Another run across America underway - is it legit? Boots currently on the ground

Who is the videographer? Does he have a name?

Reece Robinson. He did the videography on RB's "Colorado Crush" video and has done other things with The Audacious Report. He won an emmy for doc on the pandemic

Yes, WG is fortunate to have a crew that can help with everything. Key word, everything! Personally, I’d prefer the satisfaction of knowing I did all the running myself.

His career would be in no way jeopardized by simply taking pictures of this thing. No one would jump to the conclusion that he helped engineer it, nor would anyone expect someone of this stature to be traveling with the crew 24/7, or even close to that much.

Besides, people of similar stature, and with a stake in the sport much more integral to it than that of videographer to this guy (e.g. coaches, doctors, sponsors, etc), have worked alongside people who were eventually revealed to have been cheaters. The examples are too many to list.

Today's strange heart rate pattern starts early in the day. Mile 21. Take a look at mile 51 and 52. About 9:45 pace with about 109 heart rate. Freeking amazine. Perhaps he rubbed on some NuCalm cream right before those two miles.

Interesting that he wants you to join up with him prior to his nap…and then seemingly after his nap he starts to run unfathomably quick

A good example of another multi-dayer running on a low HR is Russ Cook. Day 24 averaged a 113. If Will C relaxes his hatred for WG and RB, it would be good to get an assessment on whether RC provides an example of low HR multi daying that WC said is non existent on all of Strava or is a faked run? I personally am on the fence with WG, I hope he’s doing it properly but as he makes his way across he’s becoming less and less humble which is a shame. RC on the other hand looks the real deal.

I didn't specifically mention Russ Cook to Willc but I asked if he was interested in someone running multi-day 50km efforts as a comparison. Willc replied with a message that implied 50km a day was lightweight. Which of course it isn't and is still useful data.

Russ has managed to run a good pace and with a relatively consistent and low heart rate. He is actually not well at the moment and struggling with food poisoning or a bug. So hopefully he gets through this bad patch ok.

oh dear.

Its a relatively simple sentence construct. the comma seperates out the posited question, and the positive after indicates the expected answer.

There arent two negatives, unless you think that 'know' is a negative?

Finally you claim to be a lawyer but dont understand what a democracy is? A democracy has nothing to do with justice systems. A democracy is simply a government where supreme executive power stems from a mandate from the masses (as opposed to farcical aquatic ceremonies). A feature of many democracies is that the legislative arm and the judicial arm are separated - which makes your statement, particularly as a us lawyer, i assume, supremely embarrassing for you.

Innocent until proven guilty applies to criminal law. WG is not in criminal court. The obvious historical legal analogy is roman law which has stated; 'proof is on he who asserts'.

In such cases the framework of roman law as above or its modern equivalent is clearly more relevant than the presumption of innocence in a criminal case. And this is because one provides society safety against sanction (jail / fine etc), the other provides society protection against unfair reward.

can i support recruiter in one point please?

Please keep your units consistent or at least ensure you always clarify the units. this constant 3.2 in 10, 9.45, 6.20, average a 113, etc etc is extremely frustrating as you read through the thread. pls use hr, km pace / mile pace (okay, i know those arent strictly units), so it is always blindingly obvious what you are talking about.

thanks,!

Agree with all of that, I did try to point this out to him earlier (less eloquently). Tends to make you wonder how he is going to react if all his bluster and bravado in support of this run turns out to be another Scott Dominguez.

Interesting. It feels as if Will C’s crosshairs are firmly on WG (potentially with all good reason), however there are good examples of similar situations that would counter the HR argument. It’s fishy the pattern of WG’s HR but after a visit to watch WG, countless claims of breaking information regarding sponsors and ‘smoking guns’, the argument from day 1 hasn’t changed or developed and counter arguments have just been dismissed based on WC’s self appointed position as the Guv of Transcon (which is ironic given the circumstances).

WG lost my support when he uploaded a story saying no one doing 5ks - Ultras garner his respect. He should be taking his privileged position to inspire, as Russ and Nedd Brockmann have done so well - runners from non-professional backgrounds giving it a good craic day after day. I hope Russ gets over his illness quickly, he’s a great character and deserves the best for his voyage. I hope he completes it and I hope his HR stays low just to wind WC up at this point.

I'll file my report on day 47 shortly, but just to nip any chat on Cook in the bud: his distances are very small and unlike WG he takes absolutely massive breaks during the day, which really helps. Ie. 6:17 moving time, but 9:41 elapsed.

All HR data clean for the first 23 days, thereafter yes it has come down but the breaks have sky rocketed which means he's running a lot fresher. His rate is 118 yesterday, but it's a 7:30 marathon, and that's it for the day... hardly pioneering multidaying.

The day before's rate is 102, similar to WG, but it's a 21k day in 3:43, a very slow crawl. He can have his 102 - surprised it's as high as that.

Aside from this, the whole African thing seems to be slightly half-baked, what with running out of water half way through days, and casual talk of hitch-hiking.

Russ is taking way more breaks and is moving slower than WG. Russ' data makes WG's look worse.

ALL pro runners are doped, not just African runners. Even the general public know that running and cycling are dirty sports.

Being the first person to (currently attempt) run the length of Africa is probably close to the definition of pioneering multi-daying, is it not?

Noted regarding the breaks, but he’s still knocking out quicker k’s at similar HR to WG. Half baked maybe, or doing what they can with an amateur support crew and a fraction of the sponsors/funding WG has. Would it not be a better way to approach by attempting to at least celebrate genuine attempts, whilst rightfully scrutinising those you believe aren’t, instead of undermining those attempting the wild and unusual as ‘hardly pioneering’, ‘half baked’ etc?

Another is Nedd Brokmann, crossed Australia in 47 days. Second last day, 113 km at 6:03 per km, average heart rate 123. Goodge runs a slower pace with a lower heart rate.

Hi all,

here are my Day 47 observations. Noted to be clear on whether speaking about Ks or miles; and also I don't hate WG and RB, I hate what they're doing to running. Big difference.

The day is yet more of the same. An even or negative split for the day, crashing heart rates and totally bionic spells [as noted by Cheater Watcher above]. Here's are his splits for 5 mile increments and HRs:

64 132

60 134

68 124 [all perfect up to here, no cause for concern]

61 121 [massive increase in pace, but HR declines]

55 107 [make of this what you will]

64 99

69 99

65 100

61 97

63 102

54 104 [a 54, during the last 10 mile sequence of the day, sandwiched between a 63 & 70]

70 100

Those 55 and 54s stick out terribly. Are they possible? Yes. Are they remotely likely, given the clear quality of the subject in hand? No. It's simply not how running works to peel off these magical splits out of nowhere, especially so late in the day when there'll be exhaustion and an absolute necessity to prepare for tomorrow.

This is how a normal multiday effort works: Take Lawson's Jogle WR 5 mile splits on Day 8, so still going fine:

60 57 57 59 56 55 57 58 62 61 61 56 60 60 66 67. Nothing freakish, everything just where you'd expect, with the fade toward the end. And although he's destroying Goodge overall, he still loses to him on three splits and almost four. And he can't find a 54, and only a single 55.

Molinaro on day 10 of her Jogle WR ran almost the same distance as WG, with a rock steady, clean HR. Once again, this is how normal multidaying is supposed to look:

68 63 64 63 62 61 62 67 65 79 74 85.

No frills, nothing surprising, just a brutal slugfest and a horror last 15 miles. Since when did Balenger and Goodge have a shocking collapse since RBs day 3 of Transcon or WGs day 4 at Jogle [when they both collapsed]? Never. Imperious, perfect numbers ever since, for four years, with no pulse.

Some other key points to note:

it looks like WG will come home in 25 or 26 days, which by my reckoning will be the 4th or 5th best second-half Transcon history, assuming the 53 boys did small positive splits, say 26-27]. He's fast getting into Frank Giannino territory now, who as we know held the WR for over 25 years.

And this from a man who ran 35 to the winner's 18 at MDS, 22 hours for Como [102 miles], would scrape into the women's C team at my club, who's never broken 3 for the marathon, who's untracked for no good reason, and registers a human pulse 10% of the time in multiday fundraisers since 2019, all with identical HR patterns.

Recruiter 57/Chris Heinz says none of this matters because the 20 or so boffins on here who care about this can't possibly make a dent on WG's 150K+ Instagram fans. But my message for Heinz and WGs others vocal supporters on here - the tide turned against you badly on here in the last month. Perusing the arrows, the support for the WG doubters is nudging 90% now. And 20 people care you say?:

I totted up the commenters of the just the first 20 pages of this thread and it came to 101. Let's say 200+ have now commented, and about one in 50 readers comment, if that. That's around 10,000 following this story now, which strikes me as about right. And we have WG's number one supporter saying it's 20. He also says the reason his HR is at 105 is because he's super fit. That's the level of misdirection we're being exposed to from the likes of Heinz.

Also, recall RB's screams to camera when I first contacted them: "It's ONE guy... but what if... he creates a controversy?" It ain't ONE GUY any more Robbie. [Who has now blocked me on Strava. Errr, good luck with that, I circumvented it in two second flat.]

People who love pure, honest, clean ultra and multiday running in the world may be small in number compared to the WGs fanboys who think he's Napoleon, or God, but we will do whatever it takes to protect our wonderful, precious sport from those with little ability who attempt to plunder its riches as WG and RB so brilliantly do, but refuse to join a club, race with any quality, or interact with the community when we raise grave concerns about their incomprehensible data [which is perfect for the rest of their careers].

WG and RB [and Heinz] think we can be ignored and that we'll just go away.

Try us.

I'm just saying don't try to compare Ross's run with WG's, they're incomparable. We can all run with a low HR if we're not out there long or far. And it's all but impossible to analyse HR data when we have no clue what's happened during a K due to the massive breaks.

Ross seems like a cool bloke and I wish him all the best and all I've done is defend him as clean, despite more that one pointing to low HRs which are very understandable given the huge breaks, food poisoning, low mileage and 7:30 marathon pace. It's all a complete world away from what we're seeing in America.