I was wondering this myself while watching the men's marathon last night in the Olympics. Now, this article is making the rounds (from Time magazine, my old favorite thanks to good ol Dad). Personally, I think it is really mind-boggling to think about how different runners from all over the globe, with different bodies, and training regimes and whatnot, all seem to be reaching the same limit, at least in long distances. These people don't really seem to be getting much faster. How is it possible that we have reached the limitations of the human body? Why are there so many people who are on par with each other, why not some freak of nature that smashes every record, who basically seems bred to run. I mean, if you think about, Usain Bolt seems like that guy, for sprinting. I dunno, maybe it's just that I've been told all my life that anything is possible and reach for the stars and all that, that actually witnessing human limitations seems unfathomable. Taller, faster, stronger.
Watching the Olympics makes me think about what would have happened if I hadn't given up running and sprinting. I always liked bolting around when I was a kid. Now, I feel like I can run farther than I ever did in cross country, albeit definitely not faster. (Thus, I am a huge believer in hiking now in improving lung capacity and leg strength) I guess the largest part of it is the 90% mind, 10% body that my cross country teammates always used to talk about.
1 comment:
What amazed me about Bolt is a couple of things...
First he set the records in the 100m and 200m with relative ease. The 100m he showboated the last 15m and in 200m he ran into a headwind. In both cases, in ideal conditions, if he tried he could have COMPLETELY OBLITERATED the records.
Second... he's not a normal sprinter. Normal sprinters are not tall because when they come out of the blocks they want to stay down to minimize wind resistance. Bolt is like 6'4". But that being said his legs are REALLY long so he takes less strides.
Anyways... I was never a great runner. I was always pretty average. In HS I was always deep in the JV Cross Country team. My best 5K was 18:41 and my best mile was like 5:04. Now I'd be supremely estatic to have times ANYWHERE near that.
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