We’ve just watched Beamish, maybe the definition of a glass cannon, take gold in an event that I think most would look at as being exceptionally hard on the body. I remember before Jager moved to the steeple he was plagued with injuries and couldn’t seem to find his groove until he went over the barriers.
Does the slower pace necessitated by the barriers actually help athletes who tend to get hurt when focusing on the flat?
no
the pounding (impact) caused by jumping is the problem
Clearly you’ve never landed a water jump.
(admittedly I ran 20 years ago before super spikes, but can’t imagine that make that much of a difference)
It's not the jumping that's the problem, it's the landing.
Not when you don't clear the immovable barriers and @ some point, you won't.
Steeple criteria: decent speed and athletic ability. You played other sports - football, baseball, soccer - pretty well. You have a decent vert leap. You like pain - lots of it.
Try running a steeple and get back to us on how much easier it is on the body.
I tried Steeple once and suffered a month long hip injury.
More than likely his recent rebuild caused him to better manage his overall volume, forced cross train and/or treadmill, and required him to run the workouts smartly.
That and his natural athleticism that helps him hurdle comparatively well (prelim fall notwithstanding) led to him being very competitive today.
you combine the work load of distance with the jumping and pounding of hurdles -- and occasionally eating track -- plus the "hurdles" don't give, plus the water jump with the awkward angle landing and wet.
I never broke a rib running the flat events.
Extra hydrotherapy, I suppose.
so silly it's not even worth a response.
to me in terms of physical risk it's pole vault then 3000S then 110H. PV is obvious, steeple the obstacles don't give and the water jump makes you land at a funky angle in water. i did the low hurdles 4 years and that takes some fearlessness to attack them -- i'd slide tackle anything that moves in soccer -- and 110s made me nervous. you get out of control one set and you're headfirst into the next set in roughly 10m. plus that extra half foot every hurdle.