was Hall's move a mistake?

He did say he had some left, and had more "gears" in there, so he defininty wasnt hammering THAT hard. I think he was playing it safe.

If he stayed back with Dathan he probably would have been jogging, not even a race.

A mistake? The fact that all of his 5k splits were progressively faster is proof that he had a lot in the tank and was full of run. If you were there it was clear that he was the superior runner and he ran that way.Heck, if he would have run for him an easy 5min pace for the first 5k - 15:30 as opposed to 16:52 - he would have run 2:07:40 on that difficult course.

To win a race you have to take a chance somewhere during the race. Hall's move looked very planned and deliberate. After the move his spot on the team was never in jeopardy, even if he cramped up he may have been able to win with the lead he had.

Of all the trite, moronic drivel I've read on this board over the past 6 years this surely takes the cake. Yes, Hall made a move that may have ended up costing him. From the perspective of anyone other than Hall that is obvious. Hall did workouts that gave him a sense of confidence; he knew what he could handle, he knew how much he could handle, and he knew he could handle it late in a race. That's why he did long, long runs at marathon pace in his training. He knew what to expect.

You neophytes that do 8 * mile and call it a marathon workout have leagues to go before you understand what the marathon is about. In life you have to take chances to accomplish something spectacular. Hall had the ability to prepare for it, and he had the ability to execute. He knows this. Your inability to know this doesn't make his confidence less profound; it's your own cretenism.

Reason,

The only way to succeed is to take risks. Those who play it safe end up with stories of how close they came, or how they might have if only....

reason wrote:

Admittedly, Hall's performance was absolutely phenomenal. He destroyed a very strong field, and I can't wait to see what he can do at Beijing.

Still, I think that he let his emotions dictate his race-plan after he made his move. He must have felt great breaking away, but there was a long way too go. In the marathon, you can feel great at 20 miles (or later) and then fall apart a few miles later. Losing KK was a good idea, but why did he continue to hammer after it became clear that he was running away from everyone?

Hall must have known that he was in amazing shape, but he also should have remembered how inexperienced he is. The marathon is not a distance to be trifled with.

Yeah, Hall's move was a mistake. You know what else was a mistake? The Declaration of Independence. I mean, it's only in hindsight that we see that as a succees. Think what would've happened if the British won the war. How would the writers of the Declaration have felt then, huh? Pretty cheap, I bet! John Hancock's must've known that the colonies were ready to rule themselves, but he also should have remembered how inexperienced he was with founding a new nation. The British Empire was not an entity to be trifled with!

reason wrote:

Losing KK was a good idea, but why did he continue to hammer after it became clear that he was running away from everyone?

Just a few possibilities that might enlighten you

Maybe he was not concerned about blowing up and not qualifying at that point based on his perceived level of exertion and how it corresponded to his preparation.

Maybe the increased pace felt better than his previous pace. Without getting into a long discussion about stride mechanics etc trust me sometimes it feels easier to go faster.

Also possible he was concentrating on what it might take to medal in China and was trying to gauge how his body responds in that scenario. I imagine he had more in the tank and he was testing how high he could lift his pace and still not tap into his reserves. For example in the Olympics lets say there is a small pack at 30K and someone surges, he wants to know if he can go with the surge and sustain that pace off his race pace. And then what a additional surges.

Hard to train for that but you need to know if your body can handle it. Even if someone has the mental strength to train that way u risk injury by doing it. So he did in the Qualifier. smart i think.

Hall won going away because he had the good sense not to using stupid reasoning like "reason" did. Yet another 26 min 5K troll.

Old half mile guy has it right.

reason- you are a total p()ssy!

Is it considered 'hammering' even if the pace is easy for you and you can clearly handle it? I think not.

I think the OP is basing his entire opinion on the premise that white Americans cannot run the marathon that fast. Ryan proved today that he can handle the marathon in a fashion we are not used to seeing from an American runner that is not of African descent.

We are going to have to get used to it.

Hall said after the race he just tried to run it like one of his tempo runs in training, which makes me think he had some gears left. I don't know about you, but I don't redline in tempo runs. He was fine. He made the move because he knew KK was closing on them. KK, who Hall knew has run 2:05, KK, who Hall knew has closed marathons against some of the best runners ever in spectacular fashion, and was still a wild card. Maybe Hall kept moving at sub-15 5k pace because he didn't want KK pulling something similar to Chicago 2002. When you've got a race in your hands, why let anyone else back into it by slowing down?

Reason,

The best answer has already been given several times here, he was running within what he knew he was capable of. He looked effortless doing it and he did not want to wait around to see how KK was feeling.

I agree with you that he could have backed off a tad, but as someone else pointed out that can actually feel worse and it can be harder to get going again if guys are catching up to you. He couldn't really know what Dathan or Dan Browne or KK were going to come up with until very late in the race. Weird things happen, guys pop big ones out of nowhere. Guys may look tired and then come back.

He wanted to get out of the way of any of those possibilities.

I actually don't think you were being a troll, I think you have a valid point, but you have to look at the guy and say 'you know what, he's very within himself'. It's pretty clear that this could turn out to be Americas best marathoner ever. He is not decorated as that yet, but if he stays healthy he will likely become the fastest and he may have a shot a very top medal at the olympics against the best in the world. And yes, that means he has to run faster than KK has.

There's one other thing he did today by running like that, increased his worth to all current on potential sponsors out there. You think Nike and Adidas wouldn't want a runner capable of and willing to run like that?

Two guys made an Olympic team (due respect to them) but one guy ran a world class race.

Was Your Birth A Mistake?

I can see the point you're trying to make, but here's the thing you have to understand about Ryan Hall's move:

Because of the way the race had played out up to that point he was in the perfect position to make that move. Hall has been doing 15 mile tempo runs faster than the pace of the first 25k of that marathon for years. He was cruising along comfortably for the majority of the race. The gun didn't even go off for Ryan Hall until mile 18. After sitting back for that long he must have had all the confidence in the world knowing that he was the only one out there having run sub-60 for the half. All of this is not to say that it was easy for him, but reletively, he was the best canidate to run a 62 following a 67.

I have tremendous respect for the guy.

4:32

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If you think about what he ran at Houston in the half (~4:36 pace) and look at the splits he ran in the later stages of the OT race, he wasn't running that much faster than threshold pace. His effort may have slightly exceeded it, but my guess is that the hills aren't going to cost him to work at an effort that is 6-10 seconds per mile every mile, especially considering since some of those miles had some downhill in them. Either way, Hall ran like a BEAST and will definitely be one to watch for during the Oly Games and in the future as well. Amazing Performance!