Alberto "All that is Man" Salazar...did you know about this crazy story?!

Question: "Jack, do you like Kipling?"

Answer: "Dono, I never Kippled"

Anyone know of a good basketball site I can go on and bash Bird, Magic, and Jordan for a little while?

was it ryun then?

It is Lydiard Kipling, dummy!

Don't skip the hill Kiple phase.

Alberto "All that is man" used to wish he'd lose his legs. Yep, pretty manly. Nobody disputes 'Berto was great for a small time...but why such a suspect small time and why the sudden withdraw...and 1990 cameo as an ultra marathoner? Ummm random. We have seen and heard (from him as coach) that he will search out any edge to win, whether it be done through a lab testube or engineering program. We have all read he was also like this as a runner.If Salz, as a coach today, admits he is always looking for methods outside typical training for his guys, then it is only logical that if Conte approached him and said, "...improves performance and totally undetectable," he'd have jumped on it. The fact that his name is on a list says it all. And, the Nike Oregon Project of 2001 failed horribly. He looked like a joke of a coach. People got sick...faded away. Goucher only joined in late 2004 and he's been riddled with inuries and health problems since. Rupp has been great at times, sick a lot also. Anyway, from the very awesome Wired article:

SALAZAR is up-front about his willingness to try almost anything in the name of improving performance. To some, his training methods reek of desperation. But he figures that embracing unorthodox - and as-yet unproven - technologies may in the end give his athletes an edge. So why not try?[/1] "As you improve, you have less room for improvement," he says, sitting with Browne and Johnson on a couch in the altitude house. "That's when you really start adding things. You don't leave any stone unturned."

AKA, I totally grabbed Conte's stones. All homo-eroticism intended.

posted again:

"as yet unproven" really is like an admission of his culpability when it comes to elluding rulesd and testing from the anti-doping agencies. It could be argued that he is actively seeking substances that the anti-doping agency doesn't yet know about. He's seeking that edge and if he can get it without them knowing what it is...well score one for Alberto la barra de ensalada.

Impressed! wrote:

OK, I know this is letsrun and you guys know everything, but I just read this today from Wikipedia:

In 1982 Alberto Salazar won his first and only Boston Marathon after the famous "Duel in the Sun" with Dick Beardsley. Salazar won the race in an exciting sprint finish and collapsed at the end before being taken to an emergency room and given 6 liters of water intraveneously because he had not drunk during the race. This and other noteworthy performances such as the 1978 Falmouth, Mass., road race, where after finishing 10th in 33:04, he collapsed at the finish with a temperature of 107 degrees Fahrenheit (41.7 °C) and was read his last rites prematurely, earned him the nickname Alberto "All that is Man" Salazar. (In college such tenacity earned him the nickname "The mule".)

Why people are so critical of him? He was such an incredible competitor!

This is kind of like asking, "Hey, have any of you guys heard of this book called Once a Runner?! It's awesome!"

Anyone remember the runnersworld article around AL Sal's 1994 Comrades Ultra win? I remember him saying he had seen great strength increases and could do 100 consecutive push ups at the time. Didn't he say he was low in some hormones and had been substituting to get him up to a normal level and that was what had aloowed him to train well again?

nuge,

The post from Tom D. was a good one, but then again, they often are.

please read the attached pdf by Al Sal

Yep wrote:

He has been connected to Balco, he manipulates young runners, he's a tool for Nike, he claim's Rupps parents live in poverty.

Why is not drinking any water during a marathon cool? sounds stupid. Wouldn't take advice from some one like that.

Common Knowledge wrote:

I think basically anyone who knows anything about competitive running has heard that story many many times. Yes Salazar was a great competitor, he was tough as nails, but many still suspect him of steroid usage and he is seen by many as a manipulator of runners and programs.

So what? I'm giving you credit here, but you've never said blatant lies to women in an attempt to get what you want?

loomdog wrote:

Anyone remember the runnersworld article around AL Sal's 1994 Comrades Ultra win? I remember him saying he had seen great strength increases and could do 100 consecutive push ups at the time. Didn't he say he was low in some hormones and had been substituting to get him up to a normal level and that was what had aloowed him to train well again?

Yes, I read it. He said doctors told him he had fried his endocrine and/or immune system from pushing himself so hard, so often, for so long. thus he was tired and sick all the time, and ran like crap for years. He tried various treatments (uh oh, I will get the 'HE'S ON DRUGS!' crowd going with that one), but nothing seemed to work. Finally, a someone suggested prozac, since it helped them feel better when they were feeling run-down. He said he didn't take it for depresison per se (though if you read the article, it certainly sounded like his years of bad running, injuries, and illness had made him depressed), but just to see if it balanced him out hormonally. Like magic, it did. He said he was running repeat 5:20 miles at best before prozac, and then like a month into taking it, he was running 4:40 repeats (this is from memory, but I think it is accurate).

Later, as he felt better, he thought about Comrades. He was running 40 mile runs around 6:00 pace in training. Clearly he was ready for the race, and back to his old self (more or less). He shocked a lot of people when he won comrades. He said when he finished his blood pressue was all screwed up and they were worried for him again, but he bounced back fairly quickly, and even went for a short run the next day (something he said comrades runners/winners rarely did ).

He then talked about running the marathon, and hopefully the trials. He said was hoping to do a 2:11, and then ......"who knows," maybe better. And then..... nothing. I never heard what happened after that, he seemed to just drop out of the competitve scene as quickly as he had re-emerged into it. Someone fill me in, what happened? Did he run any more big races? Did he ever try another marathon? If not, why? More injuries? I just never heard what de-railed his oh-so-short comeback, and why he stopped so quickly after that return to good running.

To me, Alberto was the "Raging Bull" of running. His intensity and desire and even craziness to some extent is what made him great, but it is also what helped ruin his career too.

In "Duel in the Sun" it explains it a little more in detail, although you've pretty much got it right, Lance. As I remember, though, even after his hormones were balanced again, his lung capacity was only operating at 60% percent of a normal person's (so far less than what Salazar was used to) and that he had developed exercise-induced asthma as a result of the years of overtraining.

Also, I seem to remember the book reporting that AlSal tore his achilles tendon after Comrades and retired shortly thereafter.

King of humoring porpoises wrote:

Goucher only joined in late 2004 and he's been riddled with inuries and health problems since.

I think you've got your timing mixed up with Goucher. Goucher had been struggling since 2001. Then he started training with Salazar in 2004 and had a dramatic resurgence. In 2005, Goucher ran a 5000m PR (13:10). In early 2006, Goucher was 6th in the short course race at the World Cross-Country Championships. In May 2006, he ran 8:12 for two miles. He didn't do as well later in the year, but 2005 and early 2006 showed Goucher running better than he had in years.

I entered high school in fall of 1982. I had watched Alberto's NYC debut on TV, and was totally inspired by it. I ended up following his career to the letter, obsessing over every result, listening to the brash quotes of his interviews. He actually said he was in such good shape that anyone "would have to run a world record to beat me". My favorite was the Runner magazine "Heart and Soul" article. It detailed his coach/athlete relationship with BD (don't feel like double-checking the spelling, and know I'll be criticized). I envisioned having the same set-up years later if and when i could run in college. For me, Alberto was the guy I worked hard to be like. I met him for the first time at Bix 7 in 1986, the summer after HS graduation, and he was gracious to me and everyone else...even the kids having him sign 5 different Nike PR ad posters. I met him years later when I was an adult, in a much less crowded setting. Although reserved, I wouldn't say he was aloof or arogant at all. If it ever is proven that he was doing anything illegal (and i doubt it ever will be), that won't change the fact that for me as an aspiring young runner, he was the perfect role model.

Derderian wrote:

I always thought that Al's older brother Ric had better form and more speed or "talent" but proved to be not as driven. But isn't that the question of training for long distance running—finding a balance between being a wimp and a maniac?

If you are a wimp you never get good enough for anyone to hear about you. If you are a maniac then you self-destruct before you get good enough for anyone to hear about you. I imagine a bell curve between the extremes. There is a day in the life of every runner at the peak when you have balanced everything as well as you ever did or ever would again. For Al it was April 19, 1982.

Tom

"The path of excess leads to the tower of wisdom"

or

"You can't burn out if you never catch fire"