1y ago

Olympic marathon runner Molly Seidel

106 comments

This feels very much like an /r/thathappened post
- As a running enthusiast whose varied from running 25 miles a week to having to restart from nothing, what the guy is talking about is extremely common. I've followed many different plans from many runners, sometimes their names are attached, sometimes not, and most of them I couldn't tell you what they look like. I will say Olympic runners are the most common. I've even come across hers. Nothing about this rings as implausible to someone remotely interested in the topic. I guess I could understand from a total outsider perspective, but from someone who looks into that topic often? Absolutely plausible. I see no reason not to believe them.
  Edit: the amount of stories Tony Hawk posts like this and never gets questioned also just makes me wonder a bit about why multiple people have already commented the way you did.
  
  Wouldn't a guy analyze a guy's training instead of a women's? I don't run but I'd imagine that training would be at least a little different for women than it is for men.
  
  Pretty sure the Tony Hawk thing is like a running joke, I’m not sure how many of those are legit at this point. I still laugh at them all.
  
  I've never come across anyone that just pulls out a training schedule when I say "I run".
  Usually there's some follow up questions about goals, training, whatever.
  But just straight up grabbing your phone and pulling out a training schedule? THAT'S the implausible part, not that he was using her training schedule.
- This feels very much like a /r/nothingeverhappens comment.
  
  Inside you there are two wolves.
  
  I mean, just consider how astronomically improbable the entire situation is for a second instead of falling for rage bait.
  
  Please don’t make meta reference comments a thing here, I beg you
- also, r/imverysmart
- That's because it is. We're supposed to expect that a random person had compiled detailed running stats on a person he just happened to sit next to on a plane.
  This is just a story to manufacture outrage, like most of social media.
  
  Where's the outrage? This is a funny story in the same vein as Tony Hawk's various "You look like Tony Hawk" moments. Its like everyone in this thread saw its a woman and assumed she's complaining instead of telling a fun story.
  Edit as I realize half the comments trying to call this rage bait are literally just you instigating lol. Touch grass.
  
  I’m not sure why you assume the person was random. There’s no indication that she hops on planes randomly. Professional runners do a lot of traveling to and from events, and it makes sense that other people connected to the sport (and likely to have detailed running stats on runners) might also be on those same flights.
  
  It depends on the analysis. I've done plans and there are tools that just print out the analysis of how well you improved in different areas. It could have been an analysis of trying the plan. Once you're into long distance, you may try different plans to get past a plateau. I don't see how you could analyze the plan itself, so I just assumed it was an analysis of implementing the plan. Cause that's common.

Why not tell him? Who wouldn't love that?
- Someone who makes assumptions about women and confidently tells them how they should be doing the things they are already doing.
  
  Just sounds to me like he's passionate about something. I guess he could be an ass, but to jump to that conclusion from just "you should train high milage" and then providing analysis is really a bit much.
- Any person unsure about their safety sitting next to a stranger with no options for escape. I wouldn't feel particularly comfortable in such a situation.
  UPDATE: I don't understand the downvotes. I have read many comments saying similar things in response to the story: give this man the benefit of the doubt, not every behavior is mansplaining, you're all judgmental and jumping to harsh conclusions, and so on.
  I used to be in that chorus until my wife explained to me one thing: when the cost of failure is high enough, constant vigilance and suspicion is necessary for protection and maybe even survival. And I could either accept that or not.
  It felt grim and I felt disappointed by the whole conundrum, but I had to accept it as it is. From there, my view of these kinds of situations changed.
- Because it isn't true. It's pretty much statistically impossible.
  
  Statistically improbable

I find this hard to believe...if the guy's doing analysis, he'd surely know who she was. He'd be a big enough "fan" of running to even start doing analysis. Man, the internet is just full of BS.
Anyway, I'll pretend this was real and it's kinda funny.
- Absolutely not. I've followed plans and couldn't tell you what the person looks like. It's usually not about knowing a lot about the person but the popularity of the plan. And I've come across hers so at least in my opinion, it's a common one. I find this no different than the countless stories Tony Hawk says that border the same concept. He just gets believed a lot more easily for whatever reason.
- Idk, I’d believe it. I’ve been involved in a few sports to the point that I’m doing deep diving into elites trainings out of curiousity. For some athletes, the only picture I would see is a small thumbnail profile pic that was basically indecipherable, or they would be in athletic gear with hats and such. I definitely wouldn’t recognize them on the street, and it would be a crap shoot if I’d recognize them on an airplane. The only ones that I’d have a shot at are Alex Honnold, Tommy Caldwell and Andrew Skurka.
- I'm pretty sure the venn diagram of people who give unsolicited workout advice and people who don't pay attention to the by line is just a circle.

The expression should be “I had too much heart to tell him.” A person lacking heart would have told them, gleefully.
- No, "didn't have the heart" doesn't mean you don't have heart, just means you have a different kind of heart, so it works fine.
  
  I had too many hearts to tell him. My blood pressure is through the roof.
  
  Ahh I see.. It should be DON'T don't have a heart.
  Thanks for clearing that up!
- A person lacking heart would have told them, gleefully.
  TIL I'm lacking heart.

This happens a lot in the firearms community. I get told about x, y, z guns and how they function. But I have all those guns and have trained on the less accessible. I own full auto legally but every other day I'm told I can't own one. People be dumb.

I am really having trouble believing it went down like that. Analyzing one specific runners routine is more like stalking than anything. Especially given that there is a wealth of material on high mileage plans (Pfiitzinger anyone?).
- ...Being inspired by a professional's methods is not stalker behavior. If he was a stalker, you'd think he'd know what the runner looked like, yeah?

106 comments