Fast Running Blog

100 m - 13.9
200 m - 27.5
400 m - 59.5
800 m - 2:12

I guess the bragging element is that with those less than stellar PRs I have run a 2:23 marathon. And the implication would be that if you match me exactly or beat me in the same proportion (proportion is very important) on all of those you may have a very good shot for 2:23 or faster if you do what I did or better in training and health.

Do PR's count from 10 years ago?  I haven't tried an all out sprint for a while but here are my PR's from a long time ago:

400 m - 51.0
800 m - 1:52

I guess that means that 10 years ago you would have ran a sub-2:23 marathon ;)

From what I can remember:

100m: 13.5 (also, 11.8 downhill with a tailwind once, and it was probably short)
200m: never raced. in track practice I did 4x200 with each in 29-30s
400m: again never raced. around 64-68 during repeats. I never went under 60s.
800m: 2:17 on the track- I really wanted to try and break 2 mins but this was the best I could get that season

Tim:

That fits Ryan Hall's profile very well. His best 800 is 1:51. I do not know his best quarter, but I do not imagine it is slower than 51. It is very difficult to run a 1:52 800 if your 400 is any slower than that. Which means 10 years ago you very well might have had a world class marathon in you with proper training. Big question is how much of that is left now.

I did the 100 meter last xc season in 12.4 - cookin for me! I have never timed my all out 400 meter or 800 meter though. *I did this from a jogging start, too, if that makes a difference.

Sasha:

I hope there is still something left, I would like to break 3 hours.  Now I just need to stay motivated and keep running.

Nick - jogging start is OK. We want to know how fast you can go more than how fast you can accelerate. 12.4 with good endurance can work wonders in a long race.

Tim - your 7 miler shows there is still plenty left for at least a 2:55 marathon, if I had to make an investment, from what I know I would invest $3000 with the guarantee of a $1000 return if you run 2:35 in St. George in two years (and lose all of it otherwise). Assuming proper training, of course, and reserving the right to pull all of my money back if the training was not happening.

I'm guessing that you could beat all of these short PR's if you run them at the same downhill grade as St George.

Sasha,
I found a quote from one of Russian elite 800m runners, Svetlana Cherkasova (PR 1:56:xx), that she never ran 100m and 200m in competition, but she did in practice and clocked 12.6 and 24.8, respectively. It could have been from a jogging start, but still very impressive.

You can actually ask some elite runners specific questions on www.runners.ru. There is a special celebrity forum, where Yury Borzakovskiy (or at least, his wife), Elena Soboleva, Yulia Chizhenko, Svetlana Cherkasova, Ekaterina Volkova are answering questions. They are all middle distance runners, though, as far as I know.

some of these are ballpark (not a race so no e time or anything, plus some time has passed)

100: 12.9
200: 25.4 (w/tailwind) 26.2 without tailwind
400: 54.0 (split time, but it was after a 32 and an 8 so I think that will make up the difference.)
800: 2:03

that was all 3 years ago but as far as speed goes I think I'm faster now...but endurance is another matter:)  trying to fix that.

Finally...a running time I can be "good" with on this blog! Of course I was a sprinter...

100M: 12.6
200M: 25.8

That's it...I never ran any further. The 400 was way too long for me.

My favorite event though was long jump...I went 17'6 a few times. Probably could have been better but I was self-taught.

Those were all in high school. I did run a 12.8 at the summer games a couple years ago though.

I'm not a sprinter at all.

100 M: 13.7?
200 M: 26.6
400 M:56.23
800 M: 2:10.54

I'm not a sprinter either.
100: I don't know. I would guess 13 something,
200: My fastest in practice was 26-27.
400: 11th grade relay split 57. I would guess 55 now.
800: 2:04

88 was my senior year in high school and 89 was my freshman year in college. After that I was done again until 2007.

400 -- 50.5 (88)
800 -- 1:53 (89)
1600 -- 4:19 (89)
3200 -- 9:36 (88)
5k -- 15:45, xc course, not pavement (88)

I have to go way back in the memory banks (25 years) for short distance PRs.

400 - 54
800 - 2:00.6 (Remember this one well.  Still mad that I didn't break 2:00  :)   

Stopped running for 15 years and haven't run anything shorter than a 5k since I started running again.