Hi all,
although things have been seemingly quiet on this issue, their very quietness says a lot. Since he finished two months ago, Goodge has:
1) Not publicised in any way his precise donations to Macmillan or American Cancer.
2) Barely run a step, 36kms for July so far, despite supposedly training for Berlin.
3) Not released his Whoop data, which he promised he would, but the glimpse we've seen showed him NOT running for 3.5 hours of the day that his Strava said he was, and burning as low as 3,000 calories a day, when he was burning 9,000 when I observed.
4) He has actually given an answer for why his heart rates were physiologically impossible: "must have been a sh*tty watch." I'm sure Coros love him for that. But he switched watches from Garmin to Coros after day 12, and they both behaved the same.
5) On his runs since Transcon his heart rates have been spot on and perfect, up in the 150s for meagre paces.
6) His sidekick, coach and manager Robbie Balenger who also does challenges like these with no human heart rate, did attempt a 24 hour race and horribly blew up at 70 miles, in the end carding just 100 for the race - equivalent to about a 4 hour marathon in quality.
7) WG has lived the life of a multi millionaire playboy since the Transcon, the best hotels, travel, food, drink and sports events that money can buy, as his business as an Instagram influencer allows him to do, and one of his key calling cards is that as one of the most inspiring and pioneering ultra and multiday runners in the world.
8) Robbie Balenger told Outside he'll look at the data, but as yet has not commented.
In summary, no-one in history has ever recorded runs like these off a heart rate of 105-110 - in the case of Balenger and Goodge, for some 15,000kms over four years and up to six events and six watches.
Also, no-one has ever come from such weak returns in sanctionned racing to such a high level in unsanctionned running. If so, name them.
An age-group duathlon world champion wrote to me the other day to say:
"Those influencers are shocking. I absolutely despise these long distance last man standing runs. [Like Balenger racing a Tesla]. Absolutely pointless and take away from genuine athletics."
So in short, don't worry, this issue hasn't gone away. The reason there's silence is that as ever they're banking on their influencer fans drowning out the cries of the running community.
Even the above comment is a dismissive: "just a couple of people..." There are thousands of us who see this thing for precisely what it was, but up against 200,000 followers, and a lazy, bashful media who simply are not prepared to dig a little deeper due to the litigious threat, it is slow progress.
But the shade has been well and truly cast on these two, and it'll be a very long time before they try something like this again - possibly ever.