This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (December 2009)

Arthur Leslie Lydiard, ONZ, OBE, (6 July 1917 – 11 December 2004) was a New Zealand runner and athletics coach. He has been lauded as one of the outstanding athletics coaches of all time and is credited with popularizing the sport of running and making it commonplace across the sporting world. His training methods are based on a strong endurance base and periodisation.

Lydiard competed in the Men's Marathon at the 1950 British Empire Games in Auckland, coming thirteenth with a time of 2h:54m:51.6s.

Lydiard presided over New Zealand's golden era in world track and field during the 1960s sending Murray Halberg, Peter Snell and Barry Magee to the podium at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome. Under Lydiard's tutelage Snell went on to double-gold at the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. Athletes subsequently coached by him or influenced by his coaching methods included such luminaries as Rod Dixon, John Walker, Dick Quax and Dick Tayler.

He was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1962 and in 1990 was made an Additional Member of the Order of New Zealand. He also became a life member of Athletics New Zealand in 2003.

Arthur Lydiard died 11 December 2004 of a suspected heart attack, in Texas, while on a lecture tour.

Time in Finland[link]

While the work he did in the late 1960s in Finland is generally acknowledged to have led to the renaissance in Finnish distance running in the 1970s (with Pekka Vasala winning gold in the 1500 metres at the 1972 Munich Olympics and Lasse Virén winning gold in both the 5000 metres and 10,000 metres at the 1972 Olympics and the 1976 Montreal Olympics), his coaching experiences in Mexico and Venezuela were less successful. Lydiard was forced to leave both countries because of what he perceived as a lack of support for his coaching efforts and the needs of athletes there.

In total, Arthur Lydiard's stay in Finland, following the Finnish Track & Field Association invitation, lasted only 19 months, but had long-lasting effects.

Before his arrival, interval training had been, unsuccessfully, the cornerstone of the Finnish training during the 1960s. Due to this background and the Finns' reluctance to change, his stay initially created mixed reviews.

However, most importantly, the new training methods were picked up by the trainers of Pekka Vasala, and Lasse Virén's coach Rolf Haikkola. Lydiard's advice is often seen as complementary to those given at the time by Percy Cerutty, an Australian coach, Paavo Nurmi, the Flying Finn, and Mihály Iglói, a Hungarian coach.

The first signs of positive results from Lydiard's visit came when Olavi Suomalainen won the 1972 Boston Marathon.

He was awarded Finland's White Cross for his efforts.

Training philosophy[link]

Lydiard's ground-breaking impact on distance running was recognised by Runner's World, which hailed him as All time best running coach.

Lydiard constantly clashed with unimaginative and officious athletics administrators in his native New Zealand and in the countries that called upon his strong personality and coaching expertise to establish national athletics programmes.

The marathon-conditioning phase of Lydiard's system is known as base training, as it creates the foundation for all subsequent training. Lydiard's emphasis on an endurance base for his athletes, combined with his introduction of periodisation in the training of distance runners, were the decisive elements in the world-beating success of the athletes he coached or influenced.

Periodisation comprises emphasising different aspects of training in successive phases as an athlete approaches an intended target race. After the base training phase, Lydiard advocated 4 weeks of strength work. This included hill running and springing, followed by a maximum of 4 weeks of anaerobic training (Lydiard found through physiological testing that 4 weeks was the maximum amount of anaerobic development needed—any more caused negative effects such a decrease in aerobic enzymes and increased mental stress, often referred to as burnout, due to lowered blood pH). Then followed a co-ordination phase of 6 weeks in which anaerobic work and volume taper off and the athlete races each week, learning from each race to fine-tune himself or herself for the target race. For Lydiard's greatest athletes the target race was invariably an Olympic final.

Lydiard was renowned for his uncanny knack of ensuring that his athletes peaked for their most important races and, apart from his tremendous charisma and extraordinary ability to inspire and motivate athletes, this was largely a product of the periodisation principle he introduced into running training.

In the base training phase of his system Lydiard insisted, dogmatically, that his athletes—not least 800 metres athlete Peter Snell—must train 100 miles (160 km) a week. He was completely inflexible on this requirement. In the 1950s and 1960s, during the base phase of their training the athletes under Lydiard's tutelage would run a 35 km Sunday training route, from his famed 5 Wainwright Avenue address in West Auckland, through steep and winding roads in the Waitakere mountain ranges. The total cumulative ascent in the Waitakeres was over 500 metres. After laying such an arduous endurance base Lydiard's athletes—including Murray Halberg, Peter Snell, Barry Magee and John Davies—were ready to challenge the world, winning six Olympic medals amongst them in the 1960 Rome Olympics and the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. Snell who, after retiring from athletics in the mid-1960s went on to obtain a PhD in exercise physiology, stated in his autobiography No Bugles No Drums that the marathon-conditioning endurance aspect of Lydiard's training was the primary factor in his success as a world-beating middle distance athlete.

The Lydiard system has been challenged since it was formalised and crystallised in the early 1960s. The two main sources of criticism of Lydiard emanate from the English coach, Frank Horwill, and the US coach, Jack Daniels. Horwill's Five Tier Training system departs from Lydiard in its claim that the maximum amount of weekly mileage that an athlete requires to achieve maximum aerobic efficiency is 110 km.

Horwill takes the view that Lydiard's insistence on 160 km a week in the base phase is at best superfluous, at worst an unnecessary cause of injuries and staleness. Horwell also differs from Lydiard in that he believes that all aspects of training must be present in a training programme at any time of the year and periodisation is a matter of simply emphasising one aspect of training such as speed or strength during a particular phase in which all the other training components are present.

Daniels, on the other hand, emphasises the need to train at what he terms threshold pace in order to achieve optimum athletic performance. He believes that the Lydiard system ignores training at such intermediate paces between the extremes of long, slow, distance running and fast, anaerobic, track work. However, Lydiard never advocated long slow distance and, in fact, had his runners work at maximum aerobic steady state during base training, which is threshold pace.

Although both these approaches represent modifications of the Lydiard system they are by no means a complete refutation of the system because they share with Lydiard an emphasis on endurance work as the point of departure in conditioning distance runners and Horwill's and Daniels' programmes follow the same periodisation sequence as Lydiard's. These post-Lydiard training systems are unavoidably indebted to Lydiard's coaching philosophy as much as they may attempt to distance themselves from Lydiard's powerful and pervasive influence on the training of distance athletes.

Legacy[link]

Nearly every successful athletics coach or athlete active in the world today consciously or unconsciously emulates Lydiard's training system by laying an endurance base and making use of periodisation for peak performance. While the direct influence Lydiard exerted on the East African athletes is a matter for debate, what is indisputable is that the Kenyan and Ethiopians athletes do significant amounts of endurance work and make use of periodisation.

Efforts have been made across the world to preserve and promote the training and coaching legacy left by Lydiard. In his native New Zealand, the Legend marathon, which follows the famous training route followed by Lydiard's greatest athletes over the Waitekere Mountains west of Auckland, was established in his memory by Zimbabwean-born Ian Winson. In the United States, where Lydiard's ideas gained most currency worldwide, the Lydiard Foundation was established by two Lydiard disciples, Nobby Hashizume and New Zealand 1992 Olympic women's marathon bronze medalist Lorraine Moller, to promote Lydiard's training philosophy. In Johannesburg, South Africa, the only athletics club in the world to be named after a coach, the Lydiard Athletics Club, was founded in 2009 to promote Lydiard's training methodology and promote running as a way of life amongst the youth.

As recently as 2009, Lydiard's training methods were also credited as the catalyst for the qualification of an unprecedented three South African male athletes, Juan Van Deventer, Pieter Van Der Westhuizen and Johan Cronje, for the 1500 metres for the 2009 Track and Field Championships in Berlin.^[1]

Jogging[link]

Lydiard was a strong promoter of running for health, encouraging easy distance running for its cardiovascular health benefits at a time when people thought distance running was unhealthy and potentially dangerous. In 1961, with his group of followers, Lydiard organised the Auckland Jogging Club, a world first. During Bill Bowerman's New Zealand visit with his world class 4 x 1 mile team, Lydiard organised Bowerman to go on a jog with one of his members, three time heart attack-recovered Andy Stedman. Bowerman in his fifties struggled to keep up with a man twenty years his senior, and following his return to America took jogging to Hayward Field and eventually the masses.^[2]

Books[link]

• Lydiard, Arthur; Gilmour, Garth (1962). Run to the Top. London: H. Jenkins. 
• Lydiard, Arthur; Gilmour, Garth (1978). Run, the Lydiard Way. Auckland: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd. ISBN 0-340-22462-2. 
• Lydiard, Arthur; Gilmour, Garth (1983). Jogging with Lydiard. Auckland: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd. ISBN 0-340-32363-9. 
• Lydiard, Arthur; Gilmour, Garth (1997). Running to the Top (2nd Edition ed.). Germany: Meyer & Meyer Sport. ISBN 3-89124-440-1. 
• Lydiard, Arthur; Gilmour, Garth (1999). Distance Training for Young Athletes. Germany: Meyer & Meyer Sport. ISBN 3-89124-533-5. 
• Lydiard, Arthur; Gilmour, Garth (1999). Distance Training for Women Athletes. Oxford: Meyer & Meyer Sport. ISBN 1-84126-002-9. 
• Lydiard, Arthur; Gilmour, Garth (2000). Distance Training for Masters. Oxford: Meyer & Meyer Sport. ISBN 1-84126-018-5. 
• Lydiard, Arthur; Gilmour, Garth (2000). Running With Lydiard (2nd Edition ed.). Meyer & Meyer Sport. ISBN 1-84126-026-6. 

References[link]

External links[link]

• Profile at the New Zealand Olympic Committee website
• Old Official Site
• Lydiard Foundation (non-profit)
• Lydiard Foundation book on training
• Obituary at the NZ Herald
• Profile at NZEdge.com
• Athletics.org.nz hall of fame
• Lydiard links
• Lydiard Athletics Club (South Africa)
• Arthur Lydiard biography from the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography

Ben Jipcho

Personal information
Born	March 1, 1943
Medal record Men's Athletics Competitor for  Kenya Olympic Games Silver 1972 Munich 3000 m steeple Commonwealth Games Gold 1974 Christchurch 5000 m Gold 1974 Christchurch 3000 m steeple Bronze 1974 Christchurch 1500 m All-Africa Games Gold 1973 Lagos 5000 m Gold 1973 Lagos 3000 m steeple

Ben Jipcho (born March 1, 1943) is a former athlete from Kenya, who won the silver medal in the 3000 meters steeplechase at the 1972 Summer Olympics, behind his teammate Kipchoge Keino.^[1]

Jipcho won the 5000 meters race in the 1973 All-Africa Games. He also won the gold medal in the 5000 m and 3000 m steeplechase, and the bronze medal in the 1500 meters at the 1974 Commonwealth Games in Christchurch, New Zealand.

Jipcho may be as well known for his role in Keino's victory over Jim Ryun in the high altitude 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City as for his own athletic accomplishments. Sacrificing his own chances for a medal to team tactics, he pulled Keino through a 56 second first 400 meters, before being passed by his teammate with 800 meters to go and drifting back into the pack. By that point, Keino had established a lead of 20 meters or more, which Ryun's famous finishing speed could not erase.^[2] Jipcho later apologized to Ryun for acting as Keino's rabbit.

He was later quoted:

"Running for money doesn't make you run fast. It makes you run first." ^[3]

His granddaughter Esther Chemutai is also a runner,^[4] while he is a distant uncle to the siblings Linet Masai and Moses Masai.^[5]

References[link]

• IAAF profile for Ben Jipcho

Records
Preceded by Anders Gärderud	Men's Steeplechase World Record Holder January 15, 1973 – June 25, 1975	Succeeded by Anders Gärderud
Awards
Preceded by Lasse Virén	Track & Field Athlete of the Year 1973	Succeeded by Rick Wohlhuter
Sporting positions
Preceded by Emiel Puttemans	Men's 5,000 m Best Year Performance 1974	Succeeded by Emiel Puttemans
Preceded by Anders Gärderud	Men's 3,000 m Steeple Best Year Performance 1973	Succeeded by Anders Gärderud

This Kenyan biographical article relating to athletics is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

This article about an African Olympic medalist is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Sir Peter Snell

Personal information
Birth name	Peter George Snell
Nationality	New Zealand
Born	(1938-12-17) 17 December 1938 (age 73) Opunake, Taranaki
Residence	Texas, United States
Sport
Coached by	Arthur Lydiard
Achievements and titles
Personal best(s)	800 m: 1:44.3 (1962, NR)
Medal record Competitor for  New Zealand Men’s athletics Olympic Games Gold 1960 Rome 800 metres Gold 1964 Tokyo 800 metres Gold 1964 Tokyo 1500 metres Commonwealth Games Gold 1962 Perth 880 yards Gold 1962 Perth 1 mile

Sir Peter George Snell, KNZM, MBE (born 17 December 1938 in Opunake) is a former New Zealand athlete, now resident in Texas, United States. He had one of the shortest careers of world famous international sportsmen, yet achieved so much that he was voted New Zealand’s "Sports Champion of the (20th) Century". A protege of the great New Zealand athletics coach Arthur Lydiard, Snell is known for the three Olympic and two Commonwealth gold medals he won.

Early athletic career[link]

Snell's family moved to Waikato in 1949 where he attended Te Aroha College, where he became an all-around sportsman. He won several middle-distance running events in his hometown of Te Aroha, although some members of his new school lived in Ngaruawahia. He attended Mount Albert Grammar School in Auckland, where he took up a wide range of team and individual sports, including rugby union, cricket, tennis, badminton, and golf.

As a teenager, Snell excelled in tennis, and pursued the sport through appearances at the Auckland and New Zealand Junior Tennis Championships.

At age 19, Snell was motivated to concentrate seriously on running by the comments of his future coach, Arthur Lydiard, who told him, "Peter, with the sort of speed you've got, if you do the endurance training, you could be one of our best middle-distance runners."^[1] During his early career under the tutelage of Lydiard, he started with New Zealand titles and records for 880 yards and the mile and, being an unusually large (by track standards) and powerful man, hinted of great things to come.

Olympic success[link]

He came to international attention when he won the gold medal and set a new national record for 800 m at the Rome Olympics in 1960. He was particularly dominant four years later at the Tokyo Olympics where he won the gold and set a new Olympic record in the 800 metres, and won gold in the 1500 metres. The 800–1500 metres double was not achieved again by a male athlete in open global championship until Rashid Ramzi of Bahrain won both golds at the 2005 World Championships in Athletics at Helsinki. (After the 2008 Olympic Games Ramzi was stripped of his Olympic gold medal for doping, but that penalty was not applied retroactively to his World Championship gold medals).

World records[link]

In January 1962 Snell broke the world mile record before a huge crowd at Cook’s Gardens in Wanganui, and one week later set new world records for both the 800 m and 880 yd at Christchurch. He then won gold and set a new record for 880 yd at the Commonwealth Games in Perth in 1962, and won gold for the mile at those same games. Later that year he was created a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE).

In all, Snell set five individual world records and joined with fellow New Zealand athletes to set a new four by one mile relay record as well. He was at the peak of his career in 1965 and promising much more, when he stunned New Zealand and the athletics world by announcing his retirement to move on to other things.

Snell's former world records of 1 minute 44.3 seconds for 800 m, set on 3 February 1962, and 2 minutes 16.6 seconds for 1000 m set on 12 November 1964, remain the New Zealand national records for these distances. His 800 m record remains the fastest ever run over that distance on a grass track, and is also the oldest national record recognized by the IAAF for a standard track and field event. The 800 m record also remains the official "Oceana" continental area record.^[2]

New opportunities[link]

Snell worked for a tobacco company before moving to the United States of America in 1971 to further his education. He gained a B.S. in Human Performance from the University of California, Davis, and then a Ph.D. in Exercise Physiology from Washington State University. He joined University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas as a research fellow in 1981. He is Associate Professor, Department of Internal Medicine and also Director of their Human Performance Center. A member of the American College of Sports Medicine, Snell was honoured in 1999 as an Inaugural Inductee, International Scholar, into the Athlete Hall of Fame, University of Rhode Island.

Adopting a new sport, Snell become an active orienteer and won his category, men aged 65 and older, in the 2003 United States Orienteering Championship.^[3] He is a past president of the North Texas Orienteering Association and a member of the United States Orienteering Federation.

Commemorations and awards[link]

Peter Snell was one of five Olympic athletes from New Zealand featured on a series of commemorative postage stamps issued in August 2004 to commemorate the 2004 Olympic Games. The two dollar stamp issued by New Zealand Post features a stylized photo of Peter Snell snapping the tape at the finish line of the 800 metres race at the 1960 Olympics in Rome.^[4]

In 2007 he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate (DSc) from Massey University in recognition of his work as an Exercise Physiologist. On 14 August 2009, he took part in a ceremony in Wellington that changed the honours received during the previous government to a traditional knighthood.

A larger than life-size bronze statue of Peter Snell was erected in his hometown of Opunake, Taranaki, and was unveiled on 19 May 2007. The statue is based on a photo of Snell crossing the finish line in the historic race at Wanganui's Cook's Gardens in 1962.^[5] A similar bronze statue of Snell was unveiled in Cook's Gardens on 15 August 2009 to commemorate his athletic achievements.^[6]

Interviewed by the Wanganui Chronicle after the unveiling, Snell said he was internationally known as a miler, but he had never reached his potential over the mile and the 800 metres was probably his best distance.^[7] He said his greatest effort was the world 800m/880yard double record set on Lancaster Park a few days after his new mile record, with an 800m time that would have won the gold medal 46 years later at the Beijing Olympics.

In 2001, Macleans College in Auckland created the Peter Snell House as part of its "Whanau House" system.^[8]

Personal bests[link]

• *En route to mile

External links[link]

• Page with Photo, one of two at Sporting Heroes
• Peter Snell - Athlete - A documentary made in 1964 available to view on NZ On Screen
• Peter Snell at NZOC website

Records
Preceded by Roger Moens	Men's 800 metres World Record Holder equalled by Ralph Doubell and Dave Wottle 1962-02-02 – 1973-06-27	Succeeded by Marcello Fiasconaro
Preceded by Herb Elliott	Men's Mile World Record Holder January 27, 1962 – June 9, 1965	Succeeded by Michel Jazy
Awards and achievements
Preceded by Ralph Boston	Track & Field Athlete of the Year 1962	Succeeded by Yang Chuan-Kwang
Preceded by Yang Chuan-Kwang	Track & Field Athlete of the Year 1964	Succeeded by Ron Clarke

References[link]

Cited References

General References