how did Alan Webb inspire you? post your stories

Not sure if it's the same guy but Alan Webb (The Triathlete) inspired me to get into triathlon

he inspired me be being super ugly and going bald in hs that unattractiveness has nothing to do with how fast you can run.

how inspired me that doping in hs was acceptable if you were going to give all that you had!

He inspired me not to wind sprint during important races. I struggled with that one for awhile.

How? Not one bit

After he ran 3:46 I went out and bought a toupee.

Every time i see on the message board: WEBB IS BACK BABY!!!!! I get super pumped up and have a minor freak out, quickly check the news only to be devastated that he is not in fact back baby.

Every time.

It inspired me to start my own bidness.

https://goo.gl/images/4mia3g

He inspired me to look more relaxed.

I wouldn't call him inspiring. I respect his obsession with the sport, but mostly he was just fun to watch.

His relationship with his HS coach Razcko inspired me to keep my mouth shut and refrain from talking training to my former HS athletes. Never second guess or ever seemed surprised when an athlete tells you what another coach is doing.

This is how I remember Alan Webb: Runners World featured him doing a core workout in the mid-2000's. I started doing them and got a sports hernia. It never really healed so I think of Alan Webb every.single.effin.day.

Sportshernia wrote:

This is how I remember Alan Webb: Runners World featured him doing a core workout in the mid-2000's. I started doing them and got a sports hernia. It never really healed so I think of Alan Webb every.single.effin.day.

lol

Never forget the Bowerman 5K fiasco!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bicep curls. Lots of bicep curls.

I am one year younger than Alan and was in Maryland my freshman year of high school. At that time Alan was of course talented but if I'm not wrong he had just come over from swimming so he wasn't so well known yet. Although he was in Virginia, for whatever reason I ended up in a few of the same meets as him and remember that the guy could fly. Watching his form was incredible, how he could change gears and look so smooth blew my mind. I didn't see that again until I saw Bekele in 2001.

My sophomore year I moved back to Europe and got to match up with Mo Farah in cross country, but at that time all eyes were on Alan. At this time things were getting so exciting, I remember dialing up on my 56k modem to connect to DyeStat and see what he was up to. There was Ritz, there was Hall, there was Curtis, but Webb was the man of the hour. This is when DyeStat was brand new and the internet was the wild west, and boy was there was a lot to talk about. On top of all the buzz surrounding him already, my coach was a Michigan alum and was like a giddy school girl when he committed. It was insanity.

I'll never forget when he first broke 4 in the mile. I remember the summer before my senior year going and trying to do a 5 x mile workout I had read about. I remember it clear as day - thinking, "this is a kid I went to school with that has made such huge bounds. I can do that, I'm better than him", typical high school stuff. I went to the track behind my house (3 Tilleuls) and went 4:36 - 4:52 - made it 400 meters before I failed the 3rd and walked my gimpy ass home. My coach thought it was hilarious.

In a way Webb was both a blessing and a curse to my running. On the one hand he had me super stoked about mid distance, I wanted to be a sub 4 (and what was he, 1:47/8?!?!) guy too, but on the other it fed into my high school stupidity of thinking I could win every race. Coming from such a small talent pool, I would often go to Army leagues or road races and blow up in spectacular fashion. On the other hand, I managed to have some major break throughs because there wasn't a race I didn't think I could win. These are the days before GPS watches too so unless you were meticulous it took a lot of effort to really keep a log. But I'll say this - he made running COOL. That was unusual, I remember cross was the sport people went to when they couldn't compete in anything else or wanted to stay in shape for another sport. Most of us wore our own shorts of the same school colours because the old Bill Rodgers from the 70's tha tpublic schools were rocking looked like mesh diapers. But at that time? Shyyyyyt, everyone wanted to be like Mike. Hell even his commit spikes that Nike brought out were fly af.

In 2001, right before I came back to the states I got to see Bekele run that 7:30 in Brussels as a junior. I moved to Michigan about a week later where people were talking about Ritz, but I was only 45 minutes from Ann Arbor and Webb was the dude to see. I was still watching these guys but my interested fizzled after he left Warhurst and I didn't run in college. Then something special happened - he came to Belgium and set the American record. Good God. 2007 USAs when he dusted Lagat and dropped to his knees pounding the ground? Jesus H. The tingles. My running came back with a vengeance and holy hell it hasn't stopped. I remember even just two years ago seeing Webb is back baby! posts and my heart skipping a beat. I went and ran club cross in LeHigh with a broken big toe just because I heard he was registered (he pulled out unfortunately).

I've got to say, Alan has been a huge part of my running. Even with all the other talent out there, he's just been super relatable to me. Watching his ups and down, fall offs and return to form, and then his brief success in triathlon. Honestly I think most people are like him - with huge what ifs? surrounding their careers.

Morale of the story? He is the dude. All day.

I ran in Webb's region in High School and later went to college where I ran with two of Webb's South Lakes teammates who would both become friends (one of whom still remains my friend to this day).

Running in high school was part of my identity and how I became athletic (I was a kid who got picked last in PE growing up and so running gave me such a boost in confidence) but Webb made running cool and made me more proud to identify as a runner.

I actually had a copy of that book Sub-4 of Alan Webb and while I was reading it on the DC metro (I can't remember whether I had it on me but I was in the middle of the book, somewhere), I saw Alan Webb sitting in my metro car. I was on my way to George Mason University where he was taking classes and I was looking to taking classes and because the distance from the metro stop to the University is famously long, he offered me a ride. Even though I had college friends who knew Alan as a teammate and taiked about him very casually, It was still a ridiculously surreal moment considering I was reading his biography at the time and I had to try extremely hard to downplay how cool this was. Webb was extremely full of energy (I would almost describe him as spastic) and would rattle off facts and anecdotes at a mile a miinute but he was an extremely friendly guy.

I think everyone in Virginia was rooting for him and bragging about how they had run in a race or spotted the guy. When he broke that record at Prefontaine, a friend who was only briefly on the cross-country team wrote out 3:53.43!!!!!! to me on IM before I even knew what was going on. I also remember a story about how this runner named Ben Stern (who was the second or third fastest high school runner in the DC area at the time and who I believe ran for an NCAA winning or placing Oregon squad eventually) even got his autograph for his brother's bar mitzvah. Webb handled it all with a lot of grace.

A couple years later, I was substitute teaching in Alexandria, Virginia and my fourth grade class ran the mile. I was in the same class for 4 days and I was thinking that maybe this would turn into a long-term gig, so I told them that I had met the man who holds the record for fastest American mile ever run and the kids were so fascinated and I thought I might score them points if I could get Webb's autograph. I messaged my friends and said, Can you get me Webb's autograph. When I bumped into Webb at a hotel (ironically, LaShawn Merritt was there too), he laughed at the idea and obliged write away. So classy guy!

Thanks for making distance running cool, Alan Webb!

Another MD guy here, a year younger than Webb. And before I forget, that Ben Stern name drop is pretty epic. I will also toss out Jarrett Van Tine and Shane Stroup.

It has been pretty awesome having my running career timeline match up with Alan's, even if my PRs are consistently 1 min/mile slower.... That Pre classic mile, my goodness. I had recently seen our county meet won in maybe 4:25, and was wowed that a high schooler could go that fast. To see him beat that by 30+ seconds, unbelievable. My favorite Webb image is that straight on shot of the backstretch on the final lap, with him moving to outside and passing all those folks.

Living out here in Portland I've had the chance to meet, and even hang, with Alan a bunch of times. And as said above, his love for the sport is infectious, and he is a super friendly dude.

As a 33 year old, I feel myself relating to him even more and more. Even though PRs are harder to come by these days, I still always have that feeling, "if I can just get in 8 solid weeks, I know I can nail that 10k...." And that has been so much of Webb's story as well. Heck, I don't know a runner that can't relate. I think that is why he has been so compelling for like 15+ years now, because we always want to believe there are some seconds to be shaved off in that next race.

SlimPickens wrote:

Another MD guy here, a year younger than Webb. And before I forget, that Ben Stern name drop is pretty epic. I will also toss out Jarrett Van Tine and Shane Stroup.

Alright, nostalgia in full effect now.

When I was 14 years old my 1600, 3200, and 5k PR's were 6:36-14:10-21:40. I didn't really have any motivation to do anything in running and was more into trying to be funny than taking practice serious. I was also on the chubbier side.

In the fall of my freshman year (when I ran the 21:40 5k) I started using this website and reading about athletes like Lukas Verzbicas, Alan Webb, and Dathan Ritzenhein. Eventually I started watching videos of their races and saw how dominant a force Alan Webb used to be and I don't think anything has inspired me more in my life so far. Over than winter I put in serious work, stuck to a strict diet that included no snacks, chips, candy, anything really. during that winter I stood up and rode a stationary bike vigorously for 30 min a day, I was on the swim team, and ran an additional 4-6 miles on top of this everyday for the entire period and even grew my base into the area of 90 miles a week. My PR's that spring for track dropped to 4:53-10:24

I stopped swimming and biking all the time and focused more on running the following years, which would eventually become a mistake, and as a sophomore I would go to run 16:10 and 9:30. For the next year I ended up burning myself out from all the mileage 1 ran (most works went over 100 miles) but still managed to run 4:20 and 16 flat for 5k but after that I died. But even to this day I still train hard and hold proud 4:13 mile 14:50 5k PR's because of the inspiration Alan Webb gave me