If you look at the great athletics performances of the early 1970's and prior, you would realize most were on cinder tracks.
I read once somewhere that in a 5k, a 13:30 on a cinder track was roughly equivilent to a 13:05 on an all weather. Is it really this much different? (12.5 lapsx2= 25s, 2s/400m lap) Less? Or perhaps even a greater difference?
It is a huge difference. During the summer I was doing intervals on a track about 2 miles away from my house. Wehn I did 400's, I noticed that for some reason I was always 2-3 seconds of my goal time. Then one day I did workout on mondo tracks I was was running 2-3 seconds under my goal time and I felt as if it were a lot easier. Of course I was also in better shape by then
Its hard to compare cinder tracks with mondo tracks b/c cinder tracks that are used very often are actually quite fast due to the cinders being crushed together and compacted, with the addition of water and dirt. I've actually had experiences on cinder tracks that were extrememly fast. In contrast, I've run on mondos that are extremely slow.
Comparing good cinder v. good all-weather: 1-2 sec. per 400 slower, or 5-8 sec per mile.
The cinder/all-weather difference is overblown. Sure, there's a difference and sure the Mondo and other artifical surfaces are faster. But 5-8 seconds a mile? 13:30 on cinder equal to 13:05? That's nuts.
The most objective measurement is to look at guys in the late 60's to mid-70's who, during their careers, ran on both. If that nonsense is true, then a guy that ran 13:30 on cinder would have run 13:05 on all weather, and they didn't come close to that. You don't see that big of a difference in their times. I ran on both consistently in high school. Yes, my PR's came on all weather tracks, but that was much more a function of the fact that my major meets with better competition were the ones on all-weather, and on cinder I was usually running some rinky-dink dual meet with no competition.
I can remember that one of the best interval workouts I ever ran was on cinder the day after a light rain. The surface was perfect; firm, but giving, your spikes slid in easily, gripped tight and no mud stuck. If felt like you were flying. Also realize that the main reason for creating artificial surfaces was not to have a faster track, but to avoid rained-out meets during the wet spring; hence they were called "all weather" tracks, not "super fast" tracks.
5-8 sec. is an average figure, based on my experiences racing on both in the '70's, and on currently training on both. A "perfectly tuned" cinder can do better, say 2-5 sec./mile, but most such tracks are only in that state for brief periods of time (even the running of a few events can substantially degrade them), and the cinder tracks around nowadays are not groomed to a high standard.
Certainly Ryun would have been sub-3:50 on Mondo(highest standard surface).
Some info from "Running the Lydiard Way" by Arthur Lydiard
"Remember that he [Peter Snell] ran his mile, 800-meters, and 880-yards records on grass, which would be at least a second a lap slower than the modern synthetic surfaces-4 seconds in a mile. Compare his 3:54.1 with John Walker's 3:49.4 on that basis, and decide how much-or how little-human improvement has been."
"over the 100m, synthetic surfaces has been calculated to be worth about 0.2 second[s]."
Pam Ryan, and Australian hurdler, hardly ever hit hurdles. The first time she ran on a synthetic track, she ran into the hurdle. Three days later, she set the WR.
"When synthetic tracks were introduced, the world record for 5,000 meters came down immediately about half a minute, and lots of 10,000-meter runners began running close to and even breaking Ron Clark's world time."