Superswede: I'm the one who made the "airhead" remark.
To be clear, I think Hall is a great runner. I want him to succeed. I wanted him to medal in London and I would be thrilled to see him win a major, or come close, like Desi.
My "airhead" remark wasn't based on the religious stuff. Nor was it meant to be an attack on his character. He seems like a nice guy.
My remark was mostly based on interviews I've seen of him, in which his words indicate that he is intensely focused on the mental and spiritual side of running.
In interviews, he comes across as somebody who has started to spend so much time with his own thoughts that he's become somewhat ungrounded. Combined with the valley girl/surfer accent, he just seems like kind of an airhead to me. Maybe it's an unfair comment, but so be it.
As an example, I watched his pre-race interview at London. He was saying something about how he wasn't really worrying about his performance because somewhere within himself there was a perfect marathon that he hoped would come out.
I thought it was weird when I heard it, and I immediately felt pessimistic about his race. It sounded to me like the type of crunchy mumbo-jumbo you'd hear in a Berkeley candle shop. But, more fundamentally, it didn't sound like a guy who was really in the zone and ready to focus intensely for 126 minutes on executing every little thing correctly to actually perform a perfect marathon.
I wish Ryan would import a little bit of Yuki Kawauchi into his approach. Be humble. Don't assume that a perfect marathon is going to emerge from your being.
Intead, assume that you are worthless and will fail unless you impose 100% of your effort and strategic intelligence over every single step of the 26.2 mile course, even if it means frothing from the mouth and fainting at the finish.
I don't want my favorite runner to talk about finding his perfect race from within. Athletic contests are not about rebirth. They're about execution.
I think Ryan Hall is a unique and amazing US talent. I am rooting for him 100%. I hope that he fully recovers from his injury and gets back to fundamentals. I'd like to see him focused on executing a world-class training and racing plan devised by a world-class coach.
I'd also love to see him develope a bit of a chip on his shoulder. I don't think he needs to prove anything to the world, but I'd love to see him try.