> Other than Juanto there hasn't been anyone who has had a shot at making an
Olympic or World Championship
> final in both the 400 and 800 in the last 30 years.
Mark Everett certainly had the potential based on his times. Jearl
Miles-Clark and Anna Quirot certainly did. How many times did Kipketer run
an elite open 400m during his peak 2 years? How many times have the other
800 contenders run elite open 400's?
I do agree that the gap between the 400m and the 800m is bigger than that
between the 800m and the 1500m and the physiological reasons for that are
pretty clear. But I suspect that the huge discrepancy we see at the elite
level also has to do with the way athletes are developed, the way they
train, and the fact that mentally the 800 seems a lot closer to the 1500m
than the 400m (at least in my experience).
As always, there's no one simple explanation,
- Ed Parrot
