"Zatopek was great ... but if his times are slower then he is not as good a runner."
This is like saying I'm smarter than Ben Franklin because I can actually USE electricity. It's not hard to flip on a light switch once the wiring has been done for you.
I said better,not faster.Zatopek would send a search party out for those two guys.
in a one on one race, Pre wins. in a rabbited race in europe Bob wins
Good debate. But those who say Pre was better need to directly address the issue of a wider base of global competition now than in the early 70's. Don't you agree that the last few decades' influx of so many Africans and other talented runners from developing countries has made it tougher to compete in the middle and long distances? An analogous (sp?) situation would be the competition in U.S. professional sports leagues before African Americans were allowed to participate widely. Like Pre, the whites who were second team All Stars in the NBA 1950's would have held their own in any era. But would they have made the All Star team if they were competing for those slots against talented minority athletes who were not given a chance? Athletes from Kenya and Ethiopia and Morocco, countries where very few were allowed access to international competition in Pre's day, have since taken the sport of middle/long distance running to new heights. Bob K. has had to mix it up with them. Kennedy didn't place as high in the Olympics or come as close to the world record as Pre, but I submit that the level of competition he faced was much better.
The Physiology of the human being has not changed in many thousands and thousands of years. What has changed is how people train. Pre was training and racing with different goals than BK simply because of the differences in WRs at the time. Pre, and others at the time trained in relation to the WRs and what would win at the time. Same with BK and company but the times are faster so you train faster. Times are irrelevent, you train to race to win.
Alan
What are you talking about?How can you make a statement like that if of a sober and competent mind?To compare Zatopek to a D3 runner is ludicris.Obvious
ducan,avg.joe,obvious man are you three the same narrow minded guy?or just from the same stunted gene pool?Pre never got beat up.He was the one of the big boys.Mr. Kennedy as good as he is, never struck any fear into the hearts of the big boys.The only way the elite guys knew BK was in the race was because the announcer said his name prerace during race intros.
Pre dominated competition in the US in his time, Kennedy did the same, BUT PRE held all those records at the same time essential being the best in the US from anything over a mile to ATLEAST 10K. Bob can never boast that-no American will ever hold that broad a range of records. How many times do I have to repeat the fact that Shorter(who we revere on here alot as the BEST EVER) clearly stated, "I knew that I couldn't beat Pre-he was beyond me and I knew I wasn't going to be able to beat him" If Shorter was the BEST EVER and he said that he knew he couldn't beat PRE, then how the hell can he not be better than Kennedy was. Like I stated before-who on this board honestly believes that 13:21 was the fastest PRE was ever going to go. YOU WOULD HAVE TO BE ON CRACK TO THINK HE HAD MAXED OUT.