Are mountain running and distance running (road/track setting) almost like different sports all together?

Obviously there's some overlap. Most elite mountain runners might be like 14:40 5k dudes, but say you took guys like Solinsky and entered him in the Pikes Peak Ascent (not that he'd register and do it as he's obviously concentrating on the track thing), do you think he'd do really well without preparing specifically for mtn running or do you think he'd bonk and run like 3-4 hours and get 0wned by some elite and sub-elite US mountain runners?

Heard a good comparison once. Track is like playing music in Carnegie Hall or a blue blood bow tie kinda event. Road running is like rock and roll. Mountain running? I don't know. Like Playing a gig at the local concert mish mash.

yeah, i mean im not knocking mountain running either. it'd be good if most track&road guys would give it a shot, and if they are good at it, great -maybe mtn running is their thing. if not, well, some will be like screw this, im a road/track guy

Over here we used to have some great champion fell runners who had success at other surfaces Kenny Stuart 2:11 marathon, Dave Norman 2:12 , Dave Cannon 2:11, Ricky Wilde (European Indoor 3'000m champion)

It should also be noted that most of these athletes switched from fell to road later in their careers and if they had always been on the track /road might have gone better

When I was running if I was running well on one surface I would go well on the other. Doing interval is actually great training for doing steep hills, then recovering on the downs

Track runners could do well on the mountains but over here where you go straight up and straight down a fell they would have big problems descending. The good fell runners drop like a stone and can make up a few minutes on the down