19 Year old Japanese Guy Runs 2:11:34 for the Marathon, What Do You Think a 19 Year Old American Could Do?

Let us see where Mr. Shimoda stands 5 years from now before we anoint him or have other youngsters follow in his footsteps.

Kirk Pfeffer did run 2:17:XX for the AJR.

Since we have seen people with 13:27 ability (or slower) for 5k run 2:11:XX many people thought that Ritz could have done it as a 19 year-old when he ran 13:27 as a college freshman and placed 24th in the Long Race at WCCC in 2002. But we know now that that would have been unlikely.

"We should have another thread, what happens if we get a fast course and get all the American to go out at 2:06 pace."

They would blow up and run 2:12-2:13-2:14 or worse.

I don't really view going through 5k at 2:07 as "going out at 2:07 pace".

Out of the 30 that you say went out at 2:07 pace, 4 of them ran that. 2 of them ran pretty close, and the 24 of them went out too fast.

Meb's coach Bob Larsen stated in an interview that he thought Ryan Hall could have run close to 2:10:xx while in high school.

“He was essentially a 4:00 miler in high school and the Mt. Sac cross country course record holder. Irv sent me his workouts. They were at a very high level. I think he could have run close to a 2:10 (marathon) in high school. I had an athlete, Steve Ortiz, who ran 2:13 as a college junior, and Ryan was doing harder workouts in high school. And when he was at Stanford they ran hard, because of all the talent that was there."

http://tonireavis.com/2015/03/17/big-3-down-to-1/

The 5k split for the marathon is equivalent to the 1185m point in a 10000m race.

If you are "going out at" X:XX pace in a marathon I think you need to make it to the half-marathon point at that pace. Otherwise you are just going out too fast for a short part of the race. The first 6 (assuming that all of the top-6 were in that leading group at 5k) went out at 2:07 and succeeded, the other 24 went out too fast.

In five years, we'll say, let us see him in five years.

smile wrote:

Meb's coach Bob Larsen stated in an interview that he thought Ryan Hall could have run close to 2:10:xx while in high school.

“He was essentially a 4:00 miler in high school and the Mt. Sac cross country course record holder. Irv sent me his workouts. They were at a very high level. I think he could have run close to a 2:10 (marathon) in high school. I had an athlete, Steve Ortiz, who ran 2:13 as a college junior, and Ryan was doing harder workouts in high school. And when he was at Stanford they ran hard, because of all the talent that was there."

http://tonireavis.com/2015/03/17/big-3-down-to-1/

Never. No way.

Hall was a wash in college out on the farm until his Junior year.

Perhaps Gerry could have.

The Overexplainer wrote:

"We should have another thread, what happens if we get a fast course and get all the American to go out at 2:06 pace."

They would blow up and run 2:12-2:13-2:14 or worse.

I don't really view going through 5k at 2:07 as "going out at 2:07 pace".

Out of the 30 that you say went out at 2:07 pace, 4 of them ran that. 2 of them ran pretty close, and the 24 of them went out too fast.

The 15 flat first 5k is not smart for most of them. I'm not trying to say that at all, but it is a different mentality.

Ryan Hall was our Kenyan. He trained like a Kenyan in high school and I think he could have probably run close to 2:11.

That was a fun marathon to watch. The camera work was good and it was a fast, competitive race.

Best man would probably be Grant Fisher or Drew Hunter for it. I'd say they could run 2:25 right now, but 2:18 with a year's training first due to their lower mileage.

Best woman would probably be Allie Ostrander or Anna Rohrer. Not sure what time tho.

The one thing we know about the Japanese is that they flood the the results with kids and young guys running 13:50's, 1:03's and 2:10+, but hit a massive brick wall at 2:07-08. They are apparently unwilling to do either the PEDs or the individualized, sensible training it takes to go past that. I get the impression is that they run pro for corporate Ekiden teams rather than training groups as in the U.S. or even Kenya, which does not foster the individualistic spirit it takes to go beyond the herd.

The guy training with NOP might be the guy who breaks through that (as he has somewhat in the 5K).

Great to see Abel Kirui back in shape. Always been one of my favourite marathoners and could do some big things later in the year. It's a shame he's left it too late for the Olympic team because he's one of the best championship racers of all time.

The Good The Bad and the Ugali wrote:

The one thing we know about the Japanese is that they flood the the results with kids and young guys running 13:50's, 1:03's and 2:10+, but hit a massive brick wall at 2:07-08. They are apparently unwilling to do either the PEDs

This is consistent with the hypothesis that EPO makes an elite runner about 5 minutes faster.

Doing it Right wrote:

That was a fun marathon to watch. The camera work was good and it was a fast, competitive race.

Other televised marathons (or any track/athletics for that matter) could learn something from this coverage. Course was marked well to TV too it seemed.

There is no incentive for a top American 19 year old to run a marathon, in fact probably disincentive to do so. Top runners are on scholarship in the Ncaa, competing in distances 10k and down. A kid who could break 2:12 isn't going to be redshirted, he's going to be raced and trained to peak for 10k or below. Now the NAIA has the marathon, but usually their scholarship athletes are a bit below the NCAA and top NAIA guys usually stick to the 10k because they'll try to double for points at nationals. What do we think Shimoda could run for the xc 8k?

Paul Gompers ran 2:15 at age 19 and before that he was kind of off the radar before that. Pfeffer was only 21 when he ran 2:11 at NYC.

Edward Teach wrote:

There is no incentive for a top American 19 year old to run a marathon, in fact probably disincentive to do so. Top runners are on scholarship in the Ncaa, competing in distances 10k and down. A kid who could break 2:12 isn't going to be redshirted, he's going to be raced and trained to peak for 10k or below. Now the NAIA has the marathon, but usually their scholarship athletes are a bit below the NCAA and top NAIA guys usually stick to the 10k because they'll try to double for points at nationals. What do we think Shimoda could run for the xc 8k?

Um, Alana Hadley? lol

Obviously this Japanese kid is no Ryan Hall.

To answer your question, it would depend on what type of talent we get to train for the marathon. I coached DI college and I thought I could get some freshman guys to the Olympic Trials Standard, but I didn't get faster than 9:40 for 3200m guys coming from high school.