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Running Speeds

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Re: Running Speeds

#171

Post by patrick0d »

michaelt wrote: post #169
patrick0d wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a good time and I gave the example of a teenager since they will likely be less physically developed, weaker and less experienced than a pro. In a place where sprinting is popular like in the US 10.70 is a pretty achievable for someone who spends time at the sport. After a quick google, the men's Scottish 100m record was set in 1980 and has not been broken since so I would think that they do not devote a lot of…

I actually took that time from [1] which was set in 2017. If you prefer, let's consider California, population 30 million to Scotland's 5 million. According to [2] for the "Boys 100 Meter Dash Varsity" 10.7 would put you among the 20 fastest in the state, although it wouldn't quite get you into the finals (which needed a time of 10.63) Fastest 20 in a state of 30 million doesn't sound "pretty achievable for someone w…

I said a good teenager might run 10.7 and you have found a list of teenagers (I don't know how old they are) that can do just that. Very few people sprint after they leave college but if they spent time becoming stronger and more physically mature then 10.7 would be quite achievable - even a good highschool runner can run that time.

My original point being that people can run this fast and that if they do they would only be a few percent slower than the pinnacle of the sport. Even from the list you shared there most of the runners in those state finals ran 10.7 or better. Imagine an olympic final that had extra lanes for the fastest teenagers from Californian highschools. We would see a horde of 60kg teenagers that could finish the race less than a second (<10.7s) behind the fastest man in the world (9.80s in the previous olympics) over a 100m race.

Re: Running Speeds

#172

Post by PartyOperator »

nlh wrote: post #68

I have what may be a silly (or even ridiculous) question: Why do recreational distance runners care about speed so much? Background: I went through a phase of long-distance recreational running - I ran lots of half-marathons, marathons, and even the Disney Goofy Challenge for a few years (half marathon on Saturday, full marathon on Sunday). It was all fun! Training was satisfying, the running itself was tough but rew…

I love having an honest measure of performance. Of course I'm slowly declining, but seeing it in hard numbers is somehow reassuring. In every other part of life, success is bound up in stories and memories and political measures of position. On the track, I know exactly where I stand. It's also a lot of fun. There's a tactical element to middle-distance running and it's very fulfilling to pull of a (relatively) good race. And always an incredibly friendly sport that brings together people from all walks of life. Millionaires racing high school kids, lawyers vs labourers - none of the usual markers of status matter on the track. I'm sure other sports are similar but this is the one I do.

Other than track (where times are very important), I absolutely love cross country. Not sure about elsewhere, but in the UK it's still a big deal. The leagues are 100% amateur, no flashy medals or goody bags, just pure competitive running. Running is usually an individual sport but cross-country is very much a team thing. The time doesn't matter, the distance doesn't matter (it's usually not more than about 10k), but it's incredibly competitive and the camaraderie is great. The fact that it takes an enormous effort and is generally cold, wet and uncomfortable makes it all the more satisfying.

Re: Running Speeds

#173

Post by nlh »

yason wrote: post #159
theLiminator wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such a silly question. Why do people care about improving in anything?

It's well debatable whether it's an improvement per se but merely a choice of competing on an arbitrary metric. It's fine if that's what you want but it's also very much fine to question that. There's nothing inherent in being faster than others (or your earlier self) that would dictate speed being the obvious primary metric. Sure, it's an easy choice to measure and thus popular but on the other hand if you do want t…

Exceedingly well-said. Thanks!

Re: Running Speeds

#174

Post by DiscourseFan »

raydev wrote: post #148

My take is that the author is focusing too much on "all factors", and the reason for the distribution is that the people who 1) realize they are "good" and 2) want to improve, end up putting in more training time to get even better, which leads to a natural gap in measured ability. Consistency may be the largest factor in peak performance, whether physical or mental. Sure, consistency alone won't get you to the Olymp…

You could just measure the running speed of every hunter in a bush tribe--there is a group of people who are in very good shape and run all the time.

Re: Running Speeds

#175

Post by iamacyborg »

morepork wrote: post #170
iamacyborg wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As an avid runner (10 miles every day, over 3k miles last year), shoes and tracks mean less than you think. I’m also a fairly avid runner and I’m going to call BS on that. There’s a ~14 second difference in world record times between track and road in the 5k. Track surface technology is a real thing, just as shoe technology is.

A 14 second difference is less than 2% of the total time though, so it doesn't entirely disagree with them. Between dirt in casual running shoes to a track and top tech shoes, there would I guess be about a 15-20% difference, and most of that would be the surface. I would speculate more for a sprint as traction/acceleration is more critical.

Right, track surface is a big differentiator, let alone shorter indoor 200m tracks.

There’s a big difference in shoe technology between road and track too, primarily in terms of the amount of super foam allowed which in terms of the shoe is generally what seems to provide the most benefit.

Re: Running Speeds

#176

Post by morepork »

iamacyborg wrote: post #175
morepork wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A 14 second difference is less than 2% of the total time though, so it doesn't entirely disagree with them. Between dirt in casual running shoes to a track and top tech shoes, there would I guess be about a 15-20% difference, and most of that would be the surface. I would speculate more for a sprint as traction/acceleration is more critical.

Right, track surface is a big differentiator, let alone shorter indoor 200m tracks. There’s a big difference in shoe technology between road and track too, primarily in terms of the amount of super foam allowed which in terms of the shoe is generally what seems to provide the most benefit.

For sprints in particular, the spikes make a decent difference on the track, more so for elite athletes as they need the extra traction more

Re: Running Speeds

#177

Post by ip26 »

bwanab wrote: post #139

I'm probably overthinking this, but the article makes me think about the infamous 10x programmer. If, as seems reasonable, the ability to program successfully depends on a number of factors (raw brain power, spacial reasoning, education, ability to concentrate for long periods, etc) and these factors follow a similar gaussian distribution, then 10x doesn't really seem that out of line for the best vs average programm…

That is pretty much the original argument for the 10x programmer, a lot of 1.1x factors compounding.

Re: Running Speeds

#178

Post by jmye »

onetimeuse92304 wrote: post #152
jmye wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. People badly overestimate the shoe effect, especially.

The shoes are the worst thing. Yes, they do work. But it does not make any sense for anybody except people who race for top positions. First of all, to make use of these specialist shoes you already need to have perfect running mechanics. You already have to be good at recovering good amount of the energy using springiness in your tendons and muscle and then the shoe will help with it. If you just put your foot on th…

I will say, in defense, that the foam and some of the carbon plates, do substantially help with recovery. I use an older pair of VaporFlys for that reason - my feet and calves feel much better the day after a big race.

That said, the effect, for me, only matters at full marathon distance. I don’t see any point in wearing any of those shoes for the average weekend 10ker.

Re: Running Speeds

#179

Post by eszed »

leto_ii wrote: post #92
alexmolas wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I'm not wrong you can't obtain a lognormal as a mixture of Gaussian distributions. The processes that generate these distributions are completely different. Gaussian distribution arise when the factors are additive, and lognormal when factors are multiplicative, so these are two completely different distributions. The same way I don't think you can get a normal distribution just by conditioning on an exponential d…

I was thinking about this and how you might get a lognormal from normals. Peer comments I think have good suggestions. The thing is a while back I took a look at the times achieved by competitive athletes at the 100m dash (from worldathletics.org), and they looked normally distributed. Intuitively that made sense to me - many other human attributes are normally distributed, so why not this?

Just a guess: all of those competitive athletes are in the far, far upper-right quadrant of the performance graph, where the curve flattens out. Their distribution will approximate to a normal curve, whereas zooming out to include everyone reveals a gaussian distribution.

Re: Running Speeds

#180

Post by onetimeuse92304 »

jmye wrote: post #178
onetimeuse92304 wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The shoes are the worst thing. Yes, they do work. But it does not make any sense for anybody except people who race for top positions. First of all, to make use of these specialist shoes you already need to have perfect running mechanics. You already have to be good at recovering good amount of the energy using springiness in your tendons and muscle and then the shoe will help with it. If you just put your foot on th…

I will say, in defense, that the foam and some of the carbon plates, do substantially help with recovery. I use an older pair of VaporFlys for that reason - my feet and calves feel much better the day after a big race. That said, the effect, for me, only matters at full marathon distance. I don’t see any point in wearing any of those shoes for the average weekend 10ker.

You can buy good recovery shoes/slippers for small fraction of the price though...
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