50"61 / km) becomes a pace of [ 2'50"61 + 8"53 ] 2'59"14 (2:06:00)

59'30" (2'49"2 / km) becomes a pace of [ 2'49"2 + 8"46 ] 2'57"66 (2:04:56)

59' (2'47"77 / km) becomes a pace of [ 2'47"77 + 8"39 ] 2'56"16 (2:03:54)

58'30" (2'46"35 / km) becomes a pace of [ 2'46"35 + 8"32 ] 2'54"67 (2:02:52)

This decrease in the speed respects metabolic parameters, in a new situation (looking at consumption of fuel instead than at the power of the engine) and can't be connected with the decrease due to biomechanical factors more than bioenergetics reasons.

The new frontier for Marathon is to try to reduce the decrease from 5% to 4.5% : in this case, we can really speak about "breaking 2" in an elegible marathon.

Interestingly the gap between the best 5 & 10 WRs is 4.16% in terms of pace. But the gap between Tadese and Kimetto is like 5.25% Now right before the sub2 attempt I did some basic math figuring that if you could replicate a standard 400m in an enclosed stadium to nullify the wind, you could take a circa 26:45 10,000m runner (say Mo, Rupp, Kamworor, Tadese etc) and try and get them to do two 27:30-35 10ks plus 1.1km and you could lower the half marathon WR to 58:02-14 range. It then becomes obvious that wind, subtle elevation changes and tight 90° turns have a greater effect on longer street races. Legitimately, I thought that 2:02:05-30 was vaguely possible in very good conditions.

What do your runners think about the Maurten drink? This is an attempt minimise glycogen & fat depletion.

Theoretically, going by your conversions the Robertsons should also run sub 2:06.

I wholeheartedly agree, Renato.

I also think the "coefficient of decrease" changes as you drop below 5k. For example, let's call these equivalent times for today's 5k/10k specialists:

13:00 / 27:00

12:50 / 26:40

12:40 / 26:20

If anything, you could probably tighten up the 10k:

13:00 / 26:45

12:50 / 26:25

12:40 / 26:05

In the second set of times, the runner slows down 1.8 sec/400.

The trouble is, if we apply the same 1.8 sec/400 "coefficient of decrease" down to the 1500, we get absurdly slow 1500 times:

3:42.3 / 13:00 / 26:45

3:39.3 / 12:50 / 26:25

3:36.3 / 12:40 / 26:05

The first line reminds me of Rupp. The third line reminds me of Bekele. Both athletes were capable of running ~6 seconds faster in the 1500 than the "line of fit" would predict.

Even if we line up current 400m and current HM abilities, the "coefficient of decrease" does not appear to be stable through the intermediate race distances. The gaps are wider from 400 to 3k/5k, narrower from 3k/5k to HM, and wider from HM to M.