Was Vin Lananna a good runner in his day? What were his prs & what/where did he run?

Ok. With 5 mile cross country times in the 27-28 minute range, it's apparent that Vin wasn't a top runner.....and that's ok. He is a great coach and has 'done well' with his career.

Some first-rate distance runners who have become good coaches: Bob Schul, Matt Centrowitz senior, Steve Scott, Doris Brown-Heritage, Alberto Salazar, Chris Fox, Doug Brown, Dick Quax...I won't count Jeff Galloway. Don't know if Aouita actally coaches. Tergat has a group that includes R.K. Cheruiyot the First. Gerry Lindgren coached or coaches in Hawaii; not sure how well, but there's a rumor that his top five HS boys all broke 9:00 in a workout one day.

Other track guys: John Smith, Bubka (who's coached Isinbayeva to a parallel of his own career, with at least one extra gold medal), Fred Samara and many more decathletes (who tend to know a lot). Valery Borzov coached USSR sprinters. Trevor Graham--the jury may be out, if not on a few other matters.

Among the true coaching legends, Mihaly Igloi was the Hungarian junior PV champion, of all things, and then became a near-national-class 800-1500 guy. Cerutty ran some impressive ultras.

It's not like cycling, though, where all the top coaches seem to have been pro riders.

Steve Scott coaches at some obscure DII school in CA.

It takes a special kind of man to work with physically challenged kids like that.

You guess Dellinger was a good runner and good coach?

Good? The guy finished third in the 64 Olympic 5,000, beating Michel Jazy, Kip Keino and Ron Freaking Clarke. The U.S. didn't win a medal on the track above 1,500 for another 20 years. He is easily one of the most underrated runners in U.S. history. As a coach all he did was coach 20 sub-4 milers at Oregon (plus Byers), four American record-holders. At one point in 1982 the top three 5,000 guys in U.S. history were coached by him. And his 1978 and 1979 cross country teams (second to UTEP both years) are the greatest North American college distance crews EVER! That includes the Duck team that won last fall. Vin's Stanford teams aren't even in the same solar system. Four of the six on the 78 team made Olympic teams--Salazar, McChesney, Clary, Boileau. The other two--Chapa and MArtin--were also pretty "good."

this sounds like a presidential debate.

CAN SOMEONE ANSWER THE QUESTION????

Kansas Relays fan wrote:

Franque Soda wrote:

I have a pretty thorough knowledge of HS track from that era Lananna was not a 4:09 miler in HS.

I didn't think so. Otherwise he would have been one of the top milers in the nation and a household name among track nuts back then, as was Kansan, Randy Smith who did run a 409/857 double at the Kansas Relays in '71.

Fair enough. I was wrong.

Sounds like he was the original 4:30 miler.

what happened to me wrote:

Sounds like he was the original 4:30 miler.

We have a winner! Like Frank Shorter said to some guy he once met; "how did I know that you ran a 4:30 mile in high school? Because everyone ran a 4:30 mile in high school."

John Wellerding (2:14 marathoner) is also on the d2 xc results earlier in the thread.

2nd place finisher Charlie Duggan trained in Gainesville in late 70's and ran 13:38. Later coached at Baldwinville, NY.

Winner Garry Bentley was an Aussie.

777 wrote:

Who cares? Often, the best coaches were not very good runners. In fact, I'm having a hard time thinking of a great coach who WAS a good runner! Lydiard was okay, Daniels wasn't bad (but was also good at shooting, horse-riding, fencing, and swimming...), apparently Lananna wasn't terrible, Bowerman was an okay 400m runner but not a good distance runner. I guess Dellinger was a good runner and a good coach.

I agree with the gist of what you are saying, for example, some of the best coaches (and high profile ones) were not great runners (like Vigil, Tegen, Martin Smith,...) but many are or were (Schumacher, Plasencia, Salazar, ...) .

However, I have to correct you when you say "I guess Dellinger was a good runner and a good coach." Dellinger was a great runner and one of America's best from that era. Nobody should have to talk up his coaching success, in terms of honors won, one of the best ever.

Yeah, and he coaches really well there. You think it's easier to coach D1 recruits than walk-ons?

From slowtwitch: "Scott's first-year team reached the stratosphere. In the first semester of the first team ever at Cal State San Marcos, Scott's men's cross-country team won the NAIA Western regionals and--ranked 16th going into the national championships--continued to overachieve by placing third. His women were almost as impressive, winning their regional race and placing 17th nationally."

This was in the first semester in which the school had ever had a team.

Vin Lananna is NOT to be confused with Vin Fleming, a top runner from the same era also from the northeast.

Vin Fleming is NOT to be confused with Renee Fleming, the opera diva.

laaaaaaa wrote:

Vin Fleming is NOT to be confused with Renee Fleming, the opera diva.

Renee Fleming is NOT to be confused with Peggy Fleming, Olympic gold medalist in Figure Skating.

what about k brantly he coaches also i think

Peggy Fleming is NOT to be confused with Peggy Hill, a cartoon character on King of the Hill

King of the Hill is not to be confused with the King of Queens, played by Kevin James.

King of Queens is NOT to be confused with Queens of the Stone Age, a lame rock band from California