Of course continuous proper training will help a lot, but only to a point. Talent/potential, or whatever you want to call it, counts for a lot. You give CF a slow, weak, uncoordinated, determined, 18 year old fat kid (say 40lbs overweight) and 4 years of training, and how fast do you think he could run the 100m at the end of those years? I would be impressed with 12.0.
While I think training is training and should be for the most part individualized to begin with. I think race as in skin color is both overblown and underestimated.
It’s overblown for the simple reason that the actual skin color of a person doesn’t mean much genetically. If Tom Cruise is slower than Tupac it won’t be because he’s white.
It’s underestimated because socially it does make a difference. Especially in the U.S. It would be willing sticking your head in the sand to assume that on the whole a black athlete and indian athlete would come to the track with the same baggage. The personalities and social experiences brought due to their “race” will undoubtedly lead to some adjustments in coaching. At least until there is a level of comfort reached.
The social argument is drastically overstated. There are plenty of black sprinters who came from good upbringings and plenty of white sprinters who didn’t.
A phrase that I like to repeat when discussing the importance of hard work versus natural talent is, “You can only nurture what nature has given.” Since I’ve accepted this, I’ve re-defined my main goal in track as realizing my maximum potential.
Let me state my summarized philosophy and tell me if anyone agrees with it. Keep in mind that the “ideal” training situation i speak of is impossible and has surely never been achieved. Ideal situation would mean “ideal” in every possible way. This person got 10 hours of sleep every day of their life. Early exposure to the sport. Never missed a workout in his life. Never ate any junk food in his life. Took ice baths whenever he needed to, got massages. Did 1000+ reps of corework for years and years. Somehow was exposed to any supplement he ever wanted and any sort of scientific advancement that could possibly help him such as therapeutic modalities and nutritional or pharmaceutical means of improvement. He had the very best coach and training program and was exposed to high levels of competition his whole life. I’m talking about absolute perfection.
“If a male of average genetics was exposed to these “ideal” situations he could become a world class athlete or even a world record holder”
I think your goal of realizing your maximum potential is an admirable one. But my personal philosophy is that achieving your potential is impossible, because there will always be things that you could have done better. Just as this “ideal situation” is impossible, so is maximizing your potential in my humble opinion.
Does no one agree?
Most of what you just said here is irrelevant to maximizing potential or would actually inhibit maximum potential for direct or indirect reasons. Almost everything you said there is stupid as hell.
“If a male of average genetics was exposed to these “ideal” situations he could become a world class athlete or even a world record holder”
I think your goal of realizing your maximum potential is an admirable one. But my personal philosophy is that achieving your potential is impossible, because there will always be things that you could have done better. Just as this “ideal situation” is impossible, so is maximizing your potential in my humble opinion.
Does no one agree?
You may never achieve your “maximum” potential, but you can get pretty damn close. That doesn’t mean that millions of people can come close to 9.58/19.19. That is just a stupid thing to say.
While we both agree that “maximum” potential cannot be reached, I do not claim to know whether or not it is even possible to get close to your maximum potential. How do you propose to know what anyone’s maximum potential is since you say that it is possible to get close to it? Do you know what your genetic potential is? And why is what I said stupid? Is it because nobody actually is that dedicated?
I don’t agree.
You take an average person and put them in this “ideal” situation and I guarantee you that someone out there is faster without ever training.
You take an above average person and put them in an “ideal” situation and someone out there in an absolutely un-ideal situation will run faster.
You take two extremely talented people and the one in the ideal situation will potentially run faster.
I think you’re attributing too much to environment and not enough to nature.
Maybe you are right that I put too much emphasis on hard work and not enough on nature. But I think the notion of this “ideal situation” is soooo farfetched and nearly impossible to attain that there is no evidence to support or disprove my theory. What if ligaments could be re-attached to structurally re-engineer an athlete with a body less than ideal. I can’t think of a physical attribute that cannot be manipulated. This is the basis for my beliefs.
Now it sounds like I’m talking about a human Frankenstein.
Because dedication often does not necessarily equal better results. I hate to say it, especially as someone who is dedicated, but there are numerous upon numerous examples of athletes who dedicated everything they had and were pretty much the definition of a freak and someone else came along and beat them with minimal dedication. There are numerous examples of people who were dedicated and had careers riddled with injuries. Being dedicated really is a relative term because Powell and Bolt still stay out late partying, still drink, sleep through practices, sometimes even around major championships.
Need I mention the most obvious example of a person with minimal dedication succeeding at the highest level: Xavier Carter. The guy ran 19.63 (at the time, the 2nd fastest 200m EVER) skipping practices, playing football (and spring football instead of going to track practice!), etc. He ran 45.x in the 400m indoors 2 weeks after a bowl game. He beat Tyson Gay, Usain Bolt, and numerous others while being called lazy and undedicated by his coaches and teammates and others at his university. In fact, his behavior was so outrageous he is now essentially banned from the LSU campus for causing such problems.
Now, he has been surpassed by athletes who are more “dedicated”, but it shows you how far talent alone will take you. In fact, had it not been for injuries, he may very well be the fastest person in the world right now. Ironically, him getting hurt was when he started to attend more than a few practices a week and eating something other than chicken wings (according to what he has said!).
You can’t disprove the statement that Santa Claus exists either. It doesn’t make it any more valid.
Your what-ifs are just becoming stupid. Run sub 14 on the big boy hurdles with this dedication and then we can start. Then go for sub 13, then sub 12.9. Once we get there, you can tell us about how far dedication and training alone will take you.
I think - a person who is naturally fast, but lacks many things and runs 100m fairly slow due to certain issues, can be brought up to great speed, and even do well internationally (so long as bolt, gay, powell aint in the race…)
I have seen people, with fast leg turn over, or fast arms, but lack any or all of the following, Strength, flexibility, stride length, posture, technique, and other types of things, improve greatly with the right training.
You have to fix certain issues on lots of different poeple - this is where programs fail.
If u or i were to do Usains exact same program, exact as he did - we would fail.
Glen Mills has been heard saying, that he worked on Usains technique, posture and other things before Usain was ready to even start doing Serious fast work.
This is how i train my cllients also, Fix the issues, once resolved, you can train the house down on them, and with the right recovery, they just keep on improving. Train them right off the bat, from the get go, and injury after injury happens.
The trouble with the average person, is they are average for a reason, Find out that reason, fix it, then train them for serious speed and they will be a great runner.
Will they run sub 10sec? Good chance they wont, how many have done it now in the history of 100m? 60? Very very few.
Train enough guys correctly, and eventually the glue will stick, and you’ll get a guy sub 10.
So why don’t we all just party, drink, eat chicken wings, and skip practice. Obsiously that’s what was best for Xavier. Maybe that’s what I need to run fast.
YOU could - but you’ll run like crap…
People like Xavier - have to be real careful with their training. No way they could handle volume’s of training. Their nervous system must just be totally nuts.
No wonder Xavier is a party head with a nervous system like he does - he must bounce off walls
You would be amazed at how many athletes have “taken a new perspective” and spent a lot more time relaxing and enjoying life (and training), which sometimes includes going out or not going to every single practice, and have had big improvements in their sprinting.
Let us not forget the numerous stories of athletes who have partied (to some degree) or stayed out late the nights before some of their best performances. Jim Hines had champaign and spent the night having sex the day before his WR and Olympic gold…
It seemed like every time I stayed up late (2-4am) before writing a final exam, watching movies, eating burgers, and enjoying a couple drinks, I did as well as could be done the next day. This goes for grade 12 through university. When I tried to eat well and go to bed on time, I didn’t do as well.
Because you weren’t used to it. If you change your routine on last minute you are going to be fried, like somoene said ´stick to what you have´.
The big problem is to adress all the issues (technique, posture, mobility, …) before it’s too late, let’s say, about 22 years?
A lot of people do all the right things and their best performances still comee after “improper” nights. I can think of numerous examples of this in a variety of sports.
obviously there are exceptions, but controlling as much as possible is still optimal