How many more people could have been champions but they never knew they're good at it ?

10 maybe not.

But 2-3 probably.

Of course anyone with the talent of Bekele or Bolt would know that from an early age. Just about any kid is going to have sprint races with others and any coach that saw Bekele run a single lap around a track would try to recruit him.

There are likely dozens of potentially great middle distance runners languishing in club/high school soccer along with dozens of potentially great sprinters/hurdlers still trying to make it as wide receivers/defensive backs in football.

Nah they see he is 6'5 and he becomes a mediocre power forward. Or they are a Jim Ryun who never goes out for an endurance sport and doesn't realize they are a super responder. We have the stories of the kids who only go out for XC like senior year and dominate. How many other kids don't go out? And how many kids go out and don't try? How many of those 430 kids who run 25mpw and take the summer off, might be 2:05 marathoners if they tried?

In the end we are left guessing. If every HS trained like the power house programs and got enough kids out, I have no doubt we would have 4x as many sub 410/9:00 guys. How many of them would then turn in elite guys? Who knows. And I bet the same rough dynamic happens in Kenya when a kid goes to work on the farm instead of running .

I think we find the sprinters a little easier than distance runners. A lot of sprinting is natural talent and gets exposed at an early age. Distance runners takes a bit more to identify one with talent. I'm sure there are quite a few sub 14 5K guys walking around who never participated in XC or T&F so never knew they had talent. Might not have been that fast in the local elementary school relay races so figured they were just slow. Therefore they were missed.