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Is 13:38 a competitive 5k time for 16 year old
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Tim: Alex Vero, ah a 'comedy classic' from the past
The dad and mothers races at school sports day.
Lets be honest Olympic Finals are less intense.
Tim, was it from zero? And he got to 73.48 at Amsterdam, which even with huge mileage, no work, and a support team, is still a heck of a distance from 69.59.
And his aim was an even sillier attempt to become elite, or qualify for a major champ wasn't it, something that makes our man Chins seem sensible in his aims.
Stevie: I think it was to run in 2012 Olympic Marathon from memory...
Stevie: Found the classic Vero thread and bumped it. It's over in Training.
oh yes, I remember now.
Instead of "fat boy to sub 1hr 14" which would have been an incredible achievement and full respect from all, he instead evokes memories of setting a foolish target and failing miserably.
Quite harsh in fairness as sub 1hr 14 is still a quality time! I doubt too many on this thread have done one, PP and Deano, not sure too many others.
Stevie; His thread certainly sparked 'an intense debate a few years ago.
Yes, that's how I saw it too.
The guy had all the support and time to train though.
To be honest I never managed a 74 half let alone a sub 74 half failing miserably with 75:04, never even broke 2:40 so I shouldn't really criticise the lad for his aspirations. and my modest times are so far in the distant past we had some decent marathon runners!!!!
I think the Alex Vero story is a classic of the genre, and should be required reading for anyone giving it the Billy-Big-Bollocks in the future! On the one hand, what he did achieve was pretty impressive, yet his HM still "only" puts him in the same league as many, many good club runners, still a world away from the exceptional club runner managing sub-70, let alone his own Olympic aspirations, which would've required more like sub-63.
That's another common theme to a lot of these posts - people's complete lack of appreciation of non-linear race time progression!! If you think the performance gap between 85 and 90 mins is the same as that between 80 and 85, 75-80, 70-75, etc. then you really need to start thinking a lot smarter, and maybe pay attention to rankings! Maybe they should start teaching logarithms in school again.
Phil it goes back to Charlie Spedding's biography, in which he said he was constantly being asked what runners could do to improve and his secrets - no one was interested in the 16 years training he had done ahead of winning the London marathon and his Olympic Bronze.
Grendel: that's unfair to CS; I'm sure he told them to avoid cottage cheese, because only fat people seem to eat it, which is pretty sound advice. The improvements I've made to my running since stopping eating cottage cheese are exceptional.
LOL - you are right there Joolska - but I seem to remember he had been asked if eating cottage cheese would help and that was his reply!!!
Perhaps looking back over 30 odd years the reason I never did very well was that I never ate cottage cheese so I couldn't give it up!!! How long should I eat it for before I give it up and is it an immediate improvement or will I have to train as well?
(I remember when Maxim first came out, the claims they made for that was nothing short of miraculous - didn't work for me though)
I think you can get the same effect by rubbing it into your legs before and after running.
Oh no! I was just about to have some cottage cheese for lunch. No wonder I'm not that fast.
The "overnight sucess" is pretty rare in any field. And in sport - never. I'll never understand why so many people are so unwilling, or unable, to grasp that.
Anyone else have any examples ?
He's not a troll he's just a very naive kid.
Mind you the question I always ask myself is why people come on here rather than trying to find out what as "fast time" looks like from race results on the internet? There's loads of information out there that could tell you in less than 5 minutes whether you're an undiscovered talent or have got your distance wrong.
Surely he could explained to him how good/ dubious the claim was.
Cougie.... Danny Larusso maybe?!!!
The only person I can think of off the top of my head is E.L.James. (Fifty Shades).
It was an idea whose time had come, buoyed up by a large Twilight fan base. The quality of the wiritng didn't even come into it, it was just a case of right place, right time. She was lucky and would probably admit that herself.
As in Karate kid. was that his name? Maybe I'm getting confused with Danny La Rue?
Scream: The only person really I can think of in athletics is Ed Moses. He only took up 440m Hurdling in 1975 and won Olympic Gold in a new World Record in 1976.
However he'd ran in sprint hurdles and 400ms before then.
Paul Evans was quoted as saying that he could always run a bit when he played football, his only problem was when he had to take the ball with him - I seem to remember he did a 33 10K in his first race - so nothing near what the OP is already achieving - agree though this has been a fun thread (especially now Tom has decided to revisit his target and train properly)
I think this example is a good illustration of overnight success only really being possible when you can rely on external factors to define "success". Within the arts & entertainment field, it can certainly help to be good at what you do, but it's certainly not entirely necessary! (Dan Brown, X Factor, shit erotica, etc.) In today's multi-billion population, mass media environment you could just get lucky. But in sport there are no short cuts; without actually being good, which takes talent and shed loads of hard work, you won't get to compete at any kind of level in order to reach that sort of exposure.
I do not really believe in 'natural ability' a guy in my old club had it in spades... never used to train, but always did well in races.
But his definition of 'not training' allowed him to not include his mileage too and from work; because that is 'commuting'.
He more likely hasn't been back because it's 8am on the east coat of America and 5am on the west.