Ever spoke to an older runner?

Not Cool Bro wrote:

andicamp wrote:

So.... you felt like an ass because you assumed that a human being wasn't worth talking to because he was older, but it turns out he was worth talking to because he wasn't as slow as you thought?

Guess what? You're still an ass.

I assumed he felt like an ass for saying "nice job" to an experienced/accomplished athlete. I might say "nice job" to my mom for going out and running 5 miles, but it'd be a weird thing for one serious runner to say to another just for being out there running.

I try not to be a complete rude dick when i pass people, so i make small encouraging comments most of the time. There's enough arrogant runners already.

Yes. During my senior indoor season, after I stumbled off the track after setting a school record in 9:48 (mediocre, I know. I live in the south so I only race indoor once or twice per year), an older overweight gentleman said something along the lines of

'congratulations, maybe someday you'll get the school record.'

I responded 'But I just did'

"No, you didn't. I ran 9:12 back in the 1970's'

I looked it up later that night, and he wasn't lying. The dude won state back when they still ran the mile and 2 mile.

I was running 5 minutes hard, short recovery and Freddy Williams came the other way. He slowed to talk, I said hello and went on to my next repeat.

He was the Canadian 800 champ.

He was only 10 years older than me but....I was in the 2nd general starting corral at Chicago Marathon in 2007 while the temps were heating up. The guy next to me notices my Hanson's socks and comments on them. I said I used to live in MI and recently moved to IL at the time. We chat about MI runners and coaches. I finally say "what's your PR" and he says like 2:09...I'm thinking I should know who this is...It was Greg Meyer...he couldn't have been nicer. He and I had simialer heat adjusted race goals that day 3:10-3:15 and we bumped into each other along the course cautioning about not going to fast with the heat (that was the year it was cancelled due to heat). It was a great experience...great guy. We finished within a minute of each other.

Gallon Rupp wrote:

Not many stories. But I can always tell that a person is an old school runner when they call a 400m runner a Quarter Miler.

If he's American.

Many of us refer it to the 400 m.

There are few quarters run anymore, and we usually refer to it as that when we've been drinking, or telling stories of how we collapsed in the last 100

I'm an "older runner".

When I was a high school miler, I talked to Billy Squires, who corrected my form in the middle of a 5-mile road race. Great guy, down to earth.

I talked often to Pat McMahon, 2nd in Boston in '71, 3rd at Boston in '70, and 12th at the '68 Olympics. He was our indoor coach my junior/senior year. Pat was hilarious. He was rude and mean, and smiled a lot.

Everyone from shot putters to 2-milers spent the first 3 weeks of training sprinting up a 150-meter hill until nearly dead. The first race of the season I knocked 7 seconds off my mile PR. Thanks Pat.

I love when this happens. I usually meet the opposite, someone tooying their own horn and how fast and great they are and here I am a sub 4 miler listening to this crap.

Shame on me wrote:

Not Cool Bro wrote:

I assumed he felt like an ass for saying "nice job" to an experienced/accomplished athlete. I might say "nice job" to my mom for going out and running 5 miles, but it'd be a weird thing for one serious runner to say to another just for being out there running.

I try not to be a complete rude dick when i pass people, so i make small encouraging comments most of the time. There's enough arrogant runners already.

A-ha. I see. Well, some people might disagree with me on this, but I would suggest just saying hello or giving a little wave to people when you pass by. Saying "good job" just because you're running faster is kind of arrogant.

a ucla teammate of mine in the late 80s told me a story about running through his neighborhood in northern california during the summer with his ucla gear on when he was called over by some old dude who lived a few blocks away. after my teammate politely answered questions about competing at ucla, he asked the old dude if he ever ran in college, and the dude replied that he'd run for berkeley back in the day. they exchanged names, and it was only after my teammate got back home from his run and later looked up the dude's name (not sure what resource he used in the pre-internet age) to find out he was none other than don bowden, the first american under 4 in the mile...

HandWringingLiberal wrote:

Yeah, I yell "track" if they are clogging the inside lane when I'm doing a serious workout.

As one of those old runners (I am over 60 and have been running for over 45 years) I have come to realize that you are only really as good as your last run.

So when younger runners do take the time to try to talk to me, I do not dwell on past accomplishments, but on the present and future.

I remember what I was like when younger, and do not bother younger runners today.

All I ask for is a bit of respect. Sometimes I am running what I now consider a serious workout using the inside lane of the track. When I am doing something like 3 x 1000m in 4:20 it may not seem like much. But I have a right to the inside lane as much as anyone for the timed portion of these intervals.

Sorry it seems slow, and sorry I am not using lanes 3-8 because its difficult to locate the proper marks for 200m splits in those lanes. And yes, when you are old and slower you want to check your pace every 200m because it takes such a relatively long time to run 200m.

Avocado's Number wrote:

The older I get, the less often I talk to older runners, and the more often I'm on the other side of those conversations.

Amen to that, brother!

And to the old guy who's running 1000's in 4:20, let me know if you want company. I remember reading George Sheehan years ago, saying that hard running still feels the same. It just takes (a lot) longer. Damn, was he right!

I was doing some 400's up and down a road and this old fella was working in his garden... well into 70's-80's. Exchanged a few pleasantries and on my final cool down he said 'nice form' and we got chatting. Turns out he ran a 4:08 mile back in the 1950's and his goal at the time was to qualify for the 56/60 Olympics (forget which). He made the final of the UK Champs to qualify but think he was 6th so wasn't selected. Made my 68's feel awfully shit.

HandWringingLiberal wrote:

Yeah, I yell "track" if they are clogging the inside lane when I'm doing a serious workout.

As yeah sow, so shall ye reap, MFer.

Age will hit you too.

I went with a runner friend to a pub once and we ran into an (I won't name him)

older runner, from Oz.

By the second pint he was rolling off the funniest coxsman stories about his game back in his traveling and competing all over the world days. His story about successfully seducing a nun was hilarious.

Aye... wrote:

HandWringingLiberal wrote:

Yeah, I yell "track" if they are clogging the inside lane when I'm doing a serious workout.

As yeah sow, so shall ye reap, MFer.

Age will hit you too.

Saw him later on the freeway, his Q-tip head was barely over the dash, he was in the left lane doing forty with his blinker on.

Damned baby boomers: move over for Millennials !

Hey, that would be a great slogan/ bumper sticker.

Big Red wrote:

I talked often to Pat McMahon, 2nd in Boston in '71, 3rd at Boston in '70, and 12th at the '68 Olympics. He was our indoor coach my junior/senior year. Pat was hilarious. He was rude and mean, and smiled a lot.

McMahon's the best. I ran for him in the late 90's and he was still pissed about getting second in Boston in '71, said the winner cut the course and cost him the win.

3hr-marathoner wrote:

Big Red wrote:

I talked often to Pat McMahon, 2nd in Boston in '71, 3rd at Boston in '70, and 12th at the '68 Olympics. He was our indoor coach my junior/senior year. Pat was hilarious. He was rude and mean, and smiled a lot.

McMahon's the best. I ran for him in the late 90's and he was still pissed about getting second in Boston in '71, said the winner cut the course and cost him the win.

How do you cut the course at Boston?

HRE wrote:

3hr-marathoner wrote:

McMahon's the best. I ran for him in the late 90's and he was still pissed about getting second in Boston in '71, said the winner cut the course and cost him the win.

How do you cut the course at Boston?

They only finished 5 seconds apart. He said there was some confusion on the last turn and the other guy cut some distance. I'm sure he went into detail but I hadn't run Boston yet and didn't have a mental picture of what the finish looked like so the details didn't stick in my mind.

It's been a couple of years now, but I used to meet with Jim Ryun every couple of months through business-related stuff, typically for a good 30 minutes or so each time, plenty of which was just small-talk. This went on for a few years. It was totally surreal for me to be with him there, every single time.

So one time when I was in a meeting with him, a good friend of mine came by and was waiting for me out in the lobby, a guy about my age (in his late 40's now), an accomplished collegiate and post-collegiate distance runner in his own right. This friend was well aware of who Jim Ryun was, but never had met him. Jim was kind enough to allow the friend in after our meeting, to meet him. I brought my friend back without telling him who he was gonna meet. You should have seen the look on his face when he saw who it was! They spent a few minutes chatting. It was very cool.

It's amazing how many runners and triathletes under, say 55, you can ask if they know who Jim Ryun is, and they never heard of him. Really quite sad.