Henry Rono training for masters mile record.

Damn its late. Won't be hitting the two-a- days just yet.

Full hour tomorrow. F***, malmo you have a helicopter??

Kennedy wrote:

malmo - regarding David Thompson video......

You have no idea how proud I am to be a Nittany Lion right now. I just laughed hysterically for more than 3 minutes and almost wet myself. You need to land your helicopter in New Mexico and start training with Henry and everyone else here.

Better watch yourself. This place is a nuthouse. There's another guy at this message board who claims he owns that link! He patrols the neighborhood in a helicopter as well, but I've got my finger in the pie.

POTY!!!

I think what Henry is striving for now is just as phenominal as what he strove for in the 70s. He had amazing success, and then, some troubles and hurdles to negotiate, just like the rest of us do in less public ways, and here we are, man, in 2006, and we are just as inspired, aren't we? Henry, your autobiography is only half complete. I'll buy the full version in decades from now. :)

Dear Henry

Thank you for the humorous replay of your bout with air conditioning and the ever rising price of electricity! I laughed in a very good way. I think I will use the sauna too since I am coming back from injury and have aged a bit. I won't get back to my times when I was 18 but to get back to 25, that would be good and means losing 30 pounds. If you can do it I can!

And about Olympic Champion versus World Record Title: I think I appreciate where you are coming from, that some people only appreciate the Olympic Champion title because they don't know how to appreciate others, like Commonwealth Champion. You know better who you are and what you achieved, and it sounds to me, that you know a World Record is more valuable than a title, especially amongst people who don't anything more than the 'Olympic Champion' title. You have an honor that transcends titles, and that is, first man to run 'X' time for 'Y' distance in the history of the human species. And you know that is incredible! There is a title that is just as important as Olympic Champion. I call it 'Hero', and you Sir, are one. Best of luck to you, and to us in losing weight and getting our times down, ha!

Just Fueled

This thread is unreal. A living legend still chasing dreams long after his best years. I'm still in my best years, and this inspires me to another level. I wish I had some footage of Henry in his prime. I was just a little guy back then, but have read and seen those amazing times/records. PLUS this thread is pulling in other legends as well. This is quickly becoming the best thread in Letsrun history.

H2 ohh wrote:

PLUS this thread is pulling in other legends as well. This is quickly becoming the best thread in Letsrun history.

As the originator of the '79 Boston thread, I would have to agree with the above.

Henry, wait until you see the pics I'm sending to you!

When I was at WSU, Chaplin didn't oversee our training every day. And he didn't put together a program for anyone in any formal sense.

Typically, the Kenyans had their own program which they'd been doing before they came to WSU. They did whatever they were doing before because it worked for them before. Only very occasionally Chaplin would require us all to show up at the same time on the track, usually for 5 x 1000m with 2 mins rest.

During XC we sometimes did 3 x 1000m at 5 or 6 in the morning which was an absolute bitch because it was cold and you were still asleep. Imagine doing a morning run on a cold day but it has to be as fast as you can run and you're going to get killed by a couple Kenyans. And Chaplin's holding the watch and no matter what you're not going to impress him because he used to hold the watch for Rono. Ouch! But we warmed up well and after a couple weeks you'd gotten used to doing it and though you still FELT like you were dead on your feet, somehow your feet would churn out a pretty damn good 1000m. On these days where we did 3 x 1000m in the morning we'd usually come back for 3 x 1000m in the afternoon.

Everyone on the team who was not Kenyan usually made up their own training plan based on their past experience with HS track and by following the lead of the Kenyans, with Chaplin interceding from time to time. You couldn't really go wrong if you showed up to practice every day. On the easy days there were always a few people to run with and the only interesting loops were 10-12 miles long so you'd get your easy base miles. Then once a week Chaplin would give you a workout (5 x 1000m). Another day of the week you'd do an interval workout of your own construction. One of the easy regular runs during the week would get out of control and go down to 5:30 pace so there was your tempo run. I only ran there for a year but I dropped a lot of time at all the long distances. It was a simple program that worked.

I liked the fact that Chaplin did not micro-manage my training. I had run at another school before I ran at WSU and everything was written on paper exactly how it should be and it looked good on paper but didn't work. I was always way overtrained and because you had to follow the written workouts to the letter you could never recover once the overtraining set in.

H2 ohh wrote:

This thread is unreal. A living legend still chasing dreams long after his best years. I'm still in my best years, and this inspires me to another level.

Definitely great stuff.

Ran at WSU wrote:

Only very occasionally Chaplin would require us all to show up at the same time on the track, usually for 5 x 1000m with 2 mins rest.

During XC we sometimes did 3 x 1000m at 5 or 6 in the morning which was an absolute bitch because it was cold and you were still asleep. Imagine doing a morning run on a cold day but it has to be as fast as you can run and you're going to get killed by a couple Kenyans.

I can imagine that. Ha!

Thanks for sharing about WSU.

Hey, runamook. How do the cheesemakers look for xc this year. I coach at the bottom end of the state. Good luck. The last I heard Kevin was coaching/massaging in the SD area. I don't know if he's still down there or still doing that.

Henry:

If somebody is smart, they'll keep a record of this entire thread, transcribe your words, edit them, and make them into a compact trade paperback book. You are, and seemingly without effort, one of the great running poets: a Zen philosopher who tosses us koans, asks us to think past our narrow ways of thinking. Running SHOULD be about this--about breaking through boundaries. But people who write about running often reduce it, or try to reduce it, to a science, thereby missing the poetry, the heart.

Be careful, or you'll become our guru! Seriously, many thanks for the warm, wise, helpful thoughts. Good soul food.

Henry,

It's been great to read about your approach and training for you WR runs in college.

I was wondering though, did you have any bad stretches in college when your times were bad or you felt bad, and what did you do to get past them? Did you cut back, run easy, or so some short faster stuff?

I agree. Henry has filled us with insight never before attained on these threads.

Henry could you answer some of the more vexing questions we have wrestled with over the last months?

1) Fanny packs in a race: yes or no?

2) Breaking up with a girl friend by power point?

3) Who would win between Webb or Ritz?

4) What could you run for a marathon on a treadmill?

5) Minimalist shoes: love them or hate them?

6) Jason Rexing or Chuck Norris?

Sorry, just joking around. We love the fact that you are so willing to contribute to this site. We all wish you the best in your efforts.

To Malmo,

Listen malmo are you trying to scare me! You know yestarday the 14 day of my training was my day off.I got up like I said that the door was open from there I listen to my body negotiet with it all-day and sitting in front of computer chat with you going to post office and so forth.Drinking tea with therflu because I'm coughing as a quack duck until I say I will end my two weeks of training with 13 days of running minutes.

Guest what when I got up at 2:45am I was ready to run;however,part of my training at night we do massage theraphy.My specialist massager is an Olympinian medalist.

I hired him at the begining of this month June 1,2006. I have to have massages twice a week one on weekend and another in the middle of the week.So I miss on wednesday I had to do it today.You know in the last 14days has been very rough me.Quiz for you guys:(1)Who is my new massues theraphist?(2)What Olympics did he ran and in what year?(3)What medal did he won in that race?(4)What is the origin of his country? This is a contest.I need answers before mid-night. I will let you know what I will do for you if you answer them correctly.Henry

Henry....we need some hints....your description is too general......Is it a name that track fans would recognize? What years were they running? What events?

To Malmo

By the way after hard deep massages on my legs he say your legs are not bad,

"what did you say?" I ask,I want to make sure I heard it right,he was right.From 3:45 am up to 5:30 am I was ready to train.This morning wasn't like last two weeks ago I'm in another phase of training let me try.I went the same route after 45 minutes I throw up(fomited) some mucuses chocking my throat Oh! some green staff plus white was chocking. I try to use my finger to push them out and finally came out bad cold no wonder I have been coughing like a duck.It was like attack of ashma.After 3 minutes of stop I continue when I reached 92 minutes another attack,I did the same thing and finally I was realieved.I train for 132 minutes today. Before sauna I weigh 203lbs after sauna 200.9 lbs close to 201lbs.I feel very good now,I think the bad colds and dry air in New mexico makes it harder to breath.Hints for my massaues theraphist.I don't think I should give it to you guys,you need to think a little harder.Okay which part of hints you want?Okay in 1988

Pre841,

I last saw the kinkster about 12-13 years ago at the masters meet in Eugene and yeah, he was living in SD then. My mooks look good. My entire soph-frosh varsity team (now juniors and sophs)from last year is back and fired up and I am hoping to snag some muy bueno freshmen. I'm even going to have a full girls team. should be fun. where y'at?

Henry Rono wrote:

Before sauna I weigh 203lbs after sauna 200.9 lbs close to 201lbs.

by jove Henry, if you can do it, so can I

Not to take away from thsi great Henry thread, but how is Joe Fulton's Philomath team doing? I thought pretty good a few years ago. This is to Pre841 and Runamook.

Henry, great to read your legs are in good condition, another positive sign for you!

I have no idea so will just take a wild guess and say Peter Koech, silver medalist in steeplechase, 8.06.79, 1998, Seoul.