Posted In: Meet Results and Discussion
I saw it coming with Merritt in for gold, while Jeremy Wariner took silver. I wonder what Wariner’s splits were like, the last 100m really didnt look good with maybe some slippage in form for him.
Also good leap from Neville, putting him in third place.
USA 1, 2, 3 sweep…
I think a lot of Wariners issue today may have come down to coaching. I know he’s supposedly using similar workouts if not the same as what he was using under Hart, but it seems clear that there is some entangibles there that Hart has vs. other coaches. I’ve noticed whether college or elite level, Harts runners were always at their best championship time. Wariner this year just didn’t seem to have that invinsibility to him and that came when Merritt beat him and showed that he was human. But I also think that Merritt was the first to truly believe that he could beat him in every aspect of the race. Raw speed, strength, confidence, etc. 1, 2, 3 is sweet, but I have been disappoined with the performances of the US.
Yeah I saw it too. Merritt looked MUCH better in his SF. I wonder if Wariner will still insist that the coaching move was for the best. With a loss of this magnitude and still being relatively early in his career you think he might want to consider eating a little humble pie and going back to Hart.
I actually don’t think his problem is so much fitness related as it is confidence and execution. These two things seemed to cost him in the area of consistency. The guy used to be automatic. Now, it looks like there’s doubt in his mind now when he steps to the line and he doesn’t execute the standard Hart race model very well anymore. The fact that he has run the fastest time of the year and until recently was actually faster than he had been in previous years at the same point indicates that the fitness was there…just not the consistency.
On a related note, it looks like the U.S. specializes in the men’s oval races. With only a few exceptions the men’s 400m and 400H have been our only bright spots.
ELITETRACK Founder
Merritt on the inside spells disaster for Wariner.
With the lane controversy earlier this year, and now Jeremy losing again to Merritt on the inside, it shows that Jeremy is completely afraid of him if he can’t see him.
Merritt on the other hand has a better 200 PR and could match Wariners first 200 while staying much more relaxed it seemed. Damn fine race for Merritt.
I just watched the race and through 200m Wariner was in great position. From 200m to 300m Wariner did not accel that corner which is a staple strategy and when he saw Merritt he got tighter and tighter and tighter and looked as though he gave up. He ran 44.12 shutting down in the semis and looked pretty good. I think it’s in his head. Someone beat him, got in his head and now when he’s a tough race he can’t dig deep enough to respond to a challenge.
I am with drive on this one, Merritt is in Wariner’s head and he has lost focus on his own race. It is not a coaching issue. Wariner can’t run with Merritt on his inside. It is equal to Asafa getting 5th in the finals when he should have coasted to 2nd. We didn’t blame that on his coach.
But did the public scrutiny and second-thoughts on switching that he must have had have anything to do with his decreased confidence?
ELITETRACK Founder
Coaching is about preparing an athlete to execute and preparing that athlete mentally. Wariner and Hart had excellent feedback and cueing, that resulted in great consistency. Coach Ford knows the workouts and how to keep Wariner fit but cannot keep him consistent like Hart had him, and Wariner is always discussing a different race model after each race that doesn’t fit the prior race’s execution and that didn’t happen under Hart. Therefore it’s a coaching issue as well as it seems Coach Ford is overcoaching Wariner. I actually find this to be a common theme among coaches who are former athletes without any training in motor learning and development and motor control and biomechanics. Talented athletes underperform in certain instances when overloaded with cues and race specifics that actually bring them away from the race model. I am not saying Wariner would have beaten Merritt under Hart, but it would have been close. The only place Wariner would have seen Merritt under Hart is coming into the homestretch or in the homestretch.
As Vern would say “Any fool can make another fool tired.”
I am with drive on this one, Merritt is in Wariner’s head and he has lost focus on his own race. It is not a coaching issue. Wariner can’t run with Merritt on his inside. It is equal to Asafa getting 5th in the finals when he should have coasted to 2nd. We didn’t blame that on his coach.
I think Powell has shown he has been wildly inconsistent after 3 rounds of 100m. Which is the total opposite of what Wariner has done. If an athlete doesn’t execute like they should have then at least part of, if not all the blame should go to the coach.
Coaching is about preparing an athlete to execute and preparing that athlete mentally. Wariner and Hart had excellent feedback and cueing, that resulted in great consistency. Coach Ford knows the workouts and how to keep Wariner fit but cannot keep him consistent like Hart had him, and Wariner is always discussing a different race model after each race that doesn’t fit the prior race’s execution and that didn’t happen under Hart. Therefore it’s a coaching issue as well as it seems Coach Ford is overcoaching Wariner. [b]I actually find this to be a common theme among coaches who are former athletes without any training in motor learning and development and motor control and biomechanics.[/b] Talented athletes underperform in certain instances when overloaded with cues and race specifics that actually bring them away from the race model. I am not saying Wariner would have beaten Merritt under Hart, but it would have been close. The only place Wariner would have seen Merritt under Hart is coming into the homestretch or in the homestretch.
As Vern would say “Any fool can make another fool tired.”
Nice post. I’ve observed the same things (in my bold).
ELITETRACK Founder
Coaching is about preparing an athlete to execute and preparing that athlete mentally. Wariner and Hart had excellent feedback and cueing, that resulted in great consistency. Coach Ford knows the workouts and how to keep Wariner fit but cannot keep him consistent like Hart had him, and Wariner is always discussing a different race model after each race that doesn’t fit the prior race’s execution and that didn’t happen under Hart. Therefore it’s a coaching issue as well as it seems Coach Ford is overcoaching Wariner. I actually find this to be a common theme among coaches who are former athletes without any training in motor learning and development and motor control and biomechanics. Talented athletes underperform in certain instances when overloaded with cues and race specifics that actually bring them away from the race model. I am not saying Wariner would have beaten Merritt under Hart, but it would have been close. The only place Wariner would have seen Merritt under Hart is coming into the homestretch or in the homestretch.
As Vern would say “Any fool can make another fool tired.”
Ford may know the workouts. Hell, I know the workouts, but Hart would do a better job because of his experience and ability to help an athlete prepare. I think Coach Hart has the “it” factor going for him. I think anyone on this entire board would agree that if they had the best coach in the world in their specific event they would have a level of self confidence in everything the coach would say how they prepare for specific races and how to execute it. I know that would be the case with me.
But did the public scrutiny and second-thoughts on switching that he must have had have anything to do with his decreased confidence?
I think if you eliminate Merritt out of the equation, we don’t need to debate Wariner. Merritt came in and got in his head along with the coaching change. Look at JW’s semi – cruised the 44 point. He lacked confidence over Merritt, something that even Coach Hart might not have been able to fix.
I watched a similar thing happen to Andrew Rock as a frosh and soph in college. He was the far superior runner but Ben got the inside of him and got in his head.
[quote author="Chad Williams" date="1219361210"]I am with drive on this one, Merritt is in Wariner’s head and he has lost focus on his own race. It is not a coaching issue. Wariner can’t run with Merritt on his inside. It is equal to Asafa getting 5th in the finals when he should have coasted to 2nd. We didn’t blame that on his coach.
I think Powell has shown he has been wildly inconsistent after 3 rounds of 100m. Which is the total opposite of what Wariner has done. If an athlete doesn’t execute like they should have then at least part of, if not all the blame should go to the coach.[/quote]
Do you blame a kicker’s coach on a missed field goal? Do you blame the coach when a b-ball player misses a free throw? At some point the athlete is responsible. Otherwise the everything would happen according to the plan and execution would NEVER be an issue.
[quote author="Mike Young" date="1219361690"]But did the public scrutiny and second-thoughts on switching that he must have had have anything to do with his decreased confidence?
I think if you eliminate Merritt out of the equation, we don’t need to debate Wariner. Merritt came in and got in his head along with the coaching change. Look at JW’s semi – cruised the 44 point. He lacked confidence over Merritt, something that even Coach Hart might not have been able to fix.
I watched a similar thing happen to Andrew Rock as a frosh and soph in college. He was the far superior runner but Ben got the inside of him and got in his head.[/quote]
Ben Dreyer wasn’t in Rock’s head, trust me. Both of his years he did not run good races. He didn’t run a very good strategy. He had no problem with him indoor so he was not in his.
Rock was also running at least the 200m and sometimes the 4×100, which add up to a lot more races than Dryer.
If I remember correctly Dreyer only ran the 400m every year except for 2002, when he added the 200m.
[quote author="Chad Williams" date="1219361210"]I am with drive on this one, Merritt is in Wariner’s head and he has lost focus on his own race. It is not a coaching issue. Wariner can’t run with Merritt on his inside. It is equal to Asafa getting 5th in the finals when he should have coasted to 2nd. We didn’t blame that on his coach.
I think Powell has shown he has been wildly inconsistent after 3 rounds of 100m. Which is the total opposite of what Wariner has done. If an athlete doesn’t execute like they should have then at least part of, if not all the blame should go to the coach.[/quote]
I do not know half of what most on here know about track BUT I am an avid fan and I am observant.
Powell’s coach also coached the GOLD MEDALIST in the Womens’s 100m so….The problem with Powell is very unlikely coach related unless he and Francis just don’t click at all which to me can’t be the case either because Powell previously was blasting off 9.7’s a few years in a row so they had something going at some point. TO me the blame for Powell rests 99% with Powell. Apparently he was following someone else’s direction besides his coach when he tore his pec earlier this year.
To me Powell is not a gamer. He will make an excuse before he even lines up and it is all confidence related it looks like to me. I hate it for him but he doesn’t seem to have IT to go along with his talent. Leroy Burrell seems similar.
Devil’s advocate:
So Wariner should have stayed with Hart so he could enjoy great success like Sanya?
Sanya problem was race tactics, had nothing to do with workouts.
[quote author="utfootball4" date="1219380026"]
Sanya problem was race tactics, had nothing to do with workouts.
How do you know? Her PR is 48.70. She was running 48 pace and died.[/quote]
Looking at the race she went out too hard and Sanya even agreed. She didnt get her ass beat like JW did, thats training..
Devil’s advocate:
So Wariner should have stayed with Hart so he could enjoy great success like Sanya?
Everyone is quick to blame Ford for JW’s loss, yet no one has blamed Hart for Sanya’s poor race distribution.
[quote author="mortac8" date="1219379056"]Devil’s advocate:
So Wariner should have stayed with Hart so he could enjoy great success like Sanya?
Everyone is quick to blame Ford for JW’s loss, yet no one has blamed Hart for Sanya’s poor race distribution.[/quote]
How can we blame Hart for her race distribution unless we wanted him to run the race for her??
[quote author="mortac8" date="1219379056"]Devil’s advocate:
So Wariner should have stayed with Hart so he could enjoy great success like Sanya?
Everyone is quick to blame Ford for JW’s loss, yet no one has blamed Hart for Sanya’s poor race distribution.[/quote]
Richards has been more consistent under Hart although she has a long way to go. However, I think it comes down to how well Wariner and Hart communicated with each other. In 2004 and 2005 Wariner was more vulnerable and more runners within his then PR than now.
It’s also tough blame Hart for Richards if we don’t know if her Behcet’s is starting to flare up again. Although I didn’t consider her a clear favorite as she hasn’t been the same runner since her diagnosis last year.
I received some very unofficial race splits for Wariner. Apparently, in the semi he went out in 20.7. In the final it was 20.9.
ELITETRACK Founder
I received some very unofficial race splits for Wariner. Apparently, in the semi he went out in 20.7. In the final it was 20.9.
I have Wariner at 10.3-10.4, 20.7-20.8, and 31.8 through 100m, 200m, and 300m. Slightly ahead of Merritt and Neville till that point. At 310m Merritt and Wariner are even at 32.9-33.0s and Merritt pretty much holds that to the line, suggesting Merritt had a much more even race distribution. I think Wariner went for the record in the early part of the race and paid for it later. He made the stagger on Rooney in the first 100m and ended up chasing Neville who was running an unbelievable clip for him 20.8 through 200m himself. Merritt looks to have split 10.4-10.5 and 20.9 which resulted in him coming out of the turn with more momentum, his 3rd 100m segment was .2s faster than Wariner’s.
My guess is instead of focusing on a complete race, he was focusing on the start and the first 200m just like he did at the trials were the same thing happened. That’s a repeatable result that never happened to him in 5+ years with Hart. I have to believe Hart did not believe Wariner was going to get the record this year and that was part of their falling out. I don’t believe it had anything to do with Merritt.
Yep. I saw the same thing. I don’t train my 400m guys like Hart but I am ADAMANT about having them follow a very specific race distribution that is very similar to Harts. I’ve found that unless you make constant reminders that the tendency will always be for a 400m guy to think they will run faster by taking it out harder. In reality, the opposite is almost always true and the easiest 400m where the athlete finishes thinking they left something in the tank are often times the fastest.
ELITETRACK Founder
I think everyone else except Merritt underperformed in the final. Having followed the games pretty closely, there have been some exceptional “deaths” right after easy looking previous rounds. Maybe it’s just a question of retrospective confirmation bias? However, it seems that many athletes have complained about them getting lactic acid much quicker than normally- perhaps air pollution is playing a little trick on people more prone to being affected by such changes?
Heck, I’m surprised Wariner got silver with the time he ran.
Yeah. Kinda shocking that a 44.74 took second. If you would have asked me before the games began, I would have told you that that wouldn’t be in the top 5.
ELITETRACK Founder
Here’s a review of Wariner’s Final and Semifinal.
Edit: I changed the file from a Word Document to PDF.
I’ve watched the video 3x now. I think Wariner could have run at least 44.25 in that race but he gave up once Merritt passed him. The deceleration that Wariner had is completely different than what Bolt did. Bolt was coming from a higher velocity (more momentum = stay moving at the same state of motion easier) and from 78m-90m just took his foot off the pedal. Wariner on the other hand had less momentum and actually seemed to put his foot on the brakes.
ELITETRACK Founder
mike:
I am working on a spreadsheet of 2007-2008 Wariner v Merritt split data. Right now, I don’t know if he put the brakes on just yet. It seems like he just blew his fuses from trying to accelerate or rather slow his deceleration at about 35-36s into the race. He didn’t give up in the Olympic Trials, so I cannot see him giving up on a medal which about happened. I just think he depleted his CP stores in the turn and again from 35-36s to about 40s in the race that his body just hit the wall. I will post it once finished, right now it’s very insightful and provides some eye opening possibilities that I think will be a bit unexpected and I only have 4 races done.
I’m looking forward to seeing it. I think if we could somehow see his 10m splits over the last 40m though you’d see a marked dropoff that appears to match the point when he appears to realize there’s no catching LaShawn and not the smoother deceleration pattern you’d expect with fatigue.
ELITETRACK Founder
I am guessing on these but 350m at 37.9s and 390m at 43.0s
So this gets us
300m 31.8s
310m 33.0s
350m 37.9s
390m 43.0s
400m 44.7s
300-310m 1.2s (1.2s per 10m)
310-350m 4.9s (1.225s per 10m)
350-390m 5.1s (1.275s per 10m)
390-400m 1.7s (1.7s per 10m)
A definite slowing in last 50m.
preliminary split data and data from 2008 OT. Granted it’s not the most scientific data possible, but using relay exchange zones, 200m start, 100m start you have standard points of reference to work from assuming the on screen clock is correct. On older videos this is not the case, but on newer videos it is.
Here’s a couple of things the early data indicates
Wariner cannot beat Merritt running from behind.
Wariner cannot beat Merritt running from a slower start.
Merritt has a greater upside to his 400m potential than Wariner.
Wariner needs to come through 300m in 31.4-31.7s in order to beat Merritt.
Merritt has become better at running through 200m over the last 2 seasons. If Merritt is splitting 300m in 31.7-31.9s he will compete with or beat Wariner on Wariner’s best days. If he’s splitting 32.0-32.2s @ 300m he will be competitive with Wariner when both are on and beat Wariner if they are even.
Wariner’s only saving grace right now is he can split 300m faster than Merritt and still finish off a race.
Merritt has become more consistent through 200m and running through 300m really well, while Wariner has become more inconsistent through 200m and 300m when it used be his strength.
If Wariner wants to beat Merritt he has to get his consistency back.
Great post!
It shows why Merritt always wanted the inside. If JW had been consistent, it wouldn’t have mattered but it was obvious that Merritt dictated the race when in this position.
Chad:
Thanks, I plan to do a bit more with it. In fact, if people want to help with getting more splits and doing some double checking it would be greatly appreciated. I will be using google docs if you are ok with it. I will be posting it on my website (Sprenten.com) and on the elitetrack forum.
Regards,
Dan
Wariner comes back with the win today AND Merritt was on the inside! Kudos to JW! Not many battles like this one going on where either can win on any day!
I believe Wariner now has the 2 fastest 400m times of the year. I bet he’d trade those in a heart beat for what Merritt has though.
ELITETRACK Founder
Using the IAAF’s Manual, I found a couple of other places to take splits for Wariner early in the race. From the start to the 4×4 start is almost 23m, 22.89ish. Also lane 7 passes the 1500m start line is just shy of the 2nd 400m Hurdle mark about 2m and the 3000m steeplechase is just before the 4th 400m Hurdle mark (150m).
From this very unscientific data.
23m-3.3s
78m-8.5s
150m-15.9s
200m-20.7s
300m-31.8s
310m-33.0s
2nd Ord Poly: 43.47s 400m.
Using the IAAF’s Manual, I found a couple of other places to take splits for Wariner early in the race. From the start to the 4×4 start is almost 23m, 22.89ish. Also lane 7 passes the 1500m start line is just shy of the 2nd 400m Hurdle mark about 2m and the 3000m steeplechase is just before the 4th 400m Hurdle mark (150m).
From this very unscientific data.
23m-3.3s
78m-8.5s
150m-15.9s
200m-20.7s
300m-31.8s
310m-33.0s2nd Ord Poly: 43.47s 400m.
I don’t think that works for the 400m other than to indicate PACE, especially since you don’t have any data points in the area of the race that most impact performance (the last 100m).
ELITETRACK Founder
Mike:
You are correct, if he carried his pace of 1.2s for 10m from 300-310 his time is 43.8s a time which still loses to Merritt. He ends up averaging a bit above .1s per 10m slower over last 90m.
As a point of comparison, here are the IAAF splits for Wariner from 2007 World Champs:
10.75, 10.17 [20.92], 10.66 [31.58], 11.87 (20.92/22.53)
ELITETRACK Founder
