Can we now say that HEAT, has by far more effect than ALTITUDE.

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So you think those guys would run 35 minutes for 12K XC at 14000'?

Apples and Oranges.

The variables are: HOW high, and HOW hot. Boulder is NOT high altitude. Mombasa IS high heat/humidity. The extreme heat conditions at Mombasa are more like running at Mt. Evans (14000'), if not higher. Both take their toll. Heat can kill but so can altitude.

I wouldn't say "apples to oranges". I would say that both are important, but mostly independent, influences on preformance. If you want to do the fruit thing, it would be like comparing the efficacy of knocking over a bucket from 20 feet with an apple to doing so with an orange. They can be resolved into their individual effects on running performance via physiology.

However, I think that if you compared racers at an altitude at which the slow down accounted for (arbitrarily) 20s/mile to humidity/heat conditions that resulted in an equal slow down, that runners in the heat condition would be more apt to pulling out of the race. This might be due to secondary effects of the heat on body processes, or subjective effects.

More people drop out of races due to heat than due to altitude.

That's because very few, if any, races are run at truly high altitude, while many races are run in hot conditions. 5000' is not altitude any more than 65 degrees and low humidity is true heat.

The negative effect of heat is heat stroke,the risk for which which begins in earnest around a dew point of 75 degrees (very common in championship/summer race situations). The negative effect of altitude is pulmonary/cerebral edema, which becomes a risk at 10-12,000'. No truly competitive races are run at this altitude, for obvious reasons. If you did, you would see plenty of DNF's.

True heat and true altitude can both debilitate and kill. Ask anyone who has climbed at truly high altitude (22000' plus). They don't call it the "Death Zone" for nothing.

So you're essentially conceding the point that people that complain about altitude in a race in Boulder (not high altitude) are complaining about nothing, and that heat, like the heat in Mombasa yesterday, has more of a negative effect on running than the altitudes that we see so commonly complained about on this message board?

62358 wrote:

That's because very few, if any, races are run at truly high altitude, while many races are run in hot conditions. 5000' is not altitude any more than 65 degrees and low humidity is true heat.

The negative effect of heat is heat stroke,the risk for which which begins in earnest around a dew point of 75 degrees (very common in championship/summer race situations). The negative effect of altitude is pulmonary/cerebral edema, which becomes a risk at 10-12,000'. No truly competitive races are run at this altitude, for obvious reasons. If you did, you would see plenty of DNF's.

True heat and true altitude can both debilitate and kill. Ask anyone who has climbed at truly high altitude (22000' plus). They don't call it the "Death Zone" for nothing.

I recall in 1968 when Jack Bacheler was the ony American to qualify for the 5,000 meter final he said that he thought one reason he fared fairly well at the altitude was because he'd been training in the heat and humidity in Gainesville. He thought that the high water content in the air cut down on the amount of oxygen you got in each breath and that was similar to what happens at altitiude.

A few years back I asked Peter Snell about that and he said that the physiological mechanisms that you use when you run in hot, humid, weather is completely different than the one you use when running at altitude. So there you are.

My own experience has been that you'll struggle with both, but at altitude you can back off your effort and "jog" to the finish but when it's really hot and humid, even that is sometimes not possible.

The moderate altitudes where it is most common to be competing in athletic events pretty much just slow you down, but with little potential for causing harm to the body. Not unlike racing over a course that is 6 inches deep in water the whole way -- you get tired and frustrated because you are going so slowly. Heat and humidity, on the other hand, have real potential for doing damage to the body. You get that same frustration (associated with not being able to go as fast as you would like to be), but at the same time the over-heating is imposing a potentially more harmful toll on your body. I have always wondered why we don't have our Olympic Trials at moer than one site; warm weather for the events that like those conditions and cooler climes for the distance events. Cities with known hot and humid weather should not even be considered for the distance events, regardless of how much money they promise TV. In fact athletes would fare better at an altitude Olympic Trials than in some sites we have used in the past. The idea of competition is not to see how many people can be carried off on a stretcher -- sounds like Roman Gladiator days.

Jack- don't you feel that the Trials conditions should approximate the Games conditions? Certainly the contrast from Eugene to Beijing is going to be marked, and possibly problematic. I would think that we would want to send over our best heat runners (much as I like to see faster times in the Trials).

I couldn't agree more...I think the guys who stayed home made the right decision.

A consideration that will be debated forever, I assume. Personally I would like to see our best athletes go, period. I guess if we can start early enough in their careers, we can move potential Olympians to a part of the country (or world) where the Olympics 8 or 12 years in the future will be held. This way they will all be good at what ever conditions must be faced. Coaches used to discuss this every year at NCAA XC Nationals -- is it better to hold your regionals on a course like the one to be faced at nationals (hilly, muddy regionals, if that is likely at nationals), or one that is easy and will allow for the best runners to get to nationals and not be completely beat up from the regional race. To say we should all train in the heat so we will be ready for a hot-weather trials or Olympics isn't too conducive to training. I would support getting our best talent (under best conditions) on the team and then do what we can to prepare them for the races ahead. At least this allows the best runners to go to the Olympics.

I would say that if your competition is to be held in hot, humid conditions that the trials for that event should be under similar conditions. The marathon would be one potential exception as 1) you need time to recover from the trials marathon and 2) in the case of the US we have had times where we have so few "A" qualifiers that we need the fast times.

And yes, in my perfect world, the US nationals would have been held some place hot and humid, but since it was apparent that not a lot of the top runners were going to Mombasa anyway, it was really a moot point. It is rare that a person turns down a spot on the Olympic team after qualifying (leaving aside injuries or making the team in multiple events and electing not to compete in one).

Jack, I was going to add the same thing. To my knowledge, man is the only animal that will voluntarily push itself past its "heat tolerance threshold". All other animals would stop and cool off even if they are hungry.

In the 1950s, 60s and 70s most of the marathons and many road races in North America were in brutally hot weather. In the 1960s, I trained at noon in a sweat suit and the heat and humidity of Toronto. I seemed to be better acclimatized than most. Also, by the end of summer I seemed to do much better.

62358 wrote:

That's because very few, if any, races are run at truly high altitude, while many races are run in hot conditions. 5000' is not altitude any more than 65 degrees and low humidity is true heat.

The negative effect of heat is heat stroke,the risk for which which begins in earnest around a dew point of 75 degrees (very common in championship/summer race situations). The negative effect of altitude is pulmonary/cerebral edema, which becomes a risk at 10-12,000'. No truly competitive races are run at this altitude, for obvious reasons. If you did, you would see plenty of DNF's.

True heat and true altitude can both debilitate and kill. Ask anyone who has climbed at truly high altitude (22000' plus). They don't call it the "Death Zone" for nothing.

Im seeing contradictory and hypocritical thinking here. Saying 5000ft is not a great altitude is mind boggling cause Im sure your the same person asking for a huge conversion for the HIGH altitude of a 5000ft once youve finished a race in it. 5000ft is a high altitude, and if you do the search you can find COUNTLESS confrimations of this. While nobody will say 65 degrees is HOT weather.

I dont see though how extreme cold with snow can be acceptable but not the other extreme. Isnt that the TRUE test of one's athletic ability? To handle all obstacles. Zersanay Tadesse would be the first to disagree with this statement. He truly proved he was the better athlete of everyone today.

Also the trials should copy the Games atmosphere. The only reason why Meb and Deena did so well is cause they knew this was important and had a duplicate of the Athens course they trained every week on during their training and they both agreed this played a huge role in their success in Athens.

Orville Atkins wrote:

In the 1950s, 60s and 70s most of the marathons and many road races in North America were in brutally hot weather. In the 1960s, I trained at noon in a sweat suit and the heat and humidity of Toronto. I seemed to be better acclimatized than most. Also, by the end of summer I seemed to do much better.

Isn't that kinda how Meb and Kastor trained for Athens?

Wearing heavier clothing and whatnot..?

stickles wrote:

Orville Atkins wrote:

In the 1950s, 60s and 70s most of the marathons and many road races in North America were in brutally hot weather. In the 1960s, I trained at noon in a sweat suit and the heat and humidity of Toronto. I seemed to be better acclimatized than most. Also, by the end of summer I seemed to do much better.

Isn\\\'t that kinda how Meb and Kastor trained for Athens?

Wearing heavier clothing and whatnot..?

Yes it is, combined with high altitude you couldn\\\'t ask for better preparation.

Also opposed to the Americans staying home, I find it very snobbish. The Africans diddnt seem to complain when they had to goto Boston and run Worlds in the snow and freezing cold. The fact that they want to pursue being the baddest and toughest in the world than tuck their nuts between their legs the second things get real tough probably made Pre flip in his fckin grave.

stickles wrote:

Orville Atkins wrote:

In the 1950s, 60s and 70s most of the marathons and many road races in North America were in brutally hot weather. In the 1960s, I trained at noon in a sweat suit and the heat and humidity of Toronto. I seemed to be better acclimatized than most. Also, by the end of summer I seemed to do much better.

Isn't that kinda how Meb and Kastor trained for Athens?

Wearing heavier clothing and whatnot..?

I read that Culpepper would go for runs in the heat wearing long pants/shirt, don't know about Med/Kastor.

Given they both ran so well at Athens I hope they can snag more medals in Beijing.

Souf Tejas wrote:

The negative effect of heat is heat stroke,the risk for which which begins in earnest around a dew point of 75 degrees (very common in championship/summer race situations).

This is not true. A 75 degree dew point is very rare.