Northern Star wrote:
rojo wrote:http://www.athleticsweekly.com/blog/galaxy-of-stars-attend-global-sports-communications-anniversary-41484/My thoughts. No chance. None (unless you count running down a mountain with a tail wind)
I don't know if you can get four full minutes, but it's clear to me that Geb (or Kimetto or Kipsang or Mutai) could have run a lot faster had you done the following:
1. Run the race at night instead of in the morning
2. Run on a perfectly flat criterium-style loop
3. Run in colder conditions
4. Better (more precise and longer-lasting) pacers
5. Delineate the perfect tangent lines on the course with a visible paint strip
6. Spend a lot of money to attract the best talent
Here's a vision for how to do it:
http://www.runningwritings.com/2016/01/how-to-break-marathon-world-record-in.html
To respond to your innovative ideas
1. I doubt this would help and might just screw with the body clock.
2. Could definitely help. But there's not the money to build this. A course like Berlin is close enough I doubt this would make a significant difference.
3. They already run races in ideal temperatures. Obviously not every race is going to have perfect conditions.
4. I mean yeah this would be nice butwhat are we talking a guy going to 22 to 24 miles pacing? Anyone in that kind of shape is capable of winning a major or setting the wr themselves. They're basically going to be sacrificing a marathon that season to pace. It's going to take a lot of money to get them to do that. And it's not like there's an abundance of guys capable of that. Plus rabbits will have off days just like the guys going for the record. As far as even pacing there are notable instances where rabbits have done a bad job.
5. I've seen this at some races but I think the top guys generally do a decent job of running tangents when chasing times.
6. It would be interesting if Berlin had the same money as London to attract that quality of a field.
Overall the pursuit of the wr makes the racing less compelling to me. The reality is conditions and courses play such a big factor. I think the sport would be better off if there was more focus on competition rather than time. Think of all the most exciting races you've watched track or roads. How many have been wr attempts. A couple of my favorite races like the world's 03 5000m was very fast and a championship record, but the fast time was achieved by racing not chasing time. The only wr attempt I can think of that was a truly great race was when El g held off Ngeny when he ran 3:26.