Honestly, what is wrong with Webb?

In 2007 Webb's Hcrit was high; all traces of epo gone; they hurried him into that bs meet(346,9 mile), while positive effects could be taken advantage of. He now runs with a guilty mind...

In 1998, a very young Alan Webb desperately wanted to run fast, as well as score with the pretty girl in his freshman history class. Night after night was spent dreaming dreams of quiet desperation.

Finally, one night, the Devil appeared in his bedroom doorway.

"Would you like to make a deal with Me?" he said.

"What do you mean?" replied Alan.

"Well, that girl you want..."

"Yes?"

"That running, you want to run fast and win ..."

"YES!?!?"

"I can make it all happen ... but you have to sell your soul to me."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, for the next several years, if you do the right things, you can have any girl you want, and you will set records by the buttload. But then after that, you are mine."

"Sure! Anything!"

Now Alan is paying his dues. Simple as that.

He's tried to train at too intense and high a level for too long. Most high school kids who train like college and pro athletes (as he must have) hit a big wall at some point or another. The great AW is no exception. I'm from Florida, and I saw (and competed against) a kid who ran 1:48, 4:08 (1600), 9:15 (3200) and 15:18 as a senior. He went to college as one of the most touted recruits of that recruiting class, and competed for an SEC team. Four years later, he was struggling to get back to 1:48.

Look at it: Webby had so much success, he was bound to come down eventually. Sad to see, but true.

Charles Nonhomogenous wrote:

Webb has GVH, short for Graft-versus-host. His hair transplant is rejecting his body. His slow times are symptomatic of the graft-rejection process. Webb has to remove his hair graft or eventually die.

exonian wrote:

Charles Nonhomogenous wrote:

Webb has GVH, short for Graft-versus-host. His hair transplant is rejecting his body. His slow times are symptomatic of the graft-rejection process. Webb has to remove his hair graft or eventually die.

http://www.whoateallthepies.tv/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/Tobias.jpg

God I miss that show.

Just curious, does Webb have a college degree? Maybe he is seeing his career dwindle and stressing out over the fact that he has no other outlet to pursue after running.

Sumguy wrote:

Do you guys think that mayb he doesn't care if he makes the trials? Maybe he just runs for fun, trains a few days a week and mixes it up with average college guys. Can we assume that just because he was once a world class runner he can't become a rec runner.

I play on a softball team and I don't care if I suck, I cared if I sucked when I was playing baseball at a decent level. Thoughts?

Haha. Comments like these crack me up. Everyone thinks that pros should quit when they aren't on top anymore.

The difference between Alan Webb's running and your softball playing is that Webb does this for a living. As long as there are people willing to pay him to compete, that's what he's going to do. Of course he wants to compete at the Olympic Trials. Any idiot knows that the Olympics are the biggest marketing opportunities for elite runners. If Webb doesn't make the Olympics this year, expect his annual income to take a MAJOR hit. And perhaps then he'll quit.

txRUNNERgirl wrote:

I also think it's funny that some people are saying he needs to go back to Raczko. I'm sure they're the same people who said he needed to leave him after the '08 trials.

Haha ain't that the truth! I consider myself to be part of the more sane group that felt he should have left raczko and gone to Salazar, but leaving Salazar was and always will be an epic mistake.

Webb's erratic career makes me appreciate the amazing consistency of both Scott and Spivey. When these guys qualified for either the Olympics or WCs they almost always made the finals. During the mid eighties it seemed a sub 3:50 mile was an annual event for Steve Scott. Scott even ran a 3:35 1500 at 35 years of age. Spivey ran his 5th sub 3:50 mile at 30! A year later he ran a 13:20 5k. Spivey's 2000 meter AR still stands today.

OSU_FAN wrote:

After watching his 1500 from last weekend I think it might be a little bit of both mental and physical issues, however I think the mental issues are the same as the past ones.

Physically he looks significantly heavier than he has in the past. There isn't the same "pop" and ease of motion in his stride. Whether or not he's out of shape due to injury/sickness/lack of conditioning etc. I don't know, but he looks like he's running in sand quite frankly. Without knowing the details and history of his training and injuries its really hard to make any accurate conclusion to whats wrong with him.

My two cents: I think Web has an image problem. He started loosing his hair at a young age.

He wants to be a runner but I think he wants to look more like a weight lifter.

If he would just forget for a moment his insecurities and worrying about what people is going to say or think about him if he looked like a starving African, then he would be a great runner. He is running out of time.

Webb needs to go up in distance. He is stale and has maxed out his potential in the 800-mile. Mentally and physically he has needed to do this for at least 2 years. I have no clue what the guy is doing for training ,but it ain't working for him. The times he is running now are worse than when he was a freshman in high school. It is time to change it up and run a p.r. at new distance and gain some confidence. Maybe run a marathon this year. What does he have to lose at this point??????

I think there must be a medical problem that they have not figured out right. But why then continue to race and run bad times?

Seen it all before wrote:

He peeked early in life, crushed high school. And as quick as he came on the scene he left it and like many is grasping to hold on to a life that is no longer kind to me.

He's been on the scene for the better part of ten years. And people have been saying he's "done" for that long. Maybe he finally started listening to them.

He would still be our top 800/1500 meter guy at Rutgers.

Even if his testosterone and stuff was out of whack he ran a 3:54 1500m. He has to be just messing around. He is entered in Mt. Sac though. Physical and mental blocks can not explain a 3:54 for a 3:30 guy... This is the most odd thing ever. Indescribable, really.

WellWebby wrote:

Even if his testosterone and stuff was out of whack he ran a 3:54 1500m. He has to be just messing around. He is entered in Mt. Sac though. Physical and mental blocks can not explain a 3:54 for a 3:30 guy... This is the most odd thing ever. Indescribable, really.

Why all of these crazy theories? Isn't it possible that he's just injured or coming back slowly from injury? Could be that simple.

WellWebby wrote:

Even if his testosterone and stuff was out of whack he ran a 3:54 1500m. He has to be just messing around. He is entered in Mt. Sac though. Physical and mental blocks can not explain a 3:54 for a 3:30 guy... This is the most odd thing ever. Indescribable, really.

Why all of these crazy theories? Isn't it possible that he's just injured or coming back slowly from injury? Could be that simple.

Here's an honest question.

Are there many examples of kids who set national high school records in middle distances (say 800m to 5K), who had a successful college and/or pro careers?

Webb's problem may be both physical, and mental (in large part, driven by denial of the physical problem).

The more I think about, the more I think that Webb is just done - I am reading Duel in the Sun now, and it seems like Webb, like Alberto, just lost it. Hard to say exactly why, but talent does go away sometimes.

Alberto didn't lose it over one season - he ran sub 28 for 10k after Boston 82 and his health problems, like WEbb ran 3:37 last year - but his body was done with the extreme efforts.

Most likely, that is what we are seeing with AW. Unfortunately.

According to his wife, he *almost* had an injury scare for indoor, which is why he dropped out of that 800m, didn't start the 1000m, and didn't do USA indoors. But it was to prevent an injury and his leg is now 100%, and she said that he's healthy and enjoying training with Robby, and that how his races went this past weekend is NOT indicative of how his training has been going