A Must Read: Ryan Hall Talks Confidently in USA Today, Says Mahon Didn't Believe In Him

I can see how Mahon questioning Hall's desire and/or not believing in Hall can arise out of the same issue.

Not sure where I read this, but I seem to recall that late in the Hall/Mahon relationship, Ryan was becoming increasingly vocal about God wanting him to take a day off (or him wanting to take a day off for God, either way) here and there, backing off of some workouts, etc. Mahon's style on the other hand is not only pretty controlling, but very regimented, with a certain number of workouts scheduled in each two week block. 'Here's what's on the schedule, so this is what you do.'

So Mahon could take Hall's wanting to be a little more relaxed in his training as a lack of desire to work hard. If Mahon didn't buy into Hall's beliefs re: his own training, then Hall would see this as Mahon not believing in him. Not in the sense of 'Mahon doesn't believe I can run 2:04,' but rather Mahon wasn't willing to fully defer to Hall's training input.

One of the biggest mistakes a mature athlete can make is to cede complete control to a coach. Inflexible programs, unwillingness to monitor your body daily and to adhere to a plan or schedule is most likely the downfall of many, if not most, athletes.

I don't care if he believes in worshipping two-headed goats, he believes in himself, and he is not afraid (from my view in the bleaches).

At this stage of his career coaches and athletes could learn a lot more from Hall than he will ever learn from them.

I enjoy watching this once in a lifetime kid for as long as his talent allows him to race at this level.

Ryan won't get a chance to run through that "Olympic Stadium Tunnel" again because the stupid course doesn't finish in the Olympic Stadium!!!! This has to be the most blasphemous, disrespecting, idiotic decision ever made concerning the Mararthon. It's completely moronic to not have the runners finish in the Olympic Stadium. What the in Hell were they thinking????????????? They can still change this - it's not too late!!!!!!

It must have been tough for Mahon to handle that dude. How do you maintain control when Hall believes his every training decision is directly empowered by God? Why even bother trying to convince him otherwise?

The headline should say, "Tebow is the Ryan Hall of football."

Complete link to the azcentral article:

http://www.azcentral.com/sports/olympics/articles/2012/01/12/20120112london-olympics-ryan-hall-marathon-training.html

"It's pretty cool to be on the starting line and think the guy who is my guiding coach is the creator of the universe. It's pretty cool to wake up every morning and talk to him about training."

No, that isn't a "cool" quote, it's ridiculous.

rojo wrote:

To me, questioning someone's desire and not believing in them are two different things.

Anyone have thoughts on this?

You are seriously overthinking this. They might mean the same thing to him and they might not but if he said both maybe he just means both.

Maybe Mahon wasn't a 'yes' man. He didn't believe in Hall? But lesser runners are fine under him? Mahon being constructive may have been it.

Jesse was indeed a friend wrote:

Yeah, I'd already posted a thread on this but I guess it was decided that it should be deleted for no reason whatsoever.

Sorry bro. I searched but didn't find one and it was 3:30 am.

Are we talking about Mike Mahon...or....?

rojo wrote:

To me, questioning someone's desire and not believing in them are two different things.

You try to create controversy out of everything. That's all it is.

just a comment here - I am liking this Ryan Hall character more and more - fire your coach? check. go train alone in flipping Redding, Ca? Check. Repeatedly surge to the lead in Boston on WR pace? check. Sense of humor? check. largely cliche-free interviews? check. Talk about religion but not have it be preachy and annoying? check.

Rupp may get there too as he forms his persona - last year we saw some coolness come out - he did a meaningless xc race in the UK, in the snow, and took it seriously anyway. He jumped into a half marathon, fell, rolled, got up and ran 60:30 or something like that. he considered running the trials marathon. he's still using the cliches in interviews, but maybe he'll get to a more honest place as he gets older and more experienced.

bad blood between hall and mahon?

How many great runners coached themselves? I'm not saying it can't be done, I just don't know of many.

Culpepper kinda coached himself after he left Colorodo, right?

Who else?

LOLOL

USA Today said:

Sara, who started dating Ryan in their first week as runners at Stanford and who married him after they graduated, instigated the interest in Bethel. She believes that prayers healed a nagging Achilles tendon injury.

Doesn't Geoffrey Mutai coach himself? I thought I read that or heard that after his run in New York.

Sp!kes wrote:

How many great runners coached themselves? I'm not saying it can't be done, I just don't know of many.

Culpepper kinda coached himself after he left Colorodo, right?

Who else?

Kenenisa Bekele.

I view Ryan's AR performance in the half in 2007 as the most shocking distance running performance of any current runners (although Mebs NY win was pretty shocking too). He had done nothing to indicate that he was going to run that fast and he did it by himself.

He backed that up with a 2:06, what many people would concider his best marathon.

Both of these were due to Terrence Mahon's coaching. He couldn't have done this with a coach that didn't believe in him.

He has been very consistant since then but he hasn't been matching those performances. In Mammoth he was probably trying to take the workouts he did before 2:06 and force them to be faster. He probably ended up over-training.

Terrence probably made some coaching errors and there were probably times when Terrence tried to coach Ryan and he didn't listen.

The change in scenery was probably good for Ryan. He may be misquoted as saying Terrence didn't believe in him but its undoubtable that he didn't believe in Terrence any more. He has new routes for tempos so he can't try to one up his previous training and he has the freedom to try whatever he wants in training. While he maybe coaching himself, I can't imagine that he isn't listening to the advice of other runners, coaches, physical therapists, nutritionists, you name it, its not all coming out of the Bible like he might lead you to believe.