Explanation of Comment on Homepage on Chris Solinsky: "It's Your Fantasy"

Wow. I like this. Usually you guys are such bashers, this is refreshing.

I like the concept of "Zones Of Projection":

1) Expectation- what you realistically expect to happen, based on previous performance.

2) Dream- what might happen, should all progression continue on track and barring any serious setbacks. Doesn't require extraordinary circumstances, but everything has to go right.

3) Fantasy- the level that includes all of the hopes and aspirations you've had since beginning the sport- usually includes winning an Olympic final, winning the Boston marathon, etc.. The perfect race on the perfect day.

For someone like Chris, the difference between the three can be a matter of seconds. For you and me, more like minutes.

The original emailer wrote me back. Some excerpts:

"I think it is fair to quote your former coach with the explanation you sent to me, as I agree athletes must have their own dreams and fantasies to be successful. But, as it was written, in my opinion, it only indicates ridicule … “You’re dreamin’, you only won 2 races last year, so you must be crazy/arrogant, etc, to think you can go undefeated.” "

My response: My lengthy explanation is meant to show it is not ridicule. However, in some ways yes I am saying "Chris's goal of going undefeated was crazy." But by doing it the way I did it I am acknowledging athletes have to have crazy goals. It's part of the what makes them successful. So there is some nuance there.

Chris' goal is so out there on the surface, by pointing out the facts it's going to look like ridicule. Bekele is the only guy I can think of in our sport has gone undefeated in the last decade. Chris for all his accomplishments has never won a USATF national championship. As the homepage noted, he won 2 races last year. If you look at it in more detail those were the 2 races without strong international fields. When Chris faced strong international fields last year he lost every single time. Those are the facts.

Part of what we do at LetsRun.com is try and give context to things. So in pointing out Chris' goal versus his past performance it's easy to interpret it as ridicule.

In the "zones of projection" goal setting described by the poster above, I would classify "going undefeated" in the "fantasy" zone. That fits in perfectly with my quote, "It's your fantasy." Super, super improbable to happen. I'd have taken 1000 to 1 odds it wouldn't happen before the season. Doesn't mean he shouldn't have the goal. However, with those type of goals the athlete shouldn't be too disappointed when they don't occur.

Emailer continued: "If you comb through your archives you will find that there is often a negative slant to how you report on Chris."

I disagree with this. But fans of Alan Webb say we're negative towards him as do the fans of Oregon or whoever the runner is. Our goal at LetsRun.com is not to be cheerleaders so if fans don't get upset from time to time we're not doing our job.

Chris 26:59 was amazing last year as was his whole season. A total surprise and the biggest story on letsrun last year (which reminds me we never announced the "Quote of the Year" but the big winner was Solinsky's 26:59). I think we pointed out on letsrun.com last year that Solinsky has never won a national championship but once again that is giving perspective, not being negative. The thread that brought this about was, "Is it safe to say Chris Solinsky is the greatest white distance runner in human history?"

Read more:

http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=3655139

and in there we realized Chris has never won a USATF title.

The emailer did agree with one point: "I also take your point re dreaming big and having big goals, like sub 12:50, etc. And I agree that this is one of most Kenyans greatest strengths; they don’t have any preconceived barriers, they just believe that they can run faster than everyone else. "

Solinsky made huge, huge strides in 2010. I actually can't believe how big they were until I just looked them up. In 2009, his best 5k was 13:18. He had run 13:12 three years previously. Yet he ran 12:55 in 2010. Solinsky had to believe he could do it before it could become true.

Personally, I'd like to see him win ONE big race in Europe this year. I think that would open the floodgates for everyone. I've contended the Americans outside of Lagat don't really race like they're trying to win in 5000ms in Europe. That may have started to change last year, but by and large go watch the tapes, they were racing more like they were glad to be up there than they thought they could truly win.

Thus Chris saying he wants to go undefeated is a huge step in the right direction, maybe a big "fantasy" step, but you have to believe you can win a race before you do it. And verbalizing it might be a good thing. I'll leave that to the sports shrinks.

wejo wrote:

Personally, I'd like to see him win ONE big race in Europe this year. I think that would open the floodgates for everyone. I've contended the Americans outside of Lagat don't really race like they're trying to win in 5000ms in Europe. That may have started to change last year, but by and large go watch the tapes, they were racing more like they were glad to be up there than they thought they could truly win.

Thus Chris saying he wants to go undefeated is a huge step in the right direction, maybe a big "fantasy" step, but you have to believe you can win a race before you do it.

I would actually argue that you have to believe you can win every race, before you win any race.

I'm reminded of Chris's interview after Zurich last year that was the Quote of the Day. (Can't find the Quote of the Day, but here's the original video:

)

I think in order to seize the kind of opportunity that he mentions in the video, you need to have utter confidence... the kind of confidence that manifests itself in a goal of being undefeated. If you think you can maybe win, or can probably win, you're unlikely to put your foot down when you're already riding the red line, effort-wise. You need to believe that you WILL win, in order to seize those opportunities and making a winning move (unless you're really just that much more fit and/or talented than the rest of the field). And if you believe that you will win Zurich, then why not Pre, or Oslo, or Brussels, too? Just because the odds are against it?

If you think you can win any of them, you can't let yourself off the hook by saying it's OK to lose one or two of them: "Oh, going undefeated is unrealistic..." Even if that's not a conscious, fully-formed thought, resigning yourself to a loss on any level -- even at a date and venue to be determined -- is going to undermine your ability to win.

In trying to reconcile your character and actions in such a way you further demonstrate your faults. A number of times I've found myself astonished and midly disgusted at your captions and comments on this site. They commonly come off as arrogant, condescending, and self-righteous.

I bet he can do it if he continues on his unicycling reginment.....

I agree, you have to believe that you can win every race before you do. However, that is NOT something you share with the world prior to the race. it's tactless.