Is it unethical to sit-n-kick?

Marty LIquori...after running many relays at Penn...used to let the 2nd place guy catch him on the anchor leg after his Villanova team mates would give him a huge lead. He would then blast the last 200 and win easily. I remember him telling someone about "sit and kick" strategy..."they'll hate you ..but youll win"..

Did you see the Prefontaine movie ? Pre and Bill Bowerman had great discussions about this topic.

A race is a piece of art. You don´t deserve to win if you dont push yourself to the limit.

It was a woman, you dicks.

Want to see how to win? Watch Viren.

Want to see how to finish fourth? Watch Pre.

that's the biggest BS I've ever heard in my life

"piece of art?

what is art? and how is a race anything like a piece of art? it's not like you're being very creative.

"deserve to win?"

are you saying that the guy who came in second deserves to win if he led most of way?

I don't have a kick. Never have, never will. But knowing that fact means that I need to put the race away early with a hard pace. If I get outkicked, I haven't done my job.

I do one thing for sure - whining about being outkicked does nothing to improve your turnover. Congrats to the original poster for scoring $100.

dpt01 wrote:

that's the biggest BS I've ever heard in my life

"piece of art?

what is art? and how is a race anything like a piece of art? it's not like you're being very creative.

"deserve to win?"

are you saying that the guy who came in second deserves to win if he led most of way?

Man, Pre said that, not me !!!!!

In the sense of whether or not it's fair to your opponents to sit and kick, there's nothing wrong with it. Winning is winning, as long as you do the training and run every step start to finish no one else can fault you for your racing tactics.

However, (I know this varys from person to person) I think there is a lot more to a race than winning. And while it's cliche, the real competition (in my opinion) is the internal one. The only races I'm ever truly proud of are the ones where I know for a fact I ran as hard as I could and did everything in my power to cover the distance as fast as possible. Some people are only happy with a medal, some people are only happy with a pr, some people are only happy with doing their best to do their best.

So in summary, is it unethical to sit and kick? Not too your oponents, but maybe to yourself.

Pre is more full of crap than any other runner the world has ever seen. He loved to portray himself as the victim/underdog. The best was when he would complain that he didn't have any talent and that he ran all on heart. The funny thing is, a lot of suckers have believed him. I would think that most of you would know by now that he was just self-promoting and trying to get the people who didn't have any talent to have this bond with him...however, it was all a lie. Anybody seen results from his VO2 max test, a factor almost completely determined by genetics?

By the way, yes, sitting and kicking is fine. Back in the day in high school I would use whatever tactics necessary to help me/my team maximize our chances of winning the meet. I have taken unsuspecting victims out for a very hard opening 1/4 of a race if I knew they would follow me and blow up while I could hold on. I have taken a mile out in 80+seconds for the first 400 before someone else took the pace (when I was a 4:20's miler...however, I was tripling that meet and it was against our rival school). I have stayed with the pack the first third, and surged the middle third before shutting it down. I have stayed with the pack in a dual meet in xc before running 100 meters in about 13 seconds at the 2.5k mark so that I wouldn't drag along any of the guys on the other team so my team could win. They're all fair game. You do what it takes to win. It actually adds some spice to racing other than everyone just running their pace the whole time and nobody passes the whole race. I have always had a good kick so if they let me use it then either they aren't as good as me and are going to lose to me regardless or they are idiots for not playing to their strengths.

what the hell do you have against pre? he ran crazy most everytime he went out there, he never just sat around, and i am sure any runner dreams they could run like that, no one wants to hear your stories of the hay days when you sat and kicked against the rival school in pouring rain on a sand track with high heels on or what ever the hell and please don't bash pre, your just trying to get attention.

Just because the dude sat on the other guy for the whole race doesn't mean he was taking it easy. Maybe he was just barely hanging on the whole way and always has a great kick. I ran a 5 mile race once where I took the lead for the first mile and then got passed. I ran one of my toughest races and struggled to stay with him for the next 3.75 miles and then blew by him with 400 to go. I won a trip to London and the second place guy looked at me and said "thanks for sharing the lead jackass." I said "thanks for the trip to London." The point is, sitting and kicking doesn't mean you are taking it easy - most of us have run our best races by sitting on someone and getting pulled along rather than leading the whole way. If you can blow everyone out of the water, then do it, but if not, be smart and sit back, or at least don't lead the whole way. Anyone who says its unethical to sit and kick is a sore loser.

No I don't think it's unethical to sit and kick.

Anyway,Here's one for the books.When I was racing a 5km on the track back in college,the guy behind me was sitting for lap after lap waiting to sprint by with 200m to go.With 2000m to go I ran to the second lane and ran behind him and he slowed down.Then I took the lead and in the next lap I came to a complete stop and bent over and grabbed my knew's.As you can imagine the kid ran right into me and I took off sprinting.He dropped out and I ran a 14:45, which was a good time for me as a freshmen.No, I am not proud of this move .......okay maybe a little ...... but was I unethical?ha,ha,ha...I just wanted to race and win.We do really stupid things when were young and full of piss & vineger.

I don't have anything against how he ran...it was stupid, but that's his decision. However, his propaganda, self-pity, and hypocritical nature made him less admirable. Remember the 1972 Olympic 5k in Munich? Of course you do, you worship Pre. Anyway, Pre was always a front runner, right? Of course, that's why you worship him. So why is it that he criticized Bedford for not front running even though Bedford was historically a front runner? It would be understandable if Pre had been leading the whole race, but he only led 1000-1200 meters of the race. Pre abandoned his own tactics as did Bedford so how did he have the nerve to go on national or worldwide television and criticize Bedford? Even if Pre had led the whole thing, Bedford still had no obligation to Pre. Pre's blaming of Bedford is merely an attempt to cover up the fact that he did not have what it takes to win an Olympic 5k. What that takes is either to be head and shoulders above the field, more daring/smart than the field, or most likely a darn good kick. Pre choked and blamed others. That is one of the many reasons I don't respect or worship him.

Wanger wrote:

I was in a situation in my last 10k, much like Mr. 15:32 here. Except, I was constantly slowing the pace, swinging out wide to keep the others from drafting off me, even looking back at everyone for some help up front into the wind. But, not one of them would come up front. I ended up leading the way, and getting outkicked by some prick in the last 50m who I dragged around for 9.9km. I wasn't impressed.

Well, you need to make up your mind. If you're swinging wide, and slowing the pace, but STILL leading, then you're just wasting your energy. Either slow down enough to get back in the pack, or run hard to try to get away from them.

If you don't want to lead, then don't! If you want a fast time, that's your business, but no one else in the race "owes" it to you help your personal goals.

I ran an 8-k in Richmond a couple years ago which was straight out and back, and started into the wind. The lead pack was 7 or 8 Kenyans, plus a couple of North American guys. No one wanted to lead, so we just jogged behind some local high school kid and came through 2 miles in just under 10 minutes. It was pretty funny to see this huge pack of guys just clipping their strides, all bunched up behind the poor kid.

In the end, I ran the last two miles in 9:08, but got dusted by almost 30 seconds by the winner. And finished one spot out of the money anyway, so guess I should have pushed it and just run for a PR after all!

(For the record, that's why I was content to sit-and-kick: I was worried about place, not time, trying to earn a little rent money.)

Other than the various "who's hotter" threads on here, this has to be one of the dumbest.

You race to win. Sometimes you have great conditions and a good field to pull you and you try win by running as fast as possible, but more often, especially in some small road race, you run to get first, and sitting and kicking is a great way to do it if you've got the tools. Worrying about the ethics of it means you need bigger problems to worry about.

I agree. You do run a race to win. Did El G set a world record in the olympic final? No. He, in his terms, "jogged" the first two laps before just completly letting lose. You do run a race to win, if you never plan on winning just even a race your justa recreational runner, because no matter how many runners I know, there is always a goal of winning (a race, age group, masters, clydesdales, etc.) For instance, why do people run races? Is the actual purpose behind a race to see who will win, or who will mess up and not do too well. Somedays it is not your day. In 72, it was not Pre's day, but I still do not think that no matter what tactics he used that day, he wasn't going to beat Viren. The purpose of a race is to win. That's why people set up road races. In the olympics does someone run their heart out or hold back and let lose the last 800 in a ATTEMPT TO WIN?

In the race you descibe,no problem with the sit and kick.In different circumstances where the primary object of the racers is to get a good time for a qualifier,then sit and kick is pretty sleasy.

1) A teamate of mine refused to take the lead from a guy from another team when they were battling it out in the conference champ 10K. The guy even moved out into lane two. At one point they practicaly slowed down to a walk...but the pack began to catch up. Finaly, my teammate dropped a 62 on the final lap. The other dud ewas pissed.

However, it's conferences and you are there to win...ethics or not. Plus, my teammate also had to run the 5K later.

2) A friend of mine sat and kicked on the last interval of a workout. He told the guy he was training with that he'd jump in the last one and try to hold on. He sat for 1800 and kicked in the last 200. That was pretty bad. Anytime someone tried something like that afterwords we'd say "Hey, you're not going to Jones the workout, are you?" (Not his real name).

i am amused the question was asked at all; that we need permission to win a race from a competitor is a sorry commentary on our molly coddled times. if you obey the rules of the race, all else is fair in love and war; ethics has nothing to do with it.