Not comparing Lance to Gebrselassie, but since he was brought up, check out the amazing range of distances he excels at. Also, there are some amazing endurance running records at the bottom.
1500 Meters (indoors)
3:31.18 Hicham El Guerrouj (MOR) '97 3:31.76 Haile Gebrselassie (ETH) '98
**3000 Meters** 7:20.67 Daniel Komen (KEN) '96 7:23.09 Hicham El Guerrouj (MOR) '99 7:25.02 Ali Saidi-Sief (ALG) '00 7:25.09 Haile Gebrselassie (ETH) '98
5000 Meters
12:50.38 Haile Gebrselassie (ETH) '99 12:51.48 Daniel Komen (KEN) '98
All-Time Marathon Lists - World Men
Khalid Khannouchi (USA) 2:05:38 (1) London 14Apr02 Khannouchi (MOR) 2:05:42 (1) Chicago 24Oct99 Paul Tergat (KEN) 2:05:48 (2) London 14Apr02 Khannouchi 2:05:56 (1) Chicago 13Oct02 Ronaldo da Costa (BRA) 2:06:05 (1) Berlin 20Sep98 Moses Tanui (KEN) 2:06:16 (2) Chicago 24Oct99 Daniel Njenga (KEN) 2:06:16 (2) Chicago 13Oct02 Toshinari Takaoka (JPN) 2:06:16 (3) Chicago 13Oct02 Tergat 2:06:18 (4) Chicago 13Oct02 Gert Thys (RSA) 2:06:33 (1) Tokyo 14Feb99 Mike Rotich (KEN) 2:06:33 (1) Paris 06Apr03 Haile Gebrselassie (ETH) 2:06:35 (3) London
14Apr02
30 miles 2:42:00 Jeff Norman (Great Britain) Timperley 07Jun80 50 km 2:48:06 Jeff Norman (Great Britain) Timperley 07Jun80 40 miles 3:48:35 Don Ritchie (Great Britain) Hendon 16Oct82 50 miles 4:51:49 Don Ritchie (Great Britain) Hendon 12Mar83 100 km 6:10:20 Don Ritchie (Great Britain) London 28Oct78 150 km 10:34:30 Denis Jalybin (Russia) London 20Oct02 100 miles 11:28:03 Oleg Kharitonov (Russia) London 20Oct02 200 km 15:10:27 Yiannis Kouros (Australia) Adelaide 04Oct97 500 km 60:23:00 Yiannis Kouros (Greece) Colac 26/29Nov84 500 miles 105:42:09 Yiannis Kouros (Greece) Colac 26/30Nov84 1000 km 136:17:00 Yiannis Kouros (Greece) Colac 26Nov/01Dec84 1500 km 10d 17:28:26 Piotr Silkin (Lithuania) Nanango 11/22Mar98 1000 miles 11d 13:54:58 Piotr Silkin (Lithuania) Nanango 11/23Mar98 12 hours 100M 1602Y% Yiannis Kouros (Greece) Montauban 15Mar85 24 hours 188M 1038Y% Yiannis Kouros (Australia) Adelaide 04/05Oct97 48 hours 294M 710Y% Yiannis Kouros (Australia) Surgeres 03/05May96 6 days 635M 147Y% Yiannis Kouros (Greece) New York 02/08Jul84
Ah, yes. I agree with you on that. I don’t think Lance could win Ironman on minimal training, either. However, I do think he would do better than anyone else on minimal training. If Bolts went 9:30, I would think that Lance would go 9:00, maybe even less than that. But win, no. Not on very little training.
Well as you started it, HGS is probably the most complete endurance athlete alive period. I’ll make the statement.
He excels at every distance and has yet to truly fulfill his potential at the marathon.
Here’s the complete list:
Worlds 10k best 27.02.11 set in 02
World 2 mile best 8.04.69 set in 03
4 time world and 2 time Oly 10k winner
Marathon debut of 2.06.35 debut in 02 absolutely outkicked by KK who is the most dominant marathoner ever with 3 of the fastest 5 times and 3 times under 2.06.
5000m WR of 12.39.36 in 98
10k WR of 26.22.75 track 98
Half marathon of 59.40
I dont know but call me silly but the man has dominated the 10k, set world records in the last 6 months at both the 2 mile and the 10k, holds the track and road 10k record, the 5k track record and the indoor 2 mile.
“Debuted” with a 2.06 marathon.
4 World championships in the 10, one in the half.
2 Oly Golds
Undoubtedly one of if not the greatest athletes that has ever lived.
Even if it is a “runner’s race” then Lance wouldn’t have to be a runner. A split of 3:05-3:10 could likely win it for him. That is not fast running, that is survival shuffling for runners. Provided he didn’t blow up completely, like Macca last year, I don’t see any reason at all that he couldn’t shuffle his way to a low 3 hour run with minimal additional training … although if he plans on trying it I think he should sit out the little ride in France over the summer and put in some solid runs and swims
I have a tape of the 1989-or 90 Coca Cola Sprint Tri - lance beats Mike Pigg and Mark Allen. Not just juniors, but the best Pros in the World at the time. He was 17 at the time.
Just adding my two cents regarding LA’s background as Triathlete.
First, on Nike Campus you can go into the the LA fitness facility and look at Lance’s memorablia.
They have old printed race results from some Tris he did in his late teens, Olympic Distance stuff and his 10ks were about 37 and change. Of course, he smoked the bike leg and his swim was superior given his age.
Good, but not great. Yes, he was young, but IM racing is still about the run as DeBoom has been proving as of late and Mark Allen and Dave Scott did in '89.
I don’t want to take anything away from LA, there is no question that he would be competitive in Triathlon again, whether he could win Kona is really just speculation.
if Lance truly didn’t run longer than a 16 miler in training but was able to hold a pretty even pace throughout I think the hair under 3 he did today tells a more positive story than you seem to be implying.
he was undertrained and still went sub 3
it was his first attempt at the distance
the latter half of the NYC marathon is one of the toughest and yet he barely slowed down
I think with focused training (rather than body building with his buddy Matthew and hitting the celeb parties) he could hit similar or better numbers in an Ironman mary after riding (for him) a conservative ride. Now I’m not sure he could beat the cream in kona first time out but if he chose to develop as an Ironman athlete over 2 or 3 years I do think he could do it.
Hi Doubletrouble, since you are into stalking me, interesting that you bring up a thread from May 2003. Were you still a freshman high school then? Seriously though, I already revised things today 3 years and 3 TdF wins later. Back then the prediction was based on his TdF fitness and then piling on run training after the TdF. Now if he did Ironman, he’d have to start from scratch relatively speaking, not leverage a full season of pro racing and V02. If you recall, Udo Bolts was able to run pretty respectably off a full season of pro bike racing. So if you look at the thread from today, I posted some revised times, and suggest that Lance can do well, but not win Kona if he genuinely has to start from today’s fitness and build to an Ironman.
