So where have I heard this before??? (Read 368 times)

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I studied T-Rex and learned to train racehorses. ........

Wow!  that must have been very hard!

So isn't this hilarious...

 

I've been challenged by multiple individuals to have a rational conversation about what I teach and of course I complied days ago with the introductory lessons of how elite of human runners actually run.

 

It's been days...it's been days....

 

And the echo of silence from anyone only proves my point that once anyone truly figures out that I know what I"m talking about, they run like cowards...

 

So now that I've openly introduced them to the real science of elite biomechanics, where are they???

 

Where are my Runners World barfing toilet vultures when it comes to discussing how to run.

 

I'm still waiting....

We're waiting, too.  Every single link you've referenced fails to prove your point.  Mostly you've cherry picked a phrase, taken it out of context, and twisted it to something other than what it meant, made unwarranted assumptions, or jumped to conclusions.

Can you cite a specific runner with a list of race times that has improved 20% along with their training logs?

Hence wanting the logs as well. If someone doubles their mileage or changes to add intervals etc.  You can't claim you make someone 20% faster and not produce actual race times. As with the horse trainer, he had horses that put up the times. My question is there are tons of runners in every city in US...I find it hard to believe he can't find one local runner to actually do the work or to have studies conducted and peer reviewed under his own name.  As has been pointed out even his proof studies don't show what he claims.

I discussed this back with him years ago. I run basically with my feet in line as did my dad. My upper body does not twist a tone. I have occasional issues with my it band but less so since I have been doing exercises for it. My Dad is insanely fast compared to me.  My form is what it is because it comes naturally. I also got smoked by pretty much everyone my team.  I as an OKish DIII guy. I ran with a guy who was ducked foot and lots of twist....torched me daily. Form has effects, but nominal compared to milage, training plans, and strength. 1-2% ok. 20% no way. Also why on message boards. Get in a lab and produce studies and submit for review. I ran with 2 guys in college who have PHDs in biomechanics. They published work in undergrad, grad, and with their PHD. Doing a study and submitting for review is not that hard.

There will never be any training logs or results posted that can be verified by separate sources (race result pages, etc). The personal motives for this particular individual have been discussed and exposed. They should have picked a different field to be thought of as an "expert", the running and exercise physiology fields have too many scientifically verified methods and studies for someone to make outrageous claims without being easily debunked.

I would suggest ghost or bigfoot hunting. You can be considered an "internationally recognized expert" very easily, without any PhDs or hard work. And there's the fame, TV shows, revenue from books and conference appearances and other sources, like "private investigations". That seems like it would be more in line with the particular individual's talents and abilities. You can make a claim that can't be disproved, such as "ghosts emit EMF waves" and people will just believe at face value, because they WANT to believe it. You cannot say "leaning backwards while running will make you sprint faster" because it can be easily disproved, even if people WANT to believe it.

And yeah, You or I could take any average non-running shmo off the street, have them run 100m, mile and 5k for time, train them for 6 months (or 2 months!) and test them again and they'd absolutely be 20% better at every distance.

 

He wants to feed his ego without doing the hard work.  This is also why he always tries to put the burden on other people to "prove him wrong" or in his words, "if you cannot explain . . . ".  It represents a pre-scientific form of reasoning: the idea that if you can come up with a reasonable explanation, it somehow reflects how the world works.

 

BTW: there's a really interesting This American Life about a guy like SJ that pairs up with a true cancer researcher.  The guy believes he can cure cancer with sonic waves.  Has some interesting initial results, but the researcher pushes him for more rigor.  The guy gives up because as far as he's concerned he had lightening in a bottle once -- QED.  The researcher counters: if you think you have the cure for cancer, why wouldn't you do the hard work to prove it in a professional manner?  Episode 450.

Presumably SJ does less harm on a running forum than he would with a scheme purporting to cure cancer, so maybe we should put up with him here.

Um....I am now convinced you are my dad just hiding behind a screen name...he basically said that last night when i was talking with him.  :-) BTW what years were you at Oregon?  My dad was a year behind Pre.

 

When I was young and near elite, I also ran with a narrow gait...at speed. Even long runs were around 6:00 pace. Each foot would be right on top of the white line. 35 years later and much slower, my foot-plant is a bit wider. However on the occasions I can brave some speed work (bad achilles), a set of :30-33 200's will result in the narrow foot plant. A lot of people tend to forget (or be ignorant of)  that gait mechanics change with velocity and tempo. That's why what works great for walking with a backpack is nearly irrelevant for running 4-5:00 pace.

 

An overlay graph of biomechanical aspects such as foot-plant width, angle of ankle to hip, hip to shoulders at toe-off, foot strike (heel, toe, inbetween), knee angle and heel height on rear extension, range of fore/aft elbow movement, etc. on top of velocity would show how much all these things change naturally the faster you go.

In a way I am glad we are having this discussion. As DP said some of these things Sport Jester mentioned is obvious. However I do admit we sometimes overlook the simplest of mechanics as we try to develop more power or speed. Since he brought up the masking tape I've been doing my trackwork with that in mind its resulted in a narrower gait on the inside lane 2 line. That's a basic we often overlook. I've been keeping my hips forward more engaging glutes and creating better levers from arm movement. So for what its worth take it as a reminder to always make the mental connection the little checklist for fast efficient running and racing.