Our Week That Was is out and we've got a blurb on the masters world record in the marathon going down:
We've got an interesting back and forth on the old record holder Andres Espinosa that warrants discussion. I'm pasting it here. It will be better formatted at the link above.
In Milan, 41-year-old Kenyan Kenneth Mungara ran 2:08:43 to break the previous masters world record of 2:08:46, held by 1993 NYC Marathon champion Andres Espinosa of Mexico (set in Berlin in 2003). Mungara also got the win in the process. 2:08 at age 41 is amazing — trust us if you aren’t yet 40 (Mungara is older than both of the LetsRun.com co-founders, who would currently struggle not be able to run one mile — 4:54 — at that pace). After Mungara set the masters WR, we got an email from one of LetsRun’s most prolific and informed emailers who was happy to see Espinosa’s mark go down as he said he’d always been “suspicious” of Espinosa’s WR as shown in the email below:
Was pleasantly surprised to see that this weekend in Milan Kenneth Mungara took down Andres Espinosa‘s master’s WR for the marathon. I have always been suspicious of Espinosa’s performance in Berlin in 2003. Look at his record:
1988 Dallas Marathon 2:16:13 age 25
1989 Dallas Marathon 2:16:19 age 26
1991 New York City Marathon 2:10:00 age 28
1992 New York City Marathon 2:10:44 age 29
1993 New York City Marathon 2:10:04 age 30
1994 Boston Marathon 2:07:19 age 31 (very strong tailwind)
1995 World Champs Marathon 2:16:44 age 32
1997 World Champs Marathon DNF age 34
1997 Amsterdam Marathon 2:10:22 age 34
1999 Boston Marathon 2:18:47 age 36
2000 Olympic Marathon 2:18:02 age 37
2001 Torreon Marathon 2:10:57 age 38
2001 World Champs 2:23:06 age 38
2003 Boston Marathon 2:19:54 age 40
2003 Berlin Marathon 2:08:46 age 40*
2004 Torreon Marathon 2:11:43 age 41
2004 Olympic Marathon 2:29:43 age 41
*If we throw out that 1994 Boston performance (as we should, since all times – including Cosmas Ndeti’s course record & Bob Kempainen’s 3-minute lifetime PR – were really fast that year due to tailwind), then that means that in his life, Espinosa never broke 2:10 in the marathon….until he turned 40 years of age…when suddenly he shatters his lifetime best on a record-eligible course. Hmm….
Mungara didn’t start running until late in life, but even so, he had a consistent record: 2:08:32 at 35, 2:07:58 at 36, 2:07:36 at age 37, and now 2:08:44 at age 41. In other words, his master’s WR didn’t come out of nowhere.
We enjoyed the email and the thought that went into it. We didn’t know that Espinosa’s non-Boston pb came at age 40 in Berlin. However, we didn’t agree with the logic that one should be suspicious of Espinosa. If Espinosa doped in 2003, one of the following two things has to be true and neither makes a lot of sense to us.
1) He never doped up until that point but decided to start doping at age 40 and that’s why he ran the big PB at age 40.
2) He was always a doper but nothing really worked until age 40 — maybe some new wonder drug came out.
Neither one makes sense to us. If you are immoral enough to dope, you’d think you’d do it during the prime of your career when the big bucks are on the line. We don’t know of any new drugs coming out in 2003. EPO started in cycling in the 1990s.
An easier answer to us is, “Espinosa was a stud who ran 2:10:00 in New York. That’s easily a 2:08 on a flat course (in our reply to the emailer we said 2:06 but must have been on drugs when we wrote it). In his prime, Espinosa normally raced marathons like Boston and New York. As a master, he time-trialed one.”
After responding along those lines to our emailer, he responded:
It’s always good to have a devil’s advocate, as it keeps us honest.
I’ll answer by saying that I suspect there have always been athletes who didn’t start doping until later in their careers…when their times start to slow down and they begin to feel that they need “help.” (Personal hunch: I suspect that this was the case with Mary Decker. Possibly with Regina Jacobs as well.)
This would explain why a marathoner might not start doping until late 30s or early 40s. (When as a young runner you are winning or finishing 2nd in big races like NYC, doping probably doesn’t seem necessary.)
Espinosa ran 2:10 for three straight years at New York City, which I suspect was pretty close to his physiological limit. Yes, people were racing [not time-trialing] back then, but they were doing so by getting close to their physical limitations.
I’m afraid I can’t quite agree that a 2:10 at New York is worth a 2:06 on a flat course (Editor’s note: LetsRun.com agrees, we made a mistake when we wrote 2:06). That would mean that Mutai’s 2:05 at NYC is worth a 2:01 or 2:02, which is surely not feasible. I suppose a case could be made that a 2:06 flat course marathoner today might run 2:10 in New York, but to compare apples with apples and not with oranges, we ought to look at Espinosa’s times and compare them with the era in which he ran. Many past winners before 2000 – when Espinosa was running – ran lifetime bests in New York. And before 2000, the sub-2:07 club consisted of only one person (Khalid Khannouchi). I could be wrong, but I don’t think even a sub-2:08 runner competed in New York before 2000.
So it’s possible Espinosa’s 2:10′s would translate to 2:09‘s or 2:08‘s…but even that’s theoretical, since he never did it.
I would be surprised if Espinosa’s agent said anything other than that Espinosa was not taking PED’s. And without hard proof, a person should be presumed to be innocent. But that doesn’t mean we can’t look at performances and raise an eyebrow.
I mean, when Regina Jacobs was winning titles and running a lifetime PR at 39 years of age, it made a lot of people raise an eyebrow…and with good reason, as it turns out. I hope this will generate discussion among LetsRun.commers – would be interesting to know what others think.
In the end, we reached out to Troy James — Espinosa’s agent and a long-time friend of LetsRun.com (James is also now an author, who writes under the singular name of “Troy” — like a Brazilian soccer star. You can check out Troy’s book, The Money Island, which has 100% five-star reviews on Amazon.com, here). James’ email defending Espinosa was incredibly good:
Thank you for your email. I had sent an email to Andres informing him of the new record.
Kenneth Mungara has been one on my radar as someone who was a threat to Andres’ mark. Like Andres, he too got a late start with his running career. Until age 25, Andres was a steelworker in Monclova and had the upper body to show. He did not fit the skinny runner body that most runners have. Andres starting running in his 20s to hopefully someday win a trophy. He far exceeded those expectations.
Having explained that, I’ll offer this observation of Andres’ career. I watched Andres for the first time at the 1990 Dallas Marathon, this race had no prize money and Andres took a 24-hour bus ride to the start. Dallas is not a fast course but from Mile 6 to 15 he averaged 4:58 per mile. He won the race by several minutes in 2:16. I met him after the race and told him that I believed he could run 2:12 and be in the Top 5 in New York. (Boy, did I underestimate that.)
Keep in mind Andres was the elite of the elite in the early-90s. He was constantly in the top 10 marathon fastest lists and was consistent being at the top. We chose races like New York and Boston and both are not known as being easy or fast courses. Pat Lynch, the elite recruiter for Boston, recognized that Andres was built for Boston and lobbied hard to get him there. It paid off. When Andres ran his PB of 2:07:19, he was the 6th-fastest marathoner of all time. His splits were 1:05:00/1:02:19. His last mile was run in 4:20.
He was drug tested each race and I was present with him IN THE RESTROOM as was my duty to each athlete to insure all details and procedure was followed.
Then came the Kenyan explosion and other marathons popped up with fast courses. Andres never ran those races due to the then lack of money to acquire someone of his stature, otherwise you might have witnessed those times. What was once 6th-fastest now ranks as the 182nd-fastest marathoner.
In simple terms, late bloomer like Mangara, Andres ran tougher courses, later in his career he accepted bad advice choosing the wrong races, a fast Berlin gave opportunity for a record and he got it. I believe that Andres would be a 2:04 marathoner today if he were aged 30. This is the first time I have ever had a doping issue presented me regarding Andres. A quiet man, Andres is an unassuming champion who was kept out of the pre-race hype so that he would bask in his race day accomplishments and not offer excuses like so many of his competitors were reduced to do.
Troy James
PS. BTW I had a doping clause in my contract with Andres. The contract was approved by the world’s biggest law firm, Baker & McKenzie.
So what do you think?