don't be idiots. nobody cares what u did in high school or college. it's a great bet for huck because he's a great athlete and will be under 5 mins for sure. so he'll be close enough to 4:39 to take 33:1 on it. worst case scenario he loses $5k, which is not a lot of money for him, and he gets into great shape.

At Seed's age it is much easier to develop top level endurance than speed. His size does not help him in either, but he is a very good athlete, yet he has no shot here. None. The training/performance curve gets incredibly steep south of 5 minutes for a 40 year old man, and all the training now will not put back in what God left out.

If he said instead that he could cover 100 miles on foot in under 24 hours, I would definitely side with him on that wager.

I have a question for the people who say it is impossible. Are you saying its impossible for any 40 yr old, or just impossible for him? If its the latter what information do you have that makes you say that?

think about that for a min....

Yea guy was a real athlete and though he may look like hes stoned all time he is in good shape

I spent 6 years of my life running track, and I feel that this would def be doable, especially when given 33:1 on this bet. I might be biased in the fact that in high school and college I was surrounded with runners that could break 4:39 easily, but while it would require a good amount of training, for the odds he is getting it would definitely be worth it. This is completely based on his natural speed, but it sounds like he could break 60 pretty easily for the 400, so he would probably only need to run around 40 miles a week of quality work. 40 mpw would be equivalent to what a somewhat serious high school sophomore would run. On my high school team, we had probably 10 kids who could run under 4:40 off of maybe 30 miles per week, with a majority of that focused on shorter speed work. It sounds like his brother is quite talented, so I would assume that he would at least have some talent, so I would def not be surprised to see him run under 439 for the mile.

do you mean at age 40 or in general? if you mean in general obviously thats incorrect

this seems pretty wrong to me. my friend in high school ran 4:34 running maybe 40+ miles a week. i know its way way way harder at age 40, but that is because of a huge loss of speed. running 70 miles a week doesn't bring speed back

Leif actually has run a 4:18.41 as recently as Jan/08 at the UW Huskies Indoor Meet (He ran a 4:11.24 in the same event in Jan/04)

http://www.gohuskies.com/sports/c-tr...rpreview3.html

However, Leif is years younger than Huck and seems to have been running competitively since high school.

Based on the posts of who people have run at high levels in this thread I don't like Huck's side of the bet. But, I would really like to see Huck win this though because I think he is one of the good guys in poker. With his recent win in the HU championship and FTing the 50K HORSE plus quitting drinking it would cap a great year for Huck.

Wrong.

Running guru George Sheehan...
Was a ** completely sedentary doctor **...
For 20 years between college and age 44...
Then ran a 4:47 mile at age 50.

If Huck was once a competitive college athlete...
He can still do it if he avoids injury...
So it would be best if he took his time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_A._Sheehan

if anyone wants to book action on this and is reputable, I am looking for you to offer me odds where I get Huck's side.

pretty sure nothing about the fact this guy did it makes what he said wrong, if im reading that correctly...

x2.

A quick check of the 2008 Olympic results shows that not a single decathlete ran better than 4:26 for the 1500m, which would equate to about a 4:44 mile.

Give me a break. Yes, at 40 exactly, suddenly your heart goes stiff, and your pecker goes soft, and you lose your close vision, and you go bald, and you gain 80 pounds, and you shrink 3 inches, and you can no longer play 12 tables for 9 hours a day to make a living playing poker.

Except somehow none of that has happened to me personally. Go figure.

News flash: people are different.

Note that decathletes HATE HATE HATE the 1500m because the training and genetics for that event are contradictory to the training and genetics for all of the other 9 events in the competition.

Successful decathetes will always suck at the 1500m, relatively speaking. Those who suck the least have an advantage.

No kidding, that's why it was ridiculous for someone to say Huck was a top athlete in another sport, so 4:39 should be attainable.

Where did you get these numbers?

I hope he pulls it off but say he can run a 5minute mile, how could he cut 21 seconds off an already fast time?

IIRC he lost a prop bet with Howard on a 50 yard dash hopping for 50k

I'd take his side of the bet - given the odds. His brother having run a 4:13 means he's probably familiar with what it would take to do 4:39 and he should know himself whether or not he has a shot.

(also, rooting for the old guy - I'm over 40 and I'm pretty sure I could run a mile, with a little work, close to my best time of about 5:25)

He lost the bet with Howard but the race actually never happened. He saw Howard do a practice run and realized that he couldn't win and conceded.

I am a certified trainer who sees people accomplish seemingly impossible feats every day. I was also an elite track athlete, though not as a middle distance runner.

It is unlikely, but possible. Nowadays we know so much more about how to maximise training that if Huck gets a professional trainer that significantly improves his chances.

If he is not going to be drug tested this also improves his chances.

That would be my condition on the bet, no performance enhancing drugs of any kind.

!= <> =

So after a little research I have found plenty of examples of 40 year olds running 4:40 or better. This makes me think that people who are saying its impossible for Seed to do this have to be wrong. I have no idea whether 33-1 is realistic odds wise, but I'm guessing we can't know without better info.

Somewhere in between on both counts.

The line is pretty close to his feakiness.

Yep that's what I would do too.

You see the determination factor with Huck comes in to play and I am sure he'll put in the time and intensity