Galen Rupp's silver in men's 10,000 m perhaps the best pound for pound performance in this Olympics (medal, won)

[wutitiz]

Mens 10000 metres Final lap - Mo Farah-London 2012 - YouTube
It's hard to overstate the dominance of East Africans, mainly Kenyans and Ethiopians. Just glance at the list of winners of the Boston marathon. The last American to win it was Greg Meyer, 29 years ago. Since 1991, there was a lone victory by a South Korean in 2001, the other 20 winners were all either Kenyan or Ethiopian.
List of winners of the Boston Marathon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Former U of O Duck Galen Rupp won silver, finishing second only to his training partner Mo Farah, a Brit born in Somalia. Galen Rupp has thrived in training with Farah, which tends to confirm that it is primarily not genetics, but the fact that 'competition improves the breed' that explains East African dominance in distance running. The East Africans are all about group training and mutual competition.

Galen Rupp uncharacteristically did some big talking leading up to the Olympics, but unlike so many others, he backed it up with results. If you would have told me that a blond-haired kid from Portland, OR could win silver in the 10K, I would have thought it ludicrous.

Couple of quotes from Rupp:

Originally Posted by Galen Rupp

That's the one thing about distance running — you can't really take shortcuts

Running Times Magazine: Galen Rupp Feels Lucky

Originally Posted by Galen Rupp

Now it's all about putting together the 54-second last lap I'm going to need to make the medal platform. Finishing fifth or sixth isn't going to satisfy me. We're after something bigger."

[everwinter]

Originally Posted by wutitiz

Galen Rupp uncharacteristically did some big talking leading up to the Olympics, but unlike so many others, he backed it up with results. If you would have told me that a blond-haired kid from Portland, OR could win silver in the 10K, I would have thought it ludicrous.

Rupp's 10k race has been the highlight for me for this olympics! I disagree that he did some big talking leading up the Olympics. Like most distance runners, Rupp is humble. That is why distance running is my favorite part of the olympics.

[Acuda]

Go Ducks!!!

Good for Galen.

[slim04]

Rupp's performance would be great, except him and his team (Mo and the rest of the Nike sponsored Salazar crew) are rumored to use very expensive oxygen deprivation equipment, air tents, and thyroid medication (i.e. fake having a thyroid problem that usually only happens to 30 to 40 year old women so you can legally take the drugs that improve performance). That's all gray area stuff and they are pretty much despised by a lot of runners because of it. No runner wants to be forced to buy extremely expensive oxygen tents and be forced to sleep in one for months to compete. That is where they are taking the sport.

Meb and Lagat are the heroes of U.S. long distance.

Originally Posted by slim04

Rupp's performance would be great, except him and his team (Mo and the rest of the Nike sponsored Salazar crew) are rumored to use very expensive oxygen deprivation equipment, air tents, and thyroid medication (i.e. fake having a thyroid problem that usually only happens to 30 to 40 year old women so you can legally take the drugs that improve performance). That's all gray area stuff and they are pretty much despised by a lot of runners because of it. No runner wants to be forced to buy extremely expensive oxygen tents and be forced to sleep in one for months to compete. That is where they are taking the sport.

Meb and Lagat are the heroes of U.S. long distance.

Until facts are presented I would hold off on the speculation regarding 'drugs'. As far as 'oxygen' training goes - the east africans train at altitude - so what?

[Ghengis]

It could be argued that "pound for pound", the greatest performance in the modern olympics occured in 1920 by the Belgium dwarf Reggie Grundl who, because of the world-wide shortage of lead due to WWI, was used in place of the normal shot used in years past.