SPORTING MORTALITY
Running, particularly long distance running is one of those unforgiving sports. Unlike, say, tennis and golf, or soccer and other team sports - where sleight of hand or foot can disguise failing power or pace - running is a sport which cannot be faked. There is nowhere to hide.
If you’re not fit, you fail. And even if you are fit, once you start to go downhill it feels, well, it feels like uphill. You can choose your races judiciously, but as you get slower, you cannot fool yourself, for even if the pursuers do not yet overtake, Old Father Time, with his trusty stopwatch is there to remind you.
And ambition can be a cruel master. When Paul Tergat broke the marathon world record, with 2.04.55, in Berlin 2003, it took a while to figure out why he was not elated. It was because pacemaker and pal, Sammy Korir had finished a stride behind him. Tergat wasn’t the only man under 2.05, he hadn’t won by a street, indeed, he had had to work to win by just one second.
Four years later, in 2007, Haile Gebrselassie, the man who had made Tergat’s track career look second-best took the Kenyan’s marathon world record too. On that same Berlin course, he ran close to half a minute faster, with 2.04.26. The following year, again in Berlin, the Ethiopian slashed close to another half minute off the record, with 2.03.59, becoming the only man under 2.04. In the interim, Geb ran 2.04.53 in Dubai 2008. A year later, he won Dubai again, in 2.05.29. He won in Berlin 2009, for the fourth time, in 2.06.08. And now he has won Dubai for a third time, in 2.06.09.
There were good reasons - heat, rain, a back injury - why Haile’s last three marathons were, on average close to two minutes slower than his world record. But there are equally good reasons for thinking that this last record attempt may be a sign of decline. And the first reason was his own demeanour, when your scribe tracked him down several hours after the race in Dubai last Friday.
The smile of greeting was just as broad, and he didn’t look like a man who had thrashed himself around 42.2k, managing to stay ahead of two colleagues, who had caught him after 30k; and who ended up just half a minute behind, his closest pursuers in recent years. But when he was asked for an assessment, the smile was not so broad. It is tempting to say it was tempered by doubt.
He agreed that Chala Dechase (in only his second marathon) had made up ground on him far too quickly. Chala was almost sprinting when he caught Geb approaching 34k. He also maintained that the back injury, provoked by an awkward sleeping position could have forced him out of the race. “I might have dropped out, especially at 30k, I was lucky it was warm here. When the pacemaker left at 30k (32k, actually), I tried to push, but I had no reply. He’s a young boy (Chala), if he’d been more experienced, he would have caught gradually. That was wrong what he did, it was too fast, he should have waited”.
Coincidentally, too fast (at the start) is how Professor Helmut Winter of Humboldt University, Germany characterises Haile’s recent races. Marathon expert Winter, who produced the two fascinating graphs here was in Dubai to see Geb’s latest world record attempt, and says of the second graph, “assume the broken line represents the split needed to run even pace….. The conclusion would be: the 2008WR is a fine race, but for all the other races (Dubai, Berlin2009) this guy (Geb) overpowered himself in the beginning and was lacking substantial reserves in the end. The typical mistake of a BEGINNER!”
(For a breakdown of Geb’s 5k splits, look at the equally interesting piece on The Science of Sport website, www.sportsscientists.com)
Gebrselassie has been written off before, like when he finished third in the world 10,000 metres in Edmonton 2001, his first loss in a 25-lapper in eight years. Or like when he didn’t win the London Marathon in his debut in 2002, or in his two further attempts in London, even dropping out in the latter one. But he came back from Edmonton, and from the London false-start, to set further world records, including eventually the marathon.
But he will be 37 in April. OK, you might say, Carlos Lopes won the Olympic marathon at 37. And Constantina Dita did the same trick at 38. But no one has shown such consistent excellence over such a lengthy period as Gebrselassie, beginning with the world junior 5000/10000 double in 1992, and racking up 27 world records and bests in the 15 years between running 5000m in 12.56.96 in June 1994 in Holland, and the 30k in 1.27.49 that he set during the Berlin Marathon 2009.
He is still adamant he wants to run the Olympic marathon in London 2012, despite his business interests accelerating, eg a new foreign vehicle franchise for Ethiopia, a new hotel complex opening in south Ethiopia in April - friend and former World Cup marathon champion Richard Nerurkar says, “I don’t know how he fits it all in, and trains twice a day”.
Geb’s next race is a half-marathon in New York in March, but he says he has no plans for his next marathon, apart from saying it will probably be in Europe. “I’ve no idea right now. Sometime after September. The Berlin course I like very much. But the big aim is to save my power ‘til London 2012. Until then, two marathons a year, or less. And keep my speed with 10k’s and half-marathons…. As long as I keep my shape”.
He may be suffering the first pangs of sporting mortality, rather later than most of us. But he has already long sewn up the more crucial role - sporting immortality.
January 26th, 2010 at 11:57 am
Lopez and Dita were world best at 37/38, an age Haile is approaching. But are there any other athletics track disciplines, or in swimming or tennis -where competitors that much over 30 can rank in the world top three? I would say that distance runners are among the more fortunate sportspeople (in the ‘vigorous’ sports), in terms of being able maintain extremely high performance levels for such a long time.
January 27th, 2010 at 12:17 pm
I don’t think that Professor Helmut Winter’s comments are confirmed by the graphs he produced. He says “assume the broken line represents the split needed to run even pace….. The conclusion would be: the 2008WR is a fine race, but for all the other races (Dubai, Berlin2009) this guy (Geb) overpowered himself in the beginning and was lacking substantial reserves in the end. The typical mistake of a BEGINNER!”
However looking at the second graph in particular, the 2010 Dubai race started off slower than the others and just stayed slower except for an attempt at about 20K to 30K to get back on WR schedule; while Geb’s 2009 Berlin attempt started off at a similar pace as his world record effort of 2008 Berlin, it got faster only after about 15K - not in the beginning as Helmut Winter seems to maintain - and it then stayed above WR schedule until about 34K before slowing dramatically from there on.
The conclusion I draw is that Geb ran too fast in the middle part of the Berlin 2009 and just started of too slow in Dubai 2010, not that he ran too fast at the beginning of these races. However for Dubai 2008 the Professor is correct; he just started off way too fast.
January 27th, 2010 at 4:09 pm
In terms of his business interests, Mr. Gebrselassie probably has a lot of people who are fiercely loyal to him and work hard for him, which allows him the freedom to train hard and not micro-manage.
In terms of his running, we need to remind ourselves that here’s a guy who ran 1:27:49 for 30km just 4 months ago, and 2:03:59 just 16 months ago.
He’s not done. Not by a long shot.
Jason Mayeroff
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January 29th, 2010 at 5:37 am
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January 29th, 2010 at 6:39 am
By going for world records every time he attempts a marathon, I feel that Gebreselassie self-imposes a lot of unnecessary pressure. The media hype does the rest. These days he seems to be obsessed with records (and big dollar bonuses) instead of trying to beat his major rivals.
Much as I admire Haile, I can’t help feeling that he and his management have been ducking Sammy Wanjiru. In the months leading up to the Beijing Games, there were stories circulating in the western media that pollution would be a major factor in the Chinese capital, and that marathon runners and walkers would suffer the most.
The scare stories about pollution turned out to be a total CROCK. Wanjiru lopped 3 minutes off the Olympic record as he won in 2:06:32, and Jaoud Gharib ran 2:07:16 behind him - also under the Games record set by Carlos Lopes at LA in 1984.
Geb and his team of advisers bought into the alarm stories before the Games, and he confined himself to the 10,000m, finishing a very creditable 6th. He said later that he wished he had run the marathon. Pity that. It would have been one hell of a race, because as we all know, Geb took his world marathon record down to 2:03:59 in Berlin a month later in a ‘race’ where he was carefully paced for over 30km of the distance.
Back in April 2009 Wanjiru won the London event in a course record time of 2:05:10. As you state, London is one venue where Geb has never enjoyed much success over 42.2km; and he did not race there last year- because he knew the Olympic Champion was racing, perhaps?
Since then, the Kenyan Olympic Champion has been frozen out of the annual Berlin event. Yes, I know, Pat, it’s all down to finances, and the Berlin budget cannot afford to pay both men…blah, blah, blah.
Geb sat out the 2009 Berlin world champs (where Abel Kirui won the marathon in 2:06:54 and Bekele retained the 10km track title) to save himself for yet another record attempt in Berlin - which fell short.
To me this is very much like the 1980’s when Seb Coe and Steve Ovett consistently avoided each other outside of major track events - presumably because Meet Management budgets could not afford them both in one race; and both wanted to be towed around to world record times without the added chore of having to RACE as well.
This scenario was very well covered by you in your excellent book on the great ‘Covett’ rivalry. In my view both men did an injustice both to themselves and to real track fans everywhere by only racing each other a grand total of seven times - and only twice in the UK if you count the 1972 English Schools Cross Country Championship race.
Gebreselassie now seems to me to be in the same rut - record chasing by time-trialling with pace-makers for large amounts of dollars and avoiding his main rival(s). You yourself have often derided paced races as being boring and predictable, and many (including me) tend to agree with you.
I admire Geb greatly for all he has done, but this aspect does sadden me. When will be ever see Gebreselassie and Wanjiru race each other over the marathon distance in a RACE that is about man-against-man rivalry and NOT about time?
I suspect that will never happen.
January 29th, 2010 at 1:54 pm
I totally agree with David, adding a detail which should tell even more about Sammy Wanjiru: during his recent marathons in London & Chicago, he ran pretty fast despite suffering a limited support from pace setters, who in both cases dropped off before the half marathon mark.
Gebre, conversely, has always been able to be supported at least until the 30 km mark, which greatly helped his feats.
I think it is clear to everyone that in a one-to-one competition Sammy would most likely beat Gebre, who would lose the aura of invincibility and almost instantly see a reduction in incomes from various sources. So better for him to pretend to pursue records avoiding competitive runs, for the few years left in his professional sporting career.
Gebre’s behaviour is not an unintended consequence of record chasing foolishness, it instead appears as a deliberate effort to preserve his myth.