Altitude?

EMU had one of those 'altitude trainers' for use by the team, a friend of mine brought it home on break once. Looked ridiculous to me, good riddence

MILE

3:43.13 ... Hicham El Guerrouj (Mor) '99

3:43.40 ........... Noah Ngeny (Ken) '99

3:44.39 ... Noureddine Morceli (Alg) '93

3:46.32 ............ Steve Cram (GB) '85

3:46.38 ......... Daniel Komen (Ken) '97

3:46.70 .... Vénuste Niyongabo (Bur) '97

3:46.76 .......... Saïd Aouita (Mor) '87

3:26.34 ........ Bernard Lagat (Ken) '01

3:47.33 ............... Seb Coe (GB) '81

3:47.65 ......... Laban Rotich (Ken) '97

2000 METERS

4:44.79 ... Hicham El Guerrouj (Mor) '99

4:47.88 ... Noureddine Morceli (Alg) '95

4:48.69 .... Vénuste Niyongabo (Bur) '95

4:48.74 ......... John Kibowen (Ken) '98

4:50.08 ........... Noah Ngeny (Ken) '99

4:50.81 .......... Saïd Aouita (Mor) '87

4:51.30 ......... Daniel Komen (Ken) '98

4:51.39 ............ Steve Cram (GB) '85

4:51.52 ........... John Walker (NZ) '76

4:52.20 .... Thomas Wessinghage (WG) '82

STEEPLE

7:55.28 ....... Brahim Boulami (Mor) '01

7:55.72 ..... Bernard Barmasai (Ken) '97

7:56.16 ....... Moses Kiptanui (Ken) '97

7:57.29 ........ Reuben Kosgei (Ken) '01

7:58.66 ...... Stephen Cherono (Ken) '01

7:59.08 .......... Wilson Boit (Ken) '97

8:01.69 ....... Kipkirui Misoi (Ken) '01

8:03.41 ......... Patrick Sang (Ken) '97

8:03.57 ........... Ali Ezzine (Mor) '00

8:03.74 ........ Raymond Yator (Ken) '00

3000 METERS

7:20.67 ......... Daniel Komen (Ken) '96

7:23.09 ... Hicham El Guerrouj (Mor) '99

7:25.02 ....... Ali Saïdi Sief (Alg) '00

7:25.11 ... Noureddine Morceli (Alg) '94

7:25.09 ... Haile Gebrselassie (Eth) '98

7:26.62 ..... Mohammed Mourhit (Bel) '00

7:27.18 ....... Moses Kiptanui (Ken) '95

7:27.75 .......... Tom Nyariki (Ken) '96

7:27.59 ....... Luke Kipkosgei (Ken) '98

7:28.41 ........... Paul Bitok (Ken) '96

5000 METERS

12:39.36 .. Haile Gebrselassie (Eth) '98

12:39.74 ........ Daniel Komen (Ken) '97

12:49.28 ...... Brahim Lahlafi (Mor) '00

12:49.71 .... Mohammed Mourhit (Bel) '00

12:49.87 ......... Paul Tergat (Ken) '97

12:50.80 ........ Salah Hissou (Mor) '96

12:50.86 ...... Ali Saïdi Sief (Alg) '00

12:53.41 ...... Khalid Boulami (Mor) '97

12:53.72 ....... Philip Mosima (Ken) '96

12:53.84 ..... Assefa Mezegebu (Eth) '98

10,000 METERS

26:22.75 .. Haile Gebrselassie (Eth) '98

26:27.85 ......... Paul Tergat (Ken) '97

26:36.26 .......... Paul Koech (Ken) '97

26:38.08 ........ Salah Hissou (Mor) '96

26:51.49 ..... Charles Kamathi (Ken) '99

26:52.23 ....... William Sigei (Ken) '94

26:52.30 .... Mohammed Mourhit (Bel) '99

26:58.38 ....... Yobes Ondieki (Ken) '93

27:04.20 ...... Abraham Chebii (Ken) '01

27:04.54 .......... Felix Limo (Ken) '01

Yes sir, the majority of them were born there. Not sure how much time Cram, Coe or Walker spent training at altitude.

On the list of the American top ten all-time, were any born at substantial altitude?

Adam Goucher grew up in Colorado Springs (6,000+ feet), although I don't recall whether he was born there. I would guess that the Mormon contingent (Eyestone, Marsh, etc.) generally grew up at moderate altitude in Utah. I don't whether Maree grew up in the high altitude region of South Africa; I'm guessing he did.

Goucher born in Florida.

oldguy, Cummings and Padilla grew up in California, Marsh was from Hawaii.

But surely they were at high altitude in the spiritual sense.

I ran in one of those altitude simulator plastic gizmos

in 1982. Covered up half the hole and puked for 14 straight

hours. My sports med physician laughed at me, before I

went to the hospital.

I guess we can conclude that, for U.S. runners, you don't need high altitude, but it sure helps to be Mormon.

Helps to be Mormon? HELL WITH THAT!

I lowered my Marathon PR by 5;20 by being nothing but a WHITE-TRASH DEVIL-WORSHIPPING ADULTERATING PUNK!!!

Jason

Hodgie-san off topic a lot but look at that ten place time put up by Steve Prefontaine from 1974, still hanging on, wow. How about that Jim Ryun from 1967, 3:51.1 in 8th place all-time USA, that was before Jack Daniels tried to "help" him out with the altitude problem of Mex. City.

You could run sub-2:10 if you'd only join the LDS.

I believe that was Pre's lone attempt at the distance. This broke Shorter's AR set in Munich (27:46).

In my mind there are both benefits and drawbacks to AT training.

Can we believe that Pre & others would have been better off training at altitude?

Hodgie-san wrote:I believe that was Pre's lone attempt at the distance. This broke Shorter's AR set in Munich (27:46).

Incorrect, hodgie. Pre ran around 28:05 or thereabouts a year later, but in really bad conditions. He also had at least one attempt at the six-mile. Also, not to nit-pick, but I'm pretty sure Shorter ran 27:51, not 27:46, in Munich.

There is no doubt in my mind that the 10,000 was/would have been Pre's best event. I also would have like to have seen what he could have done in World Cross.

27:51.32 Frank Shorter USA 31.10.47 5 München 03.09.1972

It SEEMS like less than half of the names on US lists are guys that are pretty commonly known to have spent a significant amount of time at altitude (Guisto, Goucher, Padilla, Marsh, Goucher, Culpepper, Eyestone). I recall reading about a few others dabbling with training at altitude, maybe more of these guys tried it than I thought.

In the "what if" category, what if most of them had done some amount of regular altitude training? I wonder if our top ten lists would have more sub 3:50s, sub 13s, sub 27:30s.

Also always wondered "what if Joe Falcon hadn't gotten severly injured?" I always though he would have ended up as a great 5000 guy in the mid-1990s.

I count six out of the list of 38 Americans (15 %) who spent a significant time at altitude. As I recall, Guisto's big year came when he trained in Shallow Alto, wasn't it? Out of the remained 32 runners, almost all of them had never trained at altitude.

The point that Hodgie-san is illustrating is that all the gimmicks, including altitude training, are nothing but superfluous distractions. Most of you already know what is needed to improve. You just need to commit to a proven plan that works.

malmo wrote:The point that Hodgie-san is illustrating is that all the gimmicks, including altitude training, are nothing but superfluous distractions. Most of you already know what is needed to improve. You just need to commit to a proven plan that works.

I'm reminded of something Marty Liquori once pointed out. In the mid-'70's people were already heralding altitude training. And, of course, everyone knows that hill training is required to run well. Marty pointed out that Gainesville, FL had an altitude of about 3 feet and was so flat that a bowling ball wouldn't roll more than three feet in any direction. But that didn't seem to hurt Frank Shorter, Marty Liquori, Jack Bachelor or Barry Brown, all of whom were running for the Florida Track Club in Gainesville at the time.

Not sure I'd go so far as to call altitude training a "gimmick" though, malmo. But that doesn't change the point that if you just focus on your training and not stuff like bee pollen, you'll be miles ahead. Good runners can be found everywhere.

Radcliffe does whatever it takes to excel at the very top...not just be the top in her country. To do this she has to avail herself to the best training possible, which to her and almost everyone else (except Americans who don't want to move from their favorite coffee shops) means traveling to train at altitude for part of the training cycle.

People can train any way and anywhere they want. A person with talent will eventually run fast in some race. That doesn't require anything special to be done. But to do it on the big day in the big race takes good training...good training making use, as Radcliffe has, of everthing available to you in order to excel. There are many ways to do it, but barring a genetic freak of nature, I can guarantee no one will ever mount the top of the Olympic or World podium in the distance races from now on unless they do some amount of altitude training.

Any national caliber runners reading this board might do well to remember Hodgie-san and Malmo--two vocal older opponents of altitude training--never made any World or Olympic teams in their careers.

Run for the team jacket.