Kirani James: 18 years old and World Champion

He's not really 18, let's see a birth certificate.

typical letsrun loser wrote:

He's not really 18, let's see a birth certificate.

Are you mentally retarded?? It's not common practice to falsify birth records in the Caribbean either. No real benefit to it.

Remember this thread?

http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=4171064&page=0

I said that Merritt could win WC's, that James looked great, but that it was a weak year in the 400, and that the times were weak.

For sure, it's nice to see James beat Merritt--but the last poster on that thread also wasn't ready to crown James the future of the 400m.

The question is, IS there a future for the 400m?

Seriously, think of other athletes who may have been able to win this race, but who weren't competing: Bolt and Gay come to mind immediately, Wariner can't be discounted, and even Rudisha (although everyone will disagree) could have won this race if he cared to--think of how little energy he would expend in the rounds.

No top 100m guy is going to move up to the 400m.

No 800m WR-holder is going to move down to the 400m.

So is there a future for the 400m?

Sure--nature abhors a vacuum. I just don't know where it's going to come from. If ever there was an event that was cosmopolitan, it looks like the 400m is it.

Is it because nobody particularly cares about the 400m in the way the USA used to care? The US was untouchable for a long time.

Now there is no 400m superpower. Either nobody cares, or everybody cares to the same extent. Tough call.

It was a weird year for the 400m. I'm not sure it's an indication that the event is down. The 200m was incredibly weak. 2 guys came into WCs having broken 20. Pretty weak. There are going to be guys medaling at 20.2.

Instead of a vacuum look at as an opportunity. Bolt will be around in the 200 for 2012, Moscow 2013, Beijing 2015, Rio 2016.

Rudisha will dominate the 800 for the same period.

200/400 guys and 400/800 guys will start to flock to the 400 because of the opportunities to run at high level meets and possibly win medals at major meets.

A lot of youth made the final.

dre217 wrote:Well he pipped Merritt at the line to claim victory in a personal best of 44.60 and scarily enough doesn't look winded at the end of it all

then how come he only sneaked it by a coupla hundredths ??

if he looked that good, then why didn't he run the low-44 flat that "lack of windedness" indicated for commanding win ??

especially in light of what seems to be a significantly increasing rate of baldness, something that is usually exacerbated by DHEA

seeing as he is a black guy & clean-head is one of the top cuts for them, care to tell us how you know this ?

have you got your electron microscope out & counted the number of active follicles he had in '06 & today ???

the future of the 400M just won the world championship today. How many 18 year old can run sub 45? heck how many pros can run sub 45

I'm betting my money on this: James will become to the 400M what Bolt is to the shorter sprints. MJ your record will only be around for about 5-6 more years.

don't forget that all junior 400 guys have to be judged v steve lewis - 19y 4m & 43.87 for biggest gold - & most magnificent physical specimen i ever saw step on a track...

ventolin^3 wrote:

dre217 wrote:Well he pipped Merritt at the line to claim victory in a personal best of 44.60 and scarily enough doesn't look winded at the end of it all

then how come he only sneaked it by a coupla hundredths ??

if he looked that good, then why didn't he run the low-44 flat that "lack of windedness" indicated for commanding win ??

especially in light of what seems to be a significantly increasing rate of baldness, something that is usually exacerbated by DHEA

seeing as he is a black guy & clean-head is one of the top cuts for them, care to tell us how you know this ?

have you got your electron microscope out & counted the number of active follicles he had in '06 & today ???

When a guy is breathing less hard after a 400m race than most guys getting out of bed in the morning (hyperbole) then yes, I'd consider that he's not winded.

He's a black guy, so what? I'm black too and I can definitely see hair loss at the back of his head and guess what, it's not haircut dependent loss.

Give it a look will ya. It should be noted that the drug that exacerbates pattern baldness is the same one he was banned for. A drug that has little to no side effects at low doses but negative ones at higher doses. Side effects such as the one I just mentioned.

Ah well, I call it like I see it eh. You don't have an obligation to agree and clearly you've made you discontent at my comments known.

dre217 wrote:When a guy is breathing less hard after a 400m race than most guys getting out of bed in the morning (hyperbole) then yes, I'd consider that he's not winded

idiot

how winded did lashawn look after his 44.35 ???

you gonna offer me a peak-flow for them ?

I can definitely see hair loss at the back of his head and guess what, it's not haircut dependent loss

so what was was EM follicle count '06 & today, bro ???

Not quite sure what follicle count means in terms of obvious thinning hair loss, but that's an unimportant argument about drugs that shouldn't be illegal.

Its easy to be less winded that others after a sprint and it still come close at the end, its a speed race not an endurance race, I'm sure if two men ran 60s one of them being a sprinter the other being a distance runner, the distance guy is going to look less winded and possibly get nipped at the line by the faster runner.

In this case, the faster guy forced the slower one to nip him at the line.

Holy crap are the stands empty for the 400 m final.

In French:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vH-2zFUVl0g

o.O wrote:Not quite sure what follicle count means in terms of obvious thinning hair loss, but that's an unimportant argument

nonsense

how else you going to quantify any supposed alopecia for scientific purposes ?

Mtn Dew wrote:

It was a weird year for the 400m. I'm not sure it's an indication that the event is down. The 200m was incredibly weak. 2 guys came into WCs having broken 20. Pretty weak. There are going to be guys medaling at 20.2.

Drug Testing. The sport is becoming fair again. Amazing that times slow down and no names start winning.

Shows you how much of a joke this sport has been for so long.

I don't trust any sprint times the past 10 years, and the past 20-30 years have a lot of questions.

The worst part of all of this, is the black athlete thats willing to do anything to get ahead and make a name for themselves. We see that in other professional sports, but we ignore it in Track and Field were being natural matters most. Why?

ventolin^3 wrote:

o.O wrote:Not quite sure what follicle count means in terms of obvious thinning hair loss, but that's an unimportant argument

nonsense

how else you going to quantify any supposed alopecia for scientific purposes ?

You don't need to quantify it for it to arouse suspicion.

An athlete previously suspended for DHEA use showing signes of alopecia is sufficient to arouse suspicion, and it's been voiced. I frankly couldn't care less whether you want to defend him or say my accusations are baseless.

moron

you have no proof of any alopecia with his clean-head

try again

He is not balding. That is what you call a bald-fade haircut.

dre217 wrote:

typical letsrun loser wrote:

He's not really 18, let's see a birth certificate.

Are you mentally retarded?? It's not common practice to falsify birth records in the Caribbean either. No real benefit to it.

Who cares how old he is? He won the open title.

In the end, Kirani's bigger size made the difference. Merritt's rapid movement down the backstretch and around the curve was not enough to extend his winning streak in this race. Perhaps he should have started a little more slowly and gradually built up momentum before exploding across the finish line in a blaze of glory. As things stand, it seems that with Kirani's size and youth it will hard for Merritt to beat him next year. Who says size does not matter?