Biggest Bullshit Lie You've Ever Heard About Running Times or Workouts

I had this guy at work tell me he ran a sub 4 on the first mile of the Crystal Springs 2.95mi (Belmont, CA) Cross country course.

I told him maybe he ran sub 5 but not sub 4.

Sydney Maree's claim that he ran 10 mile runs every day at under 5:00/mile pace would be a good candidate.

I have no doubt that Sydney could have run 51-53min for 10 miles nearly everyday.

this kid i knew who had a 1600m PR from high school of about 4:26 told me that he ran 5x1200m once in hs at 4:10 pace, but he couldnt just say they were in 3:07 or whatever, just that they were in 4:10 pace. it was just odd.

second one was this week. i was on this bus traveling to visit some family and I get to talkin to this guy about running because he sees me on my laptop with some running article. he is being nosey looking over my shoulder and he tells me he ran "one second under the olympic mile" and im thinkin 'what the hell does that mean?' and i ask well "what time was that?" he said "one second under 4:00" so i say "so you mean 3:59?" and then i said hey "where did u go to college?" and he said some no name school I never heard of. sounded like 'sal more' (maybe one of you all heard of it. i was thinkin it was a high school or a junior college at best) or something weird i couldnt even understand him. so im like hmm "ok wow you are fast." then he says "what is your time?" and im thinkin yeah i have to tell this guy i ran slower so i say "uh yeah i broke 3:00" and hes says in return "wow you are fast." IDIOT. then later i saw him talking to himself so i knew this guy was about was queer as a football bat.

In HS and college I caddied during the summers. Once me and another caddy about my age were joking around and convinced these two 14 year olds who had the other bags in our group that I was an All American and had almost broken 4:00. We just kept running with it, and convinced all the guys we were caddying for that it was true. They wished me good luck making the Olympic Trials and getting under 4:00. Since the best races I've ever run are 15;40 for the 5 and 32;43 for the 10 this qualifies as a decent sized lie

When Suzy Hamiton dropped out of the world championships and told the world she was saving her self for Zurich!

this donk that used to go to my school but transferred to some NAIA school claimed that he ran a 31:00 10k time trial. The thing was is that this joker would only run fast in a time trial he ran by himself with no one around to prove but when it came time to run a real race he couldn't run what he claimed he could run. I mean his best 5k on the year was 15:32. I called him out on that shit and told him he was a liar and the bitch got hella pissed off and threatened to punch me in the face or some bull shit. Then he wanted to race me in a 10k right then during practice so I told him I don't need to waste my time racinga pussy like you I have better comp to worry about, which got him even more pissed and he almost started to cry. I wish the fag would have hit me so I could have kicked the shit out of him.

Average_Joe wrote:

Sydney Maree's claim that he ran 10 mile runs every day at under 5:00/mile pace would be a good candidate.

I dont doubt that either. I have heard stories from former nova runners that Maree used to do workouts the day of races. ex. he did 600 repeats the saturday of penn relays.

I've heard an old saying that goes, "If you think golfers lie, just ask a runner about how many miles he runs." Per haps off the mark a bit but I thought it was appropos.

I had a gf in hs tell me she ran a 2.10 800m in another state before she transfered and she was training to do it again. Later I find out that she has never broken 2.30 and she smokes cigarettes.

these stories are great. i have a few to add. i've run 2:37 in the marathon and people i work with are nervous that i'm going to quit my job to run in the olympics. no matter how many times i tell them that i don't amount to crap in the marathon they always ask, "are you gonna go to the olympics?" they think that i'm just being humble.

on the other side of things.....on easter sunday (this year) when dave and i were poking across northern missouri a man was standing on the side of the road next to his pick-up truck. he was in his early 50's, wearing farming clothes, and looked a little rough around the edges. he stopped us to chat for a while. after telling him what we were doing he said,

"yeah, i used to run. i still have my high school mile record. ahhh, what did i run in that? i think i put down a bout a 4:19. then in college i ran about a 4:05, still have the school record there too."

my first thought was "yeah right, this guy is a bit confused." but i didn't say anything. he offered dave and i dinner and a place to sleep, and we kindly accepted. later that night while we were drinking some busch punders and casually chatting about running, he asked if we'd like to see his college year books from the early 70's. we said sure, and were anxious to see the track and xc pages. so we fillped through them, and sure enough Linley Lipper ran 4:05 his senior year at Northeast Missouri State (now Truman State). he is still the school record holder there. Linley Lipper and was one of the kindest and most generous guys dave and i got to meet on our trip. truly a class act. he's now a catt;e farmer in kahoka, MO.

a few days later we spent a couple of nights with the current Truman State team and they said that they have a party every year called "The Linley Lipper." funny stuff.

anyhow, while most of the time when you hear "i ran 4:05 in the mile," from someone...it is quick to disregard the comment, or accept it as ignorant, but you never know when it might actually be true.

The biggest running-related crock of shit I've heard is galloway's contention that walk breaks help you get faster.

Look at the post entitled "Predict my marathon time" written by "Jerry."

The biggest crock of crap that we all here everyday is how people who cant run sub 15 (or 16) run all there 10+ mile "easy" runs at 6:00 pace. Just aint possible, not everyday.

that Sheldon Monderoy guy a few months back claiming he'd run 3.58 for the mile or something

jeez - what a joke

magpie.

When someone (I think Wejo) tried to make a comment that Geb trained at 8 minute pace because he saw Geb doing a slow warm up!

This tread is funny because this past Saturday I spoke to this guy who siad his PB in the Mile was 2:30....I tried to correct him and say...You mean the 1/2 Mile right? NO! NO! NO! GO ON THE INTERNET AND LOOK UP MY NAME AND HIGH SCHOOL YOU WILL SEE MY NAME! So I was like you must be be drinking?

He went on to say that the WR in the Mile was 2:03 and it was by a Kenyan. I asked him "do you know Hicham El.G"? Uh? "No" he replies and gets pisted off and say "I'm a track man I know what I'm talking about I watch the Olympics (every year)" At this point I begain laughing because he would not stand to be corrected and said I was slow when I told him my 4:09 College PR compared to his 2:30 I'm crawling!

The Roc

This is a great one....a woman I worked with who claimed she ran a 3:07 marathon at the Bermuda marathon. She bragged about it to all her friends, and all her co-workers were very impressed with her running ability. She was somewhat fit looking, ran with Team In Training and was buddies with a bunch of runners. But, everytime I asked her about her training--how fast, mileage, intervals--she was wa-a-a-y evasive and had no clue about stuff that a 3:07 female marathoner should know about.

WELL....about two years later, as I sat here bored, I put her name in a search and VOILA....she did the Bermuda HALF Marathon in 3:07!!!!!! Gotta love it...