MJ's 19.32 Legit or on Drugs

i know this sounds dumb, but frankie fredericks ran ridiculously fast that night, too. it was just WAY behind what johnson did. it's hard to say.

Come on!! We all know that MJ was juiced up to the T. His 19.32 (and especially his 43.18) shouldn't even be counted as WR's. Have you seen MJ lately? He weighs about 160 lbs. He looks more like a Kenyan distance runner than former American sprinter. No way he was clean!

The facts are these

1. Michael Johnson ran 19.32 in the finals of the Olympic 200 meters

2. Michael Johnson passed his drug test.

The rest, while interesting, remains speculation.

That track was extremely fast. Donovan Bailey ran much faster on it than he ever did otherwise, and Marie-Jose Perec ran the fastest 400m since out-of-competition drug testing started.

Here is the big factor that NO ONE (virtually) brings up when discussing why his 200m is so much better than anyone else's ever:

How many 10.09 100m runners train for the 400m?

My bet is that if you've run 10.0 or low 10anything you are going to keep tryin gto run the 100 and possibly the 200, but that's where your focus is going to be.

What Johnson did, is he took 10.0 100m speed and trained essentially like a 600m runner; lot's of speed endurance work, much more than most 200m runners. Is there any top 400m runner with a faster 100m PR?

This is bracketing: spend time fine-tuning your basic speed (like they did in 1994 when he ran 10.09) but train for 400m speed endurance: the result is the fastest 200m ever.

Combine that with an ultra-fast track, unbeleivable competition, hot weather and gallons of adrenaline and you've got an anamalously good performance.

You forgot about the quart of drugs mixing with the gallons of adrenaline.

MJ was never particularly muscular. His physique was very achievable with non-drug assisted weight training.

Of course, maybe he was doing EPO. Who knows? The record is amazing but, as he passed all the tests, the record stands.

tamicuk wrote:

The facts are these

1. Michael Johnson ran 19.32 in the finals of the Olympic 200 meters

2. Michael Johnson passed his drug test.

The rest, while interesting, remains speculation.

Yep, Marion too right.

The track was short.

Michael Johnson was just different than the other runners. He said it himself, if he ran like everyone else, he'd be back with everyone else. He's the only man to break 20 in the 200 AND 44 in the 400. I don't believe he was juiced up.

I don't know if you folks are being sarcastic or if you are really that naive about world class track and field. Of course he was juiced.

It was the Burger King Whoppers.

Every world record since '72 (19, not 18) should be dropped and track and field start over.

The Hearings agenda for for "exceptions" is now in order.

How far back do we go to decide things we can't prove?

No way Bob Hayes could do that anchor leg in Tokyo....or Mills get up like he did...

or that little girl mararthoner in '84

or Beamon

or Charles Dumas

or Simes

or...Navratilova?

Ollie wrote:

Yep, Marion too right.

No not Marion too. But then again, there seems to be a great deal of evidence against Marion. Much of it circumstantial true, but some of it not. We don't know yet. They're still sorting it out.

Against Michael, what you have is very fast time. No bills from Balco. No convicted drug cheats for spouses. No incriminating emails. That's why it's "speculation", as opposed to actual facts.

These "actual" facts, are they different from regular facts?

These "regular" facts. Do you mean the cynical opinions that LetsRun posters seem to think substitute for "actual" facts?

If you have access to some other "actual" facts ("actual" meaning verifiable), please share them with us.

"2. Michael Johnson passed his drug test"

We need to get over the idea of athletes having to "fail" a drug test to be using. The whole point of athletes going to companies like Balco (and believe me there many more companies out there), is so that they can use performance enhancing substances and "pass" the drug test. I think MJ saw all of this coming and got out while the getting was good. He made his millions, broke his records and got out before they could catch him.

// wrote:

"2. Michael Johnson passed his drug test"

We need to get over the idea of athletes having to "fail" a drug test to be using.

Exactly. Frankly all we really need to do is see them run fast. Then we have all we need to run them out of the sport. Good plan.

The whole point of athletes going to companies like Balco (and believe me there many more companies out there), is so that they can use performance enhancing substances and "pass" the drug test.

We should believe you, huh? OK. That's good enough for me. You obviously have plenty of inside information.

I think MJ saw all of this coming and got out while the getting was good. He made his millions, broke his records and got out before they could catch him.

Right on again. The fact that he was a 33-year old 200/400 meter guy after his last Olympics could not possibly have had anything to with his decision to retire. We all know that the 200 and 400 are an old-man's game.

Uh, yer overlukin' my sarcasm.

I wish there were more facts and less rumors. Thassall.

Facts don't need verification. They went through all that to become accepted as fact.

Saying we have actual facts that are better than regular facts is like saying "very first" is before first,

or "Was she last or very last?"

or "Was it a copy or an exact copy or the exact same thing?"

Back to you, Billy Bob...