Cam Levins nowhere to be seen on final lap

Watched the race wrote:

Are you sure you paid attention to the splits? You missed the 61.x lap in the early-middle there... or the 26:55 pace from 3k to 5k and from 6k to 8k.

Yes, Farah and Rupp are as strong as any 10,000m runner. It was strength that won today, not speed. 53 is pretty standard for the last lap of a 10 or 5,000 in WC or Olympics.

Levins will make a good ultra or trail runner one day.

Watched the race wrote:

Are you sure you paid attention to the splits? You missed the 61.x lap in the early-middle there... or the 26:55 pace from 3k to 5k and from 6k to 8k.

Are you serious? I have the lap splits written down in front of me. A single 61 does not make a fast race. A bunch of sub 27 guys running their PR pace for 2k does not make it a fast pace. It's a fast pace when they run their PR pace for 10K! All you really had to do was look at two things. 1) The size of the pack at 9k and 2) The last laps of the top few. that was a relaxed pace for the top 6 or so. Had they manned up (and I am not saying Rupp or Farah should have as they knew they would win the kick) it could have been a much different scenario. when you have a faster PB than the guy you beat and he runs faster than his 800 pace for the last 400 you screwed up big time. No reason that pace should not have been 3:20 per kilo if those guys wanted a shot at winning.

distance Freak 23 wrote:

Yes, Farah and Rupp are as strong as any 10,000m runner. It was strength that won today, not speed. 53 is pretty standard for the last lap of a 10 or 5,000 in WC or Olympics.

Actually the pace was quite slow for most of the race.

Synthroid wrote:

This is true. Rupp deserves every ounce of that medal and every dollar it gets him. In all honesty, I'd like to see a system where coaches like Salazar work with kids from the age of 14. Until that's a reality, however, that guy who finds a way to get it done at the age of 21-22 trumps the kid who had the silver platter from 8th grade on.

8th grade? Rupp was a late discovered soccer player who didn't even run in 9th grade, much less 8th. Only in retrospect does having Salazar as a highschool coach look like a silver platter, not like he had an established record with highschoolers before that, many at the time was predicting Salazar would burn out and ruin Rupp. 13:37 was supposed to be Rupp's peak as a runner, right there in highschool.

Lukas wrote:

dispon wrote:

who was the d-bag from Lithuania insisting to stay in the first lane despite being lapped [twice].

Lukas Verzbikas. Give him a break. He was just killed in a biking accident three days ago. He just came back to life to run the Olympics.

I hope you the sign of the L when you said his name...I;m going to write a book about him and then go tell the world!

From Running Times:

Strictly speaking, the Galen Rupp era in U.S. distance running began on a late-summer day in 2000, when Jim Rilatt, the soccer coach at Central Catholic High School in Portland, Ore., watched a skinny, towheaded 14-year-old freshman midfielder, totally untrained as a runner, knock out a series of 200m sprints at under 30 seconds per rep. Rilatt reported the kid's performance to the legendary former marathoner Alberto Salazar, whose son attended Central and who'd just begun coaching the school's cross country team. Salazar stopped by soccer practice to take a look at the speedy freshman. The rest, as they say, is history.

He started with Salazar the summer after 8th grade. Only an idiot would think having Salazar as a coach when you are 14 is a disadvantage. But then again, only an idiot would deny facts fully available to anyone who cared.

He gave candid interview prior to the games. This was not going to be his year.

http://www.flotrack.org/coverage/248216-2012-London-Olympics-Games/video/640678-Cam-Levins-Olympics-Pressures-and-Expectations

Synthroid wrote:

He started with Salazar the summer after 8th grade. Only an idiot would think having Salazar as a coach when you are 14 is a disadvantage. But then again, only an idiot would deny facts fully available to anyone who cared.

Only an idiot would say that having a good coach is equivalent to having everything handed to you on a silver platter, too, for that matter.

Cam Levins seems to have a good coach, too.

Until yesterday, Rupp may have made more of a difference in Salazar's career than Salazar made in Rupp's.

Seriously? As good as Houle is do you want to compare his athletic and coaching resume to Salazar's? You may not have heard of him, but there is this guy named Mo who Salazar has also coached for awhile. Google him. Starting before he entered high school, Rupp was given advantages professional runners rarely have. Do you know who paid for his trip to run that 13:39 I'll give you a hint. The last name doesn't start with RU. Rupp is a great runner and has earned everything he has but those of us who go to public schools and don't have former world record holders and Olympic medalists who also have the most well financed shoe company on the planet behind them as coaches can relate just a little more to the guy at Southern Utah University who woke up one day and said, gee I think I'll start running 130 mile weeks (on actual ground) and see what happens.

webby wrote:

Only an idiot would say that having a good coach is equivalent to having everything handed to you on a silver platter, too, for that matter.

Cam Levins seems to have a good coach, too.

Until yesterday, Rupp may have made more of a difference in Salazar's career than Salazar made in Rupp's.

well ya, clearly he's not there yet but he still finished 11th at the olympics as a 22 or 23 year old. galen rupp finished 13th as a 22 year old. he has a tremendous amount of talent and great work ethic. it's still possible for him to become an elite at the world stage

Yeah but the difference between Rupp and Levins is that while Rupp was taking a slow, gradual approach that brought him up to higher intensity and mileage, Levins has already run ridiculous mileage and should not be expected to improve as much as Galen did.

Synthroid wrote:

Dennis Reynolds wrote:

He's not a failure, that's great. That wasn't my point. I only started this thread to ground the morons on here who seemed to think he had a legit shot to get a medal and idolize him for no reason when he hasn't accomplished jack sh*t on the world stage. He's right where Rupp was 4 years ago roughly, it would be great to see him in 4 years where Rupp is now. That's the right progression.

I idolize him a lot more than I do Rupp. If I want to teach kids how to improve without having advantages pretty much no one has (except Rupp) Levins is my example. Levins is a real world example of hard work paying off. Rupp is a hard worker, but 1 in 1000 will be offered the advantages he has.

Sour old fart.

American sprinters and shot putters would like a word with you.

Sssssss wrote:

American sprinters and shot putters would like a word with you.

Good luck to them running the distance events.

Don't criticize Cam for running high mileage. What he accomplished in London was much greater than what any distance runner has accomplished ever in Canadian history. All the runners who ran 70- 90 miles per week who thought they were bing sensible and gradual did not accomplish what Cam did today.

If he retires or gets injured tomorrow, he has accomplished more than almost anyone in Canadian history.

Sometimes you will only do something great if you take a risk.

Haven't there been like 10 blue collar runners who we all want to cheer for over rupp since we can better identify with them? If we add all of their careers together they don't touch rupps, and he still has a big future. Maybe what we identify more with these other guys is their irrationalities and inconsistencies, whereas rupp is to consistent, and ever progressing.

It's easy to take a stance against somebody when they can do what you, or maybe your homeboy cannot. That doesnt make rupp any less a runner, just us smaller people.

Blow me over wrote:

Haven't there been like 10 blue collar runners who we all want to cheer for over rupp since we can better identify with them? If we add all of their careers together they don't touch rupps, and he still has a big future. Maybe what we identify more with these other guys is their irrationalities and inconsistencies, whereas rupp is to consistent, and ever progressing.

It's easy to take a stance against somebody when they can do what you, or maybe your homeboy cannot. That doesnt make rupp any less a runner, just us smaller people.

So you ignored everything I said and projected your own pettiness onto me? You may identify with irrationality and inconsistency; I don't.

(Not about PED usage) Isn't Levins the largest long distance runner besides Solinsky ever(at the world class level). He looked like miler or even a half miler out there.