Just seen the CIM start lists for a few weeks time, what do we think about CJ running his fifth marathon this year, 3rd in as many months… surely that’s not sustainable? Intrigued as to his thought process (assuming $$ which is of course totally fair)! Maybe it was a dry year after the Olympics and so many good marathons they carved out budget to bring him in.
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He has a good shot of finishing first or second, which means at least $10,000. He's a guy who still works a real job so that kind of money is huge for him.
By 2028 he will be done. He doesn’t understand what he is doing to himself.
We’ve seen other genetic outliers accomplish similar things, arguably on less rest (Yuki Kawauchi, Michael Wardian, etc.). Until the evidence (injury/burnout) proves otherwise, I suggest trusting CJ’s judgment of what he is and is not capable of. He seems pretty grounded, even if his training/competing is on the extreme side.
CRM immediately becomes interesting with CJ in the field.
Brilliant news. It's what excites and motivates him, having targets that others would find mind bending.
Ultimately he's having a fun. I think at end of his career his PB will be 2 mins short of what it could have been with "normal training" but all race wins/major top 10s/podiums is worth more to him then one or two stand out performances and not being true to himself.
If you’re an athlete, you gotta get that paper while you’re still young! 💵
CIMer wrote:
Just seen the CIM start lists for a few weeks time, what do we think about CJ running his fifth marathon this year, 3rd in as many months… surely that’s not sustainable? Intrigued as to his thought process (assuming $ which is of course totally fair)! Maybe it was a dry year after the Olympics and so many good marathons they carved out budget to bring him in.
Guys like Doug Kurtis and Kjell Erik Stahl ran about twice as many marathons as Alberstson will do this year for several years. Late in his career Ron Hill was doing abut six marathons a year. He'd usually have three be all out efforts and three just reasonably hard runs. Money was certainly a big reason these guys did what they did and I don't doubt it's a factor for Albertson. People have different capacities for hard running. This reads like a page out of Kawauchi's handbook. Based on what I read here about his training it seems like he routinely does training runs that are not all that much easier than an actual race.
It's a shame there's no TV coverage (as far as I know--anyone know differently?). I only live a 2 hr drive away, but that's a lot of driving to get a couple of glimpses of the race.
As CIM is not a record-eligible course, would the time/win not impact his World Ranking? I don't fully understand how the World Ranking system works, but I know he really wants to be on the 2025 Worlds team in Tokyo so wondering if that is a factor. Or, of course, it could just be easy money.
As much as people hate to admit it, super shoes have changed the game to be significantly less beat up than usual after a long distance race. David Roche won two 100 milers a few month apart, Ben Johnson (not elite but still quick) has run a marathon a month for a few years in the 2:35-2:50 range. I'm sure there are more examples. All that said, CJ is still a freak! But we already knew this when he ran 2:11 on back to back weekends last year, ha!
CIMer wrote:
Just seen the CIM start lists for a few weeks time, what do we think about CJ running his fifth marathon this year, 3rd in as many months… surely that’s not sustainable? Intrigued as to his thought process (assuming $ which is of course totally fair)! Maybe it was a dry year after the Olympics and so many good marathons they carved out budget to bring him in.
link to start list pls?
This is CJ's first year training and racing in "proper" super shoes. His legs must feel so much better than they used to; no wonder he can't stop racing.
Didn’t he run 2 in December last year? Would this put him at 7 in 12 months?
this guy is AWSOME. Going to run more good marathons this year than some folks run their whole careers!
The OG Coconino Cowboy wrote:
CRM immediately becomes interesting with CJ in the field.
What is CRM
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