CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

[Friar]

I'll be going to the NCAA Dis.1 race in Franklin Park [site of the '92 world champs]in a couple of weeks, it's a beautiful rolling course on a fall NE day.

Who would win among the big 4 : while hilly, the course has a flat final 200m fairway,followed by a dogleg sharp 100m 40 degree decline to the finish.

While all four are frontrunners I'd have to think Salazar and Porter would take up the pace,and leave Lindgren and Pre to kick hard downhill to the line. Advantage Pre.

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

Yes, that would be a great match. It would be interesting to see how fast the pace would be with those four hard pushing front runners....that would be a fun one to watch!I agree Pre would take it--with his guts and speed.

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

Out of all those you named, only one had put Cross Country as his TOP priority and had the altitude background that prety much everyone since the mid-eighties has enjoyed in winning the World Cross meet.
Advantage, Porter!

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

Franklin Park CAN be beautiful. However, it is not beautiful if it has recently rained. Heavy rain turns that place into a muddy swamp.

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

Porter was truly a fantastic CC runner - Tough to see anyone beating him - as good as the others mentioned - I would have to take Pat over any US runner from any era if Pat was healthy and rolling.

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

I agree that Porter was a class CC runner...he made it his specialty and he was superb. My point is ,however, that Pre, Salazar and Lindgren had 10K/6-mile track performances that indicate if they had taken their talents to CC would have been superior to Porter.

[GeoffPietsch]

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

I'd take Lindgren. Porter perhaps "should" win, but his hard-to-understand tactic of frontrunning-from-the-gun would have set him up for the others to draft off him, the way Carlos Lopes, Steve Jones, and (?) did when the Worlds were in New York (well, the Meadowlands) in the early '80s.

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

I assume the winner gets into the final to race Craig Virgin, the best American XC runner ever?

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

Just what I was thinking. You have to add Craig Virgin to make this race complete.

I have Porter leading them through a fast opening mile, Salazar throwing in some surges in the mile miles, Lingren pushing mile 5 and Pre and Virgin racing over the last 800m for the win.

Man, fun to think about!

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

Sorry. Should have read "With Salazar throwing in surges in the middle miles".

I really do need to proof read before hitting "Post Reply".

[GeoffPietsch]

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

As I mentioned in the Distance Thrills thread, not only should Virgin be included, of course, but so should Frank Shorter. All his National XC titles weren't accomplished with smoke and mirrors. He not only had the endurance, obviously, but he had track speed and racing smarts.

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

What is your take? Could Salazar, Shorter, Lindgren or Porter gotten away from Virgin and Pre enough to pull off the win? And if it came down to the last quarter mile who had the best kick out of that group (obviously not Salazar)?

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

>Porter perhaps
>"should" win, but his hard-to-understand
>tactic of frontrunning-from-the-gun would have
>set him up for the others to draft off him, the
>way Carlos Lopes, Steve Jones, and (?) did when
>the Worlds were in New York (well, the
>Meadowlands) in the early '80s.

The ? is Tim Hutchings.
Porter was very young in that race. His tactic destroyed all but three in the world during an Olympic year (traditionally a year when everybody would contest the World Cross as part of their Oly preparation). And, for the record, all of those four went out hard at the start. You had to in the World Cross meet, even before the Africans took it over in the late eighties.

The tactic itself isn't difficult to understand: take a high VO2 Max athlete who lives year-round at 7500 feet and trains very hard at going out fast in that barometric pressure and bring him down to sea-level where he blasts the first part of the race because he CAN do so without feeling the same ill effects of built up lactic acid the sea-level trainers behind him (or unfortunate enough to try staying with him) feel. In CC, it is much more difficult than track to move up later in the race...the soft and uneven ground provides less energy return so anyone trying to close a gap has to work tremendously to do so, usually leaving them dead by the time the push for home begins. So much for a kick. Mid-race surges also fail, since these are impossible to do if you aren't right alongside the guy, if you're constantly playing catch-up.
There will be a few who can accurately pace themselves over the entire distance and these folks will be in a position to win if they do so. But there aren't many who will do this successfully.

Going out hard in CC is a great tactic, if you can pull it off. Porter could, so could all the Adams State teams coached by Dr. Vigil. But Porter had the talent to be the best of them all at it.

[GeoffPietsch]

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

Several years ago, at a coaches clinic, I asked Vigil about Porter's tactics and he defended them. He may have a Ph.D. in Physiology - and obviously he is a great coach - but I still say it's crazy. Yes, psychologically it's very tough to run even pace when you are so far behind early, and on some courses it can be very tough to work through the field, but it is beyond dispute that physiologically even pace makes the most sense.
As for '84 Worlds, while Jones, Hutchings and Lopes also went out very fast, they did sit in, especially Lopes. The benefit of doing so is also indisputable.

[MJD]

Re: CC Match race:Alberto,Pat,Pre,Gerry

Speaking of Vigil, Walt Murphy just sent this around:

RELEASE

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