Komen's 3000 not as good as everyone thinks

I think that the tables are off. Most anyone with a serious athletics background agrees that Komen's 3000m record, though rarely contested, is nearly unbeatable.

Arbitrary! The WR times are the true measure. This notion of comparisons and assigning points is as half assed as a CNN Newsflash.

back to back 3:40 1500s, nothing beats that.

or maybe people's perceptions are skewed because it is rarely run and when it is, no one is really going after the record, so it slowly has gotten this aura of invincibility.

It's 10 years old now. El G, when in top form, got to 7:23. It may even get to 20 years old before being busted. It is Beamonesque. This is the true measure. IAAF points can never be authoritative. Some geeks sit in a room and try to formulate. The only numbers you really need is 3000m/7min20sec.

Skuj wrote:

It's 10 years old now. El G, when in top form, got to 7:23. It may even get to 20 years old before being busted. It is Beamonesque. .

El G tried it seriously only ONCE and in a year when he was 1.6s slower in the 1500 than his best. With a concerted effort (several races in succession), it was well within reach at his peak. The 3000 is not an Olympic event and records will linger at a seldom-raced distance. It is par, no better.

yea wrote:

back to back 3:40 1500s, nothing beats that.

I don't know, man. I would say that back to back 13:08's is more impressive. 7:20 is pretty amazing, but the 26:17 is just sick. Up until '96, I think, the Olympic Record in the 5k was around 13:08. Two of those consecutively? Forgettabouddit.

Take the record holders past and present and almost record holders, at 1500, 5000, and 10,000 and let them take shots at this record, and it would go, right. Well, those guys have taken close to a dozen shots at the record and no one is close. In particular, Geb had a 1500 PR of 3:31i despite not racing the distance very often. Combined with is WRs at 5000 and 10,000 he still did not really threaten the 3000 mark.

In general, non-championship distances have inferior WRs than championship distances: The KEY exception is the 3000 because it is a nice intermediate distance filling the biggest gap in the standard set (the ratio of 5000/1500 = 3.333; 2:1 is the normal ratio and the 3000 gap is almost like the asteroid belt for planets). Thus, it is raced much more often than any other non-championship distance (the mile is the 1500 equivalent and is probably not raced as often anymore at the highest level. Note that the World Cup has the 3000 and 5000, not the 5000 and 10,000.

perspective:

So Geb, Bekele and ElG all world record holders over distances above and below the 3km have taken a shot at it but none have come within 3 seconds.. Sounds pretty unbeatable to me...

it's the best distance record there is mother F***ER!..two 3:40's slapped back to back!!Come on!!How GOOD is THAT?!?1

non-rifter wrote:

Skuj wrote:

It's 10 years old now. El G, when in top form, got to 7:23. It may even get to 20 years old before being busted. It is Beamonesque. .

El G tried it seriously only ONCE and in a year when he was 1.6s slower in the 1500 than his best. With a concerted effort (several races in succession), it was well within reach at his peak. The 3000 is not an Olympic event and records will linger at a seldom-raced distance. It is par, no better.

But Komen didn't have a succession of attempts, he wasn't a 3000 specialist. It was just as unique a race to him as it has been to everyone else who has attempted it.

The 3000 is raced infrequently, but seriously. It's not like its a 300m hurdles race.

I don't know why you guys keep saying the 3k is raced infrequently. Nearly every other meet in Europe has a 3k(either that or a 5k) there is probably at least 5 top quality 3k races in Europe every year. It probably doesn't have as high a profile in recent years as athletes have not been making world record attempts.

The reason for this....

They know how strong the record is and that they don't have a chance at breaking it.

Just the other night in Rieti Songok was supposed to be looking for a time around 7.25 and headed out at about that pace but ended up with 7.28.

That was supposed to be my point. It isn't a championship event, and it isn't at every meeting, but most guys will have a go at one at least once a season. And my main point was it wasn't as if Komen specialised at it any more than anyone else.

Komen's 3000m record is phenominal, no doubt about it, but in reality, there's nothing really to separate the 1500m, 3000m, 5000m or 10,000m records at present.

Take for example the 5000m records - 12.37. That's passing through 3,000m only 14 seconds slower than Komen's WR and continuing for another 2,000m.

Everyone think of their own 3,000m record, add 14 seconds, then calculte what you should be running for 5,000m.......outrageous really.

Yes. Look at it this way: The 3 is about 58.7/ lap, while the 5 is 60.6. On the other hand, the 15 is 54.8. So, doubling the distance to the 3 we slow down about 4 s/lap. Going 66% farther we slow down less than 2. If one were to draw a line connecting the 15 to the 5, the 3 would be slower than the line predicted. Thus, either the 15 or the 5 is better than the 3. Frankly, I think they both are, but it seems to me that the 15 is the best of the lot. I think the 10 is also better than the 3.

Note, too, that longevity of a record is not a good indication of its quality. Was Komen's record any less impressive one year after he set it?

Personally, I think that ElG's 2k is the best record on the books for 15 and up.

Actually Komen did make a point of it to go after the record that year, which is very different than things now. Yes, people run the 3k, but seldom do the races go out faster than 7:30 pace, so no one is really trying for it. Really, the guys who are going to get the 3k record are not 5k/10k types like Geb or Bekele, fast as they may be, but guys who run 1500-5000 like Komen or ElG since they have the faster footspeed. But there haven't been a whole lot of those types the last few years. It's possible Songok or Choge may have a shot when they're older, but they'd have to be able to run 3:29 or faster eventually.

I tend to think ElG could have gotten it had he actually he tried for it as seriously (and not a one-off deal like he did) as Komen did. But kind of like the 5000, we'll never know what his true range could have been.

Also, for what it's worth, after Morceli ran his 3:27 WR in the 1500 (in 1995, a year after his 7:25 WR) he said that he believed his mark translated to a 7:21 3000. Something to think about....

the 26:17 is just sick.

this is an interesting thread.

I always thought the 1000 record is unholy. The video of ngeny going after it is absurd. What kind of runner could challenge this record?

The 3k is becoming more and more popular as fewer and fewer meets wanna put up with the length of a 5k. They figure it's too boring for most folks and they are probably right since it seems half the world has attention disorder these days.

Long gone are the days when you could see regular 10k track races throughout Europe. Now you'll never see one except in a major games.