Renato Canova wrote:
Armstronglivs wrote:
"We don't know how well Temu or Gammoudi tolerated altitude and it is equally as likely as not that they tolerated it better than Keino did."
The quote above perfectly demonstrates the anomaly in Keino's 1500m performance. It isn't necessarily the fact that that he was beaten by other runners but the comparison with his own prior performances that is the anomaly. If the runners that beat him in the 5k and the 10k "tolerated altitude better than (he) did" then it is a necessary inference that altitude affected his performance negatively. Why then did it not affect him in the 1500, his last event? The response that it was a shorter event begs the question as to why that wouldn't have affected him, as it was no less an aerobic event than the longer races - and he had already demonstrated in those races the negative affect of altitude on his own performance. The most plausible answer is that he found a way to improve his capacity from what it had been in the earlier events to cope with the affect of oxygen depletion. The change is so dramatic it could not have occurred naturally.
The rest of the debate has become a little like how many angels can dance on the end of a pin, and does not change the point that to a greater or lesser extent altitude affects performance negatively in distance events.
Armstronglivs, maybe you didn't read what I wrote about my personal talk with Keino. The explanation because altitude affected his 5000m more than 1500m is very simple :
1) The real value in 5000m was very much better, but Keino didn't push the race, thinking to have a better final sprint than Gammoudi. This was not true : Gammoudi was one of the fastest finisseur in the long distances, in the period 1964-1972, winning Olympic medals in every edition of the Games : silver (behind Billy Mills) in 1964 in 10000m, gold in 5000m and bronze in 10000m in 1968, and again silver in 5000m in 1972 behind Viren but ahead Ian Stewart and Steve Prefontaine.
Durimng our talk, Kip explained was a tactical mistake, because he had the possibility to run faster from the beginning but supposed Gammoudi slower than him. In 1500m, he using that lesson for changing strategy, with the help of Ben Jipcho, in order not to repeat the same mistake with Jim Ryun.
2) His preparation was directed to increase his speed, thinking his endurance was already enough. For that reason, during the last two months before Olympics he didn't do any workout for specific endurance of 10000m and 5000m, and his 10000m was a sin of presumption, because really he was not prepared. So, don't compare his personal optimal level of 5000m with the level he had in Mexico : this was a problem of training.
About the fact that 1500 is an aerobic event, of course the percentage of intervention of the Aerobic Power is fundamental, but, increasing the distance, this percentage continues to grow, while the percentage of anaerobic utilization decreases.
This means that the best shape of an athlete in 1500m can't mean anything about his shape in 5000m. The shape is NOT something general (an athlete in shape for every event), but something specific, built with specific training, and also two events with similar characteristics can't be at the personal best at the same time. That's the reason because Bekele, who REALLY NEVER PREPARED 10000m (he always won with the preparation for 5000m), in 10000m, in spite of what people think, was very far from his theorical value, compared with his WR of 5000m. All the athletes really preparing 10000m in specific way can perform with a difference of 35" - 45" compared with the double of their PB in 5000m (for example, 13' and 26'40"-26'45"). Kenenisa had a difference of 1'03", really to high, and is not something strange to suppose his WR of 10000m (that is the weaker of the WR on track in middle distances) could be very close to 26' if his preparation was in that direction.
I read your comments and I understand what you are saying but what I believe I am hearing are some rather strained excuses for Keino's losses in the longer events. I don't believe that as a 13.20 runner over 5k he ran 14.05 simply through tactical error. He may have thought he could outsprint Gammoudi but the pace was slow chiefly because of the altitude. If Keino was as unaffected by the altitude in the 5k as he appeared to be in the 1500 he would have been capable of a time equivalent to his best over the longer distance. In those conditions, I don't believe that he was. He further showed how much the conditions affected him when he failed to finish the 10k, which, again, was run at a very slow pace compared to sea-level times. You say he also claimed that he neglected his conditioning training before Mexico, focussing instead on his speed training; I don't find that credible either, because to run the number of races that he did, culminating in the sustained brilliance of his 1500m effort, would have taken outstanding aerobic conditioning. I also don't find it credible that he could be in the best shape of his life for the 1500 but in poor shape for the 5k; Keino was a miler/3miler - not a half-miler/miler; if he was supremely fit for his shorter event I am sure he would have been in the same form for the longer event. Witness El Gerouj at Athens in 2004. El Gerouj was a similar type of runner to Keino, as a 1500/5000 specialist. In respect of that type of runner, if you are fit for one race, you are probably fit enough for the other.
In this discussion I accept there is a validity in some of the arguments offered against my own. What I find those arguments cannot answer satisfactorily, however, is the extent and degree of difference in Keino's 1500 performance compared with how he ran in the longer events and compared to how other runners were and are affected by altitude in the 1500. Essentially, he was simply too good in that one race. I think he had to have had help.