What's the reason/s that high schoolers and collegiates are running so fast in the last couple of years.

I just scanned the thread. wrote:

Fffffff wrote:

Nobody has run Sub 3:27 because of EPO testing. I notice how you ignore how many more people are running sub 3:28,3:29,3:30,and 3:31. Just coincidence that the elite time dropped about 2s shortly after the shoes come out? The 5/10 numbers are even more blatant.

Nylon shoes and syntenthic tracks helped. Super shoes are just the next step.

Believers in modern shoe types don't offer any science. In my initial post I asked: Which shoes? Track shoes? Training shoes? Offer a reason or reasons why shoes don't produce fast times 100m to 1000m.

There were changes in U.S. high school training from circa-1990 when Peter Coe & David Martin began writing books. Supposedly, according to posts on here, bad days for U.S. distance running. Peter Coe & David Martin-type training produced in 00s & 10s the most sub-1:44 800m runners in U.S. ever.

Training now has gone away from Coe-type training in U.S., greater mileage now. We are seeing better 3200m performances and even many fast 1600m performances but the goal seems today to develop fast U.S. 5000m kids. Any theory for performances which leaves out 800m performances is a weak theory.

Gvjjjj wrote:

I just scanned the thread. wrote:

Believers in modern shoe types don't offer any science. In my initial post I asked: Which shoes? Track shoes? Training shoes? Offer a reason or reasons why shoes don't produce fast times 100m to 1000m.

There were changes in U.S. high school training from circa-1990 when Peter Coe & David Martin began writing books. Supposedly, according to posts on here, bad days for U.S. distance running. Peter Coe & David Martin-type training produced in 00s & 10s the most sub-1:44 800m runners in U.S. ever.

Training now has gone away from Coe-type training in U.S., greater mileage now. We are seeing better 3200m performances and even many fast 1600m performances but the goal seems today to develop fast U.S. 5000m kids. Any theory for performances which leaves out 800m performances is a weak theory.

Shoes don’t offer an advantage for 100 through 800 because the advantage of the shoes is that they reduce fatigue over time. 100 is over way too fast. Same with the 400 and 800. You’re in oxygen debt for pretty much the whole thing. Nothing is helping once you hit oxygen debt. You need a distance where you can run economically for a period of time. This is where the shoes help because they return energy and delay fatigue. I would argue that they start to offer an advantage for 1000m but not enough races. If you don’t believe shoes are the main reason for the time improvements over the last four years go to iaaf (or whatever it’s called now) and average top 100 US times for 1500m through marathon and then compare those averages with years 2010-2019. The difference is night and day. It is so unbelievably ridiculous. What changed in 2019-2020? SHOES! You really think training changed in one year? Or nutrition? Or whatever else. I would argue that ped use could have increased over Covid, but ped use existed before Covid as well. My college alma matter, 2019 they were pretty bad (as far as times). Even the years leading up were bleak. Now they’re all superstars - relatively speaking of course because everyone is a superstar now. If the shoes don’t work why is everyone wearing them?

CO Coach wrote:

Gvjjjj wrote:

Shoes don’t offer an advantage for 100 through 800 because the advantage of the shoes is that they reduce fatigue over time. 100 is over way too fast. Same with the 400 and 800. You’re in oxygen debt for pretty much the whole thing. Nothing is helping once you hit oxygen debt. You need a distance where you can run economically for a period of time. This is where the shoes help because they return energy and delay fatigue. I would argue that they start to offer an advantage for 1000m but not enough races. If you don’t believe shoes are the main reason for the time improvements over the last four years go to iaaf (or whatever it’s called now) and average top 100 US times for 1500m through marathon and then compare those averages with years 2010-2019. The difference is night and day. It is so unbelievably ridiculous. What changed in 2019-2020? SHOES! You really think training changed in one year? Or nutrition? Or whatever else. I would argue that ped use could have increased over Covid, but ped use existed before Covid as well. My college alma matter, 2019 they were pretty bad (as far as times). Even the years leading up were bleak. Now they’re all superstars - relatively speaking of course because everyone is a superstar now. If the shoes don’t work why is everyone wearing them?

Yep, most of the college and high school events have been pretty stagnant over the last 10 years, the bump we've seen recently has been almost exclusively in the longer distance events, the 1500 and up. I do think more distance coaches are focused on aerobic development now instead of hammering intervals and that helps some too, but the shoes are probably the single biggest factor.

The people talking about PEDs are clearly not looking across the gamut of track events. If drug use is rampant in high school track why are we not seeing slews of boys throwing the shot put over 70' (there's one so far this year) and boys regularly running the 100m in 10.0 or 9.9 (10.22 is the fastest so far this year)? There probably isn't an easier PED for a high schooler to get ahold of than various anabolic steroids and yet I don't think we are seeing a lot of evidence they are being abused by high school track and field athletes. For high school track the 3200 and to a lesser extent the 1600/mile have been outliers in recent years with sudden and dramatic improvements in performances nationwide, going back through the results of the Arcadia meet over the last 20 years is incredibly informative. These improvements correspond almost perfectly with the development of the new shoe tech that is now widely available.

better training is key wrote:

CO Coach wrote:

Yep, most of the college and high school events have been pretty stagnant over the last 10 years, the bump we've seen recently has been almost exclusively in the longer distance events, the 1500 and up. I do think more distance coaches are focused on aerobic development now instead of hammering intervals and that helps some too, but the shoes are probably the single biggest factor.

The people talking about PEDs are clearly not looking across the gamut of track events. If drug use is rampant in high school track why are we not seeing slews of boys throwing the shot put over 70' (there's one so far this year) and boys regularly running the 100m in 10.0 or 9.9 (10.22 is the fastest so far this year)? There probably isn't an easier PED for a high schooler to get ahold of than various anabolic steroids and yet I don't think we are seeing a lot of evidence they are being abused by high school track and field athletes. For high school track the 3200 and to a lesser extent the 1600/mile have been outliers in recent years with sudden and dramatic improvements in performances nationwide, going back through the results of the Arcadia meet over the last 20 years is incredibly informative. These improvements correspond almost perfectly with the development of the new shoe tech that is now widely available.

As for Arcadia results, if you're taking 99% of the best high school 3200 meter runners you're going to have fireworks. And that's exactly what happened. There has never been a field that strong and yet the national record remains in place.