Is my former HS teammate the biggest XC/track prodigy ever?

That's impressive, but you should look up Jim Ryun.

Runner62783848 wrote:

Anyways I am convinced this kid has to be the most talented guy ever. If you guys have ever heard or know of runners running quicker times than this in a very short period of time please post.

So what did he do in college? If he's the most talented guy ever, why aren't you mentioning his name?

I've heard of Jim Ryun. Very impressive runner. I know of course he broke 4 in HS and first did it as a Jr. How fast was his first season running?

I said most talented. Not fastest. I think there's a lot of talented runners who get beat by less talented runners for a variety of reasons such as, training, motivation, environment ect.

As far as why I won't mention his name I'm not sure how'd he'd feel about me posting about him on Letsrun. He probably wouldn't mine but I'm no longer in contact with him and don't want to take the chance of invading his privacy.

Funny you say that, I know another guy who has a similar story. In his junior year, he joined the track team from soccer and ran around 4:40 in his first race. He ran 10 seconds faster in his next race and by 2 months he had clocked 4:15 at some medium-sized invitational. He was never great at xc due to his lack of an aerobic base, but then again we only were running 30 mpw at the time and our coach sucked ass. Over the summer he got injured but still managed to pull off a few more sub 4:20s, a 1:55-56 800, and a 9:3x 3200. With all that talent, you'd expect him to be a 3:40 1500 guy by now. Unfortunately, he went to Cal which is not exactly well known for developing distance talent. A few months in he got injured again and has stayed that way ever since. I feel really bad for him, he's a really nice guy and was really devoted to running. It's a real shame that his body gave up on him so soon.

Also I mentioned he ran 23:18 for the 8k-14:14 for the 5k-8:08 for the 3k and 3:46 for the 1500m. He competed 2 years (was on the team for 3 and redshirted 1 year) and got injured on and off. So his college career was decent. Again not the fastest runner ever but again I think he's got to be one of the most talent. Running 4:16 for the mile as a sophomore on 5 months of training is crazy to me.

Runner62783848 wrote:

I've heard of Jim Ryun. Very impressive runner. I know of course he broke 4 in HS and first did it as a Jr. How fast was his first season running?

1962-63 15 year old sophomore

- 5:38 mile time trial

- 11:51 2 mile XC first time trial

- 11:23 4th is first JV race

- won the next JV race

- 10:36 in first varsity race, eventually becoming Wichita East's top runner

- 6th at State meet, leading the team to victory.

- 4:40 self-timed time trial during the winter of his sophomore year

- 4:32.2 loses his first mile race by 0.2 to defending State champ Charles Harper

- 4:26.5 down 15 meters with 100 to go, Ryun digs deep and finds that kick of his, winning his first mile over Harper.

- 4:21.7 leads from gun to tape for win #2

- 4:21.3 wins again, runs first 880, a leg of winning 2mi relay team

age 16

- 4:19.7 wins another mile

- 4:16.2 wins state meet

- 4:08.2 MVAAU loses to college runner, doubles back with 1:54.5 880 (5th)

- 1:53.6 5th again, behind four college kids

- 4:07.8 USTFF 6th to college kids

1963-64 Junior year 16 years old

- Undefeated in cross country

- 4 mile AAU XC meet against college runners he finished 3rd

- indoor meet at Cow Palace (SF) Lindgren in race. Ryun stumbles off track then finishes well back in 9:22.6

age 17

- 4:06.4 wins state meet in national hs record time.

- 4:01.7 3rd in Modesto behind Burleson and O'Hara2

- 3:59.0 8th in Compton, first ime that 8 runner had broken 4:00 in the same race, and the first time a hs kid broke 4:00.

- 1:50.3 5th in open competition

- 9:06.5 in KS allcomers

- 3:39.0 4th at AAU 1500m

- 3:46.1 4th NY Randalls Island OT

- 3:41.9 3rd LA Olympic Trials last lap 53.5

- 3:44.4 4th Tokyo heats

- 3:55 DFL Tokyo semi Flu

1964-65 senior year 17 years old

- 4:07.2 State Indoor meet

- 4:04.4 Wichita East Invite

- 4:02.0 Hutchichson Invite

age 18

- 3:58.3 State meet win, first and only sub 4:00 in all hs competition

- 3:58.1 1st California Relays Beat Grelle

- 3:56.8 Modesto 3rd behind Snell and Grelle

- 4:04.3 Golden West HS 1st

- 9:04 Golden West HS 1st

- 3:55.3 1st San Diego American Record, defeats Snell 53.9 last lap

- 3:40.4 2nd US/USSR dual meet

- 3:49.9 1st US/Poland dual meet

- 3:41.6 1st US/Germany

This guy sounds way more talented than the OP's guy. He got to 4:15 faster, and he did it off of 30 mpw. The OP's runner was doing it off of 50-55 mpw, which is actually reasonably high mileage for a highschool runner.

There is a huge difference between 30 and 50 mpw. The benefits of more miles diminish as you run more and more. There is a huge benefit from going from 30 to 40 mpw. While going from 50 to 60 is a good thing, the 30 mile runner will improve far more by increasing his miles by 10 than the 50 mile runner.

We had a guy, his senior year, played football in Fall (starting QB), basketball in Winter (starting point guard) and ran 4:10 1600 in Spring track, He did the same thing his junior year and ran 4:25.

I checked all Footlocker finalists and this person does not exist. Even if he did, the time to train in high school for an otherwise fit boy. is about 5 months. So even had this guy started running a year earlier he would have hit about the same times regardless. You are thinking too much like a 25 year old marathoner.

Grassrunner wrote:

We had a guy, his senior year, played football in Fall (starting QB), basketball in Winter (starting point guard) and ran 4:10 1600 in Spring track, He did the same thing his junior year and ran 4:25.

Coley Candel?

I watched German Fernandez split something like 3:15-3:18 for 1200 on a DMR in his first competitive race ever as a freshman. A week later he ran 4:33. By the end of that year he ran 4:22 and 9:40ish.

Senior Year he ran 4:00 and 8:34 90 minutes apart at the CA state meet. This was despite losing multiple seasons to injury, one which requires ACL surgery

leo ran 3:59 in all hs race

My experiences were based not so much on progression, but on watching uber-talented guys race in high school before they "figured it out".

1. I saw Andrew Wheating jog something like a 4:12 1600. I was only 15 and didn't know much about the sport, so I wasn't really sure what I was watching. I just knew it looked different from every other race I'd seen.

2. I saw Cas Loxsom even split a 1:52, just rhythm running the whole way. It was so obvious he had this whole other level of horsepower that he hadn't learned to access yet.

Depends a lot on the grade they start running in and if they do a sport, like soccer, that involves a lot of running. I knew a soccer player that ran track as a senior and ran 1:52 and 4:13 his first year running, but that’s probably not as impressive as a freshman kid that played video games until track season running 4:25 and 1:56.

O.P., there are 9th & 10th grade boys who play basketball & hockey all year who race sub-95 600m and sub-5 1600m in P.E. I personally know young basketball players who have raced 4:50 1600m on zero T&F training.

Wrong. He had been training for years too. He was just doing it on the soccer field.

Runner62783848 wrote:

So after just 5 months of training with no prior experience [...] and was challenging me in workouts. I had been running for years and this kid passed me up in 5 months.

We had a kid join track his freshman year because of his friends, and soccer was only in the fall, so he trained with us for a few months and did a few races. His first 800, he ran somewhere between 2:00 and :05 (can't remember exactly) indoors, and he didn't know where the finish line was. This was after 2-3 months of training. His season was cut short after two races, but I think had he been able to have an outdoors he would've been ~50 400, ~1:50 low/mid 800. Idk about his mile time because I don't think he ever ran one, but he would've at least challenged 4:30.

Sounds similar to the other stories about soccer players-turned mid-d runners. On a related note, something like half of our very successful xc varsity played soccer for years.

Runner62783848 wrote:

He was previously a soccer player.

I had been running for years and this kid passed me up in 5 months. It's not like he had done any insane training either.

I assume he was pretty big into soccer and didn't just casually play it. Tons of young soccer kids start running and do great, because you run a lot and essentially do interval training in soccer. It's not like he came off the couch.

So your guy ran 4:16 as a sophomore in his first track season. German Fernandez comes to mind for who might be more impressive. He ran 4:20 in his first season as a freshman, then four years later in college he ran something like a 3:55 mile to set the NCAA record and was the 1500 NCAA champion. Unfortunately that seems to be his peak year, only had a short career after college.

I'm convinced after all these years that playing sports like hockey and soccer that emphasize repeated high intensity bursts to build up endurance set you up for long term running success. A ton of the best milers are former soccer players.

Starting running in middle/elementary school though... 90 percent of those kids flamed out. Peaked early, never really developed any sort of fast twitch movement, etc. The guys on my college team that were lifetime runners were just as good/slower than they were in HS.