Advantage? Long legs or short legs for distance running?

I should restate my answer from above,

Long legs compared to body height is better.

That is why runners like Bekele and Haile are fast, they might be short but they still have longer legs in proportion to their bodies

Actual Source wrote:

I should restate my answer from above,

Long legs compared to body height is better.

That is why runners like Bekele and Haile are fast, they might be short but they still have longer legs in proportion to their bodies

You should restate your answer again. The real reason Bekele and Geb are fast is NOT the length of their legs in relation to their height. There are many who possess this ratio and cannot run like them. Please try again.

STEM is gone for now wrote:

Fishing Instructor wrote:

Yes there are.

Do they not teach how to do literature searches in schools anymore?

No they don't. Obama and his liberals have the schools too busy teaching gay history and women's study's to teach anything that actually matters like the STEM subjects. Have no fear, though. We can rest assured that after the next election schools will be back to teaching instead of pushing a liberal agenda.

Okay buddy. Who fvcked up our education? That would be your main man George Dubya. Haha, teaching history? pushing the liberal agenda? really? yes, gay studies and women's studies is a degree at some colleges that anyone with sense doesn't major in, but i have certainly never heard of anyone being forced to take those classes. anyway, your buddy George managed to cut funding to many areas of education including cutting a national program that specialized in helping under-privileged kids get into college. if it wasn't for that program, i probably wouldnt have to gone to college, and neither would my brother or my sister. my brother is a doctor now. my sister is still working on her degree, and i am successful as a engineer. nobody else in our family went to college before us. Oh and dont forget about his great idea to set certain teaching standards that totally screwed people who having been teaching for years, causing thousands to lose their jobs and causing many kids to lose out on a good education. haha yeah, those republicans did a fvckin grrrreat job!

What you say does make some sense. On the other hand, its not like there's a ton of black people who even try competitive swimming.

There are several very stupid people here. This is very well understood, as I already stated. I've had it discussed in classes ranging from a graduate level course on Neandertals to General Ecology to a comparative physiology class. For some reason it won't let me post the links, but read the wiki pages on Allen's rule and Bergmann's rule. Those guys are from the 1800s. Get with the times!

Guppy I don't necessarily disagree with the benefits/drawbacks of certain anatomical features

What I disagree with is the idea that these features are what make or break an athlete. I'm sure that everyone has their own anatomical strengths and weaknesses, and, when mixed in with the much more important thing called training, all these differences are reduced to nonsignificance.

There are too many factors to worry about any particular one (except for whether someone is training or not)

All else being equal, having a longer leg to torso ratio is better. That seems pretty well established. Look at all the world class runners. There are only a few exceptions to this.

However, having longer legs than your upper body may be almost necessary but it is NOT sufficient. You could have the perfect leg ratio but have inherited crappy mitochondria from your mom, or be heavy set, or be less likely to develop as many capillaries from training etc.

So the exceptions like Seko, the great japanese marathoner with his legs much shorter than his upper body, probably were off the charts in the other areas. Also his legs were strong as hell.

Cute ladies wrote:

Guppy I don't necessarily disagree with the benefits/drawbacks of certain anatomical features

What I disagree with is the idea that these features are what make or break an athlete. I'm sure that everyone has their own anatomical strengths and weaknesses, and, when mixed in with the much more important thing called training, all these differences are reduced to nonsignificance.

There are too many factors to worry about any particular one (except for whether someone is training or not)

I don't think anyone has argued these are what make or break athletes. They're advantages and disadvantages. Like you say, dozens of other factors together determine one's physical ability. Saying they're reduced to nonsignificance is a huge overstatement, however.

Guppy wrote:

I don't think anyone has argued these are what make or break athletes. They're advantages and disadvantages. Like you say, dozens of other factors together determine one's physical ability. Saying they're reduced to nonsignificance is a huge overstatement, however.

I pretty much agree. See my post right above yours...

Ha, what are you a follower of POSE? What a fraud you reveal yourself to be.

Actual Source wrote:

Also, the study said that this longer leg body cause the belly button to be higher up, which is the bodies center of mass, causing the person to fall faster(which running has a lot of falling since you fall with each step).

In general, This is why black people are fast runners and white people, usually with longer belly button to head lengths, are better swimmers. The longer upper bodies on white people help them ride on the wave they create while swimming.

SO, LONGER LEGS ARE BETTER

http://news.discovery.com/human/belly-buttons-sports-athletes.html

<-this is my source

T&F Coach wrote:

tall vs short wrote:

Are there any research studies that look into biomechanical advantages with leg lengths? Lever arm systems and such...

I know Geb and a few other world class Kenyans are no taller than 5'8, while Paul Tergat is well over 6'3.

The purpose of this thread is to see if there are any actual studies that form any sort of conclusion on this.

Speed at any distance, part particularly middle and long distance, is all about leg turnover. Short legs will have a higher volume of leg turnover and consequently are going to produce better results.

LOL. I assume you're a troll. What about the fact that longer legs cover more ground with each stride, so THEY are faster and produce better results? Hmm?

tall vs short wrote:

Are there any research studies that look into biomechanical advantages with leg lengths? Lever arm systems and such...

I know Geb and a few other world class Kenyans are no taller than 5'8, while Paul Tergat is well over 6'3.

The purpose of this thread is to see if there are any actual studies that form any sort of conclusion on this.

When you say Paul Tergat is well over 6ft 3, what you mean to say is "he is nearly 6ft tall"

Research involves reviewing the published findings from SCIENTIFIC STUDIES. We are talking about SCIENCE! We are talking the same people who's research gave us evolution and global warming.Finshing instructor tell us again who schools will be teaching in science after the next election. If Perry wins, I bet it won't be science.

STEM is gone for now wrote:

Fishing Instructor wrote:

Yes there are.

Do they not teach how to do literature searches in schools anymore?

No they don't. Obama and his liberals have the schools too busy teaching gay history and women's study's to teach anything that actually matters like the STEM subjects. Have no fear, though. We can rest assured that after the next election schools will be back to teaching instead of pushing a liberal agenda.

gedoe wrote:

BigFella wrote:

I wouldn't call 6'3" "really tall". It is the average height for 20 year old Dutch or Scandinavian men.

This is simply not true. Try again...

Ever been to the Netherlands? Anyway, let me rephrase: the average height of white Dutch 20yo men. Immigrants are obviously shorter.

you're making an argument based on irreducible complexity.

BigFella wrote:

Ever been to the Netherlands? Anyway, let me rephrase: the average height of white Dutch 20yo men. Immigrants are obviously shorter.

No, this is still wrong. Although this is beyond coincidental, I just read the other day that the average height for a man in the Netherlands is 5'11". That is still very tall on a world scale. The US is at 5'9" and that is considered tall.

Bringing it back to the topic of the thread... Tergat was tall for an African at just under 6'0".

6'3" is enormous on a world scale. At 6'1", I still find myself to be taller than most, especially in the running world. It never seemed to slow me down.

I don't see why everyone is talking about height. I'm the same height as one of the guys that was on my high school track team but his hips come up past my bellybutton so he has a lot longer legs than me. Kinda funny to watch the state meet where a 5'6 guy wins the 300m hurdles.

but I guess if you don't want to read all that then read the first sentence and say that taller people always have longer legs and shorter people always have shorter legs and call me an idiot or something.

Another Dad wrote:

BigFella wrote:

Ever been to the Netherlands? Anyway, let me rephrase: the average height of white Dutch 20yo men. Immigrants are obviously shorter.

No, this is still wrong. Although this is beyond coincidental, I just read the other day that the average height for a man in the Netherlands is 5'11". That is still very tall on a world scale. The US is at 5'9" and that is considered tall.

Bringing it back to the topic of the thread... Tergat was tall for an African at just under 6'0".

6'3" is enormous on a world scale. At 6'1", I still find myself to be taller than most, especially in the running world. It never seemed to slow me down.

6'0.5"

How many seven footers have distance running world records? Obviously, leg length alone isn't enough.