Andres Arroyo wins 800, 1600, 3200 at states

jdjdj wrote:

What is wrong with the weather and terrain in Florida? There's no snow and no hills. Sounds perfect.

I assume they have hills on the track where you live. The weather was terrible at the meet. There were 15-20 mph winds at yesterday's 3A meet and I highly doubt they got much better for today's 4A meet. Plus they moved all the events to a rolling schedule. There was about 2 hours in between all Arroyo's victories.

jest a bit more info wrote:

Flat would not be good. Hot would not be good. It is not conducive to distance training.

None of the good and elite runners I know have ever used hills much if at all for training. Hills are in no way a necessity for running well on a track.

Um. Kenya

jdjdj wrote:

jest a bit more info wrote:

Flat would not be good. Hot would not be good. It is not conducive to distance training.

None of the good and elite runners I know have ever used hills much if at all for training. Hills are in no way a necessity for running well on a track.

RuppNation wrote:

I assume they have hills on the track where you live. The weather was terrible at the meet. There were 15-20 mph winds at yesterday's 3A meet and I highly doubt they got much better for today's 4A meet. Plus they moved all the events to a rolling schedule. There was about 2 hours in between all Arroyo's victories.

The weather was worse today than it was yesterday at least on a steady basis.

jdjdj wrote:

None of the good and elite runners I know have ever used hills much if at all for training. Hills are in no way a necessity for running well on a track.

a small sample I presume. That's only one issue though.

jest a bit more info wrote:

jdjdj wrote:

None of the good and elite runners I know have ever used hills much if at all for training. Hills are in no way a necessity for running well on a track.

a small sample I presume. That's only one issue though.

What does the sample size have to do with it? The sample size is irrelevant. Hills are not a necessity for track running. Why would they be? There are no hills on a track.

The average weather in Florida is not that bad. Sure, it's hot and muggy but so is the whole east coast. Run earlier or run at night. And drink a bit more water. You'll be fine.

Maybe you should call Lydiard , if you could , he has passed on and tell him he was full of shit

Lydiard advocated four weeks of strength work. This included hill running and springing, followed by a maximum of four weeks of anaerobic training (Lydiard found through physiological testing that four weeks was the maximum amount of anaerobic development needed—any more caused negative effects such a decrease in aerobic enzymes and increased mental stress, often referred to as burnout, due to lowered blood pH). Then followed a co-ordination phase of six weeks in which anaerobic work and volume taper off and the athlete races each week, learning from each race to fine-tune himself or herself for the target race. For Lydiard's greatest athletes the target race was invariably an Olympic final.

Hill training can be an integral part of improvement

Not too many people argue with Lydiard's results

Trialswatcher wrote:

Maybe you should call Lydiard , if you could , he has passed on and tell him he was full of shit

Lydiard advocated four weeks of strength work. This included hill running and springing, followed by a maximum of four weeks of anaerobic training (Lydiard found through physiological testing that four weeks was the maximum amount of anaerobic development needed—any more caused negative effects such a decrease in aerobic enzymes and increased mental stress, often referred to as burnout, due to lowered blood pH). Then followed a co-ordination phase of six weeks in which anaerobic work and volume taper off and the athlete races each week, learning from each race to fine-tune himself or herself for the target race. For Lydiard's greatest athletes the target race was invariably an Olympic final.

Hill training can be an integral part of improvement

Not too many people argue with Lydiard's results

I don't know why you're so angry. I didn't say Lydiard was FOS. I didn't say that hills don't work. All I said was that they aren't a necessity. You people are crazy.

you all are f ucking dumb if you think there are literally no hills at all in Florida and if you think the weather is somehow a training liability

You can find short steep hills in Florida and there are places with rolling hills of some size like San Antonio, FL or Clermont, FL not too far from Orlando, where Arroyo is. But honestly, the weather is far harsher than in the northeast in the spring and summer, and for distance running the humidity and the intensity of the sun are tough unless you run prior to 8:30 a.m. But it is a fine place to train in the winter and not too bad even in March and April some years. The real reason that distance running is weak in a state where there are tremendous, nationally elite athletes all over the place in football is that that sport is king and distance running is not a consideration. In a lot of places in Florida too there are not a lot of even safe places to run. I almost get hit by cars on a daily basis in Tampa, though you can get to parks with safe roads and trails. Sprints and field events aren't too bad here, with some great ones, but there are dozens of elite national prospects in the Tampa Bay area alone in football, all of them prototypical size and weight and speed, many of them headed for places like Auburn, LSU, Alabama, and the gators.

sssd wrote:

I'm actually surprised that Florida with as large a population as they've got, doesn't have deeper talent.

Arroyo: 4:15.50, 1:54, 9:30.75

I agree. The winning 4x800 relay team didn't even break 8:00. That seems incredibly slow unless class 4A is a small school class.

jjjjjjj wrote:

You can find short steep hills in Florida and there are places with rolling hills of some size like San Antonio, FL or Clermont, FL not too far from Orlando, where Arroyo is.

I know somebody in Fort Lauderdale who was complaining about lack of hills to train on. I advised running repeats up an open drawbridge, but make sure to stop before going over the edge and ending up in the water. There are gators in there!

On a more serious note, there are some pretty good trails in some parts of Florida. Long, really tough hills are a bit harder to find, but quite a few areas have decent rollers.

Some folks have to learn their history, many greats moved to Florida to run there, or ran there already

The old Gainesville experience

Liqouri, Barry Brown, many more, the disadavantages maybe in May/June etc?

How about training outdoors in November thru Feb

Lack of hills didn't keep top American runners in the 1970's from relocating to Florida and running for the Florida Track Club with Galloway, Shorter, Brown, and Liquori.

How many great runners come from Appalachia and West Virginia?

Of all of Lydiards training theories, the hill rep phase was the most useless.

Kenyans are good because of genetics and growing up at altitude. Not all those hill repeats they do.

you do realize Shorter trained in CO right?.... have you ever talked to the man?...... Just because you wear the singlet doesn't mean you train or live there. You should go out to the bar and have a few drinks with him. You'll learn a lot more than runnersworld or the print on a singlet.

Florida(especially anything south of Orlando) is FLAT. Landfills and bridges are 'hills'.

I never had a beer with Shorter but in 1990 I had a few with Keith Brantly in Boulder. A few others. Paul Christman the writer. Even the bartender was a 2:14 marathoner that also worked at Shorter's store Runners Roost.

I guess I was misinformed that Frank Shorter at one time lived and trained in Florida. I knew he was living in Boulder before Montreal but I always thought when he made his big breakthrough in 1970-72 he was based in Florida the majority of the year.

Shorter, Galloway and Bachelor moved away from Florida to Taos, New Mexico and trained there.

People who live in the NE have no clue.

whiner wrote:

Why don't you run it then since you like it so much and stop whining and complaining on here - he's going to run what he wants to run - not what some jerk on a message board wants

He'll run what his coach tells him to run. Or do you think he's ignoring the NR by choice?

I agree. The winning 4x800 relay team didn't even break 8:00. That seems incredibly slow unless class 4A is a small school class.

Like I said, there were 15-20 mph winds yesterday and it didn't get much better for today's meet. 4A is the biggest class and Bloomingdale's time would have definitely been sub 8 in normal weather (weather was perfect last year and they finished 7th in 8:00).