This fall off which began in 2008/2009 is just a result of someone who fried themselves with overtraining. I believe also may have to do with the negative effects of doping and then stopping but I don’t want to speculate that part.
either way, he fried himself burnt the candle at both ends til it burnt out. Salazar seemed to have him back on the right track and I believe had he stayed with him through 2012 he would have been a serious threat again.
Really just wonder what he is going for. Like he is fast enough (I think) that he probably has to train a decent amount to run these times, not just running for fun.
And yet these are like solid age-group times, such an incredibly far cry from the level he was once at, even age-graded.
He def had a glimmer of hope then. But the dude was overtrained, and over neurotic about everything. I remember at the 2012 gran prix on Randall’s island he was warming up for like 2.5 hours straight, super serious, etc. He prob obsessed over running and got crappy sleep.
Really just wonder what he is going for. Like he is fast enough (I think) that he probably has to train a decent amount to run these times, not just running for fun.
And yet these are like solid age-group times, such an incredibly far cry from the level he was once at, even age-graded.
Yes, he was training upto 100 mpw before Grandma's Marathon and I'm sure he had to do sufficient training for this. I get what you're saying though. I think maybe his body was so shot when he retired that he had to do a reset by forgetting the past and starting over. One would think this should be a breeze for someone with his pedigree, but apparently not so much. It's still cool to see him doing this and progressing.
Really just wonder what he is going for. Like he is fast enough (I think) that he probably has to train a decent amount to run these times, not just running for fun.
And yet these are like solid age-group times, such an incredibly far cry from the level he was once at, even age-graded.
Yes, he was training upto 100 mpw before Grandma's Marathon and I'm sure he had to do sufficient training for this. I get what you're saying though. I think maybe his body was so shot when he retired that he had to do a reset by forgetting the past and starting over. One would think this should be a breeze for someone with his pedigree, but apparently not so much. It's still cool to see him doing this and progressing.
Look at him now compared to when he was competing, he’s lost at least 20 lbs of muscle. So I would think hormonally he’s not the same person, and just doesn’t have the strength/stamina as before. He should see an endocrinologist he may be low T like Ryan hall was. Would love to see him pull a hall and get serious in the gym and put back on some of that muscle, focus on speed development/power and then come back to running and watch the difference that would make he would probably run 24 min for 8k with ease.
I hope he still has his death blow and he enjoys unleashing it even if he's just community road racing. Regardless of whether you recognize him during the race - imagine you're near him with 300m to go and he drops the hammer. Even though he can only run 26:0x I bet he can still go under 26 or 27s for 200.