Training will beat talent when talent doesn't train. The guy running 100 mpw but with no talent, will beat the superstar training 30 mpw eventually. The superstar running 60 mpw will beat the guy running 100, 120, maybe even 140 nearly every time though. The superstar training 120+ is on the lists.
Your goal should be improve yourself- your times, because you can't control the rate at which others improve.
For myself as a no talent type, I beat a lot of people eventually by training significantly more than them, but there were just some guys I couldn't catch up to. I know a couple real talented guys who ran around 1430. One did at 90 mpw, the other did at 35 mpw - though every single run was moderate or hard.
"Talent" isn't easily defined. At it's simplest, running talent could just be your basic body composition. Do you have a thin athletic body vs a very large very muscular body, are you built like a football center, or a miler? A guy that's 6'4 250 isn't going to ever be much of a distance runner.
I'm going to say something pretty controversial but that I very much believe in - body phenotypes change based on genetic activation. If you start training as a distance runner when you're young (i.e., early stages of puberty), you will not proceed to grow into some massive beast meant for football/basketball. You might be extremely tall, but not incapable as a distance runner.
The longer I live life, the more convinced I am that our decisions do indeed impact which genes we express. If this were not the case, we would see massive hulking individuals helpless about their body composition but still passionate about marathon running from a mental standpoint. Instead, we see that everyone who is truly passionate about running from an early age is lean and toned, not a massive tank lumbering along.
And some kids run sub 50.00, sub 2:00 and 4:30 their first weeks trying track and field. Same with kids who are sub 16 their first season of XC. Talent matters. The rest have to work hard or very hard and still may never get anywhere close. Things like VO2 max, and foot speed are completely genetic. Mitochondria count is genetic but can be developed through training too. Lactaid threshold is very trainable. Luckily for LRC posters pretending to be athletes, lactaid threshold training gets you very far.
"Talent" isn't easily defined. At it's simplest, running talent could just be your basic body composition. Do you have a thin athletic body vs a very large very muscular body, are you built like a football center, or a miler? A guy that's 6'4 250 isn't going to ever be much of a distance runner.
I'm going to say something pretty controversial but that I very much believe in - body phenotypes change based on genetic activation. If you start training as a distance runner when you're young (i.e., early stages of puberty), you will not proceed to grow into some massive beast meant for football/basketball. You might be extremely tall, but not incapable as a distance runner.
The longer I live life, the more convinced I am that our decisions do indeed impact which genes we express. If this were not the case, we would see massive hulking individuals helpless about their body composition but still passionate about marathon running from a mental standpoint. Instead, we see that everyone who is truly passionate about running from an early age is lean and toned, not a massive tank lumbering along.
That's not even so controversial based on what I've learned at uni in development psychology classes. Your genes affect what niche you pick for yourself but that niche then again affects your genes. Basically the whole nature vs nurture debate again.