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Apr-3-2006
American Marathoner Sets Sights On Boston Marathon Victory
by Paul Gains
(c) Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved
The following story was written by Canadian Paul Gains for the IAAF News Service which has granted RRW permission to distribute the story. This is NOT an RRW copyrighted story --David Monti
American Marathoner Sets Sights On Boston Victory by Paul Gains
Marathoners must put all their eggs in one basket. Their training is geared to two maybe three races a year and if they don't get it right on the day or injuries occur they are metaphorically up a creek without a paddle.
Meb Keflezeghi believes he has got it right and, when he lines up for the 110th running of the prestigious Boston Marathon April 17th, he will be ready to do battle with a formidable field, which includes 2005 champion Hailu Negussie of Ethiopia, and the two previous champions Timothy Cherigat and Robert Cheruiyot, both Kenyans.
It's not as though Keflezeghi is a rookie. After all, the American citizen demonstrated incredible tactical aptitude in Athens two years ago to come through the field and claim the 2004 Olympic silver medal when nobody expected him to do so. But with a personal best time of "only" 2:09:53 from New York, about five minutes slower than Paul Tergat's world record, he is not on anyone's list of fastest performers.
The Eritrean born Keflezeghi is a tremendous competitor. Eventually he will focus on times, he says, and select a race where the course is conducive to fast times. Boston is not the place to run fast, given the challenging Heartbreak Hill, really a succession of hills. The course record is 2:07:15 set by another Kenyan, Cosmas Ndeti, in 1994. Boston is a place of honour.
And with a lengthy uninterrupted period of 100 miles plus weeks at high altitude Keflezeghi is ready.
"The plan in 2005 was to run a fast time in London and then come home this year and try to do well in Boston. I am looking forward to running Boston,"
he explains. "I got injured last year, my achilles flared up, and so I couldn't run London. But I definitely want to run a fast one and be competitive whether it's London, Chicago or Rotterdam or whatever. I definitely want to see myself run a fast one. There are lot of people who want to see me run on a fast course."
"I will take a win in Boston. A lot of people have tried to win it. It depends where you are. When I ran Chicago in 2003 my only goal was to run the world championships standard (under 2:12). I didn't go with the leaders, I wasn't competitive, and I let them go. I ran 2:09:53 in New York just ten weeks after the Athens' Olympics. And last year I ran 2:09:56. Those are pretty good times for New York but you can imagine also what I could do on a fast course. If I can work out details for Chicago, this fall maybe, definitely I have interest to run fast."
Of course winning an Olympic medal, the first in the event by an American since Frank Shorter's 1976 silver, has not hurt his marketing appeal.
Turning over that area of his career to his brother Merhawi Keflezeghi a year ago has resulted in several endorsement deals. He has had a long standing contract with Nike and is featured in a MasterCard "priceless"
television commercial. He also has an association with Home Depot. There are other deals in the works according to Merhawi.
The financial picture being bright, Keflezeghi has invested his money wisely buying property in Mammoth Lakes, California and in Mira Mesa, a San Diego suburb.
"Mammoth Lakes is in Sierra about a two and a half hour drive from San Diego," Keflezeghi reveals. "I live in San Diego in the winter, due to the snow, and usually in the spring, as early as February, I come up to Mammoth Lakes until November. I have been in Mammoth Lakes doing altitude training.
It's almost 8,000 feet where my house is. But I go back and forth to a track at Bishop High School to do speed work. It's at 4,000 feet."
Keflezeghi arrived in the U.S. back in 1987 and though he has spent the majority of his life in California he has a keen interest in his roots. When he is at his parents' home he speaks Tigrinya, the native language. Three years ago he flew to Eritrea with his mother for a visit. The memories are clearly precious.
"You can't put it in words. Where I was born you can't change it. I was born in Eritrea, you can't change your birthplace," he says quietly. "I went back to the place I lived and rekindled the memories of family, and I was able to spend eight weeks there. I was born in the capital of Asmara, and my dad was 30 kilometres from there and my mother was probably 78 kilometres away from there."
"I went with my mom. It was fun, they treated me very well. They honoured me. The night before their championship there was a police motorcycle escort for me. They have many athletes doing well. Zerdenay Tadesse won a (10,000m) bronze medal in Athens."
The Boston AAA has put $575,000 prize money on the line for this year's race with the winners of both the men's and women's elite field earning $100,000 apiece. Not bad considering.
Despite the presence of the African juggernaut Keflezeghi is confident. His last test was the US National 15km Championships in Jacksonville, Florida, March 11th where he won for the fifth time in six years - albeit in his slowest time to date, in 43:43. That can probably be excused by the fact that his wife Yordanis, whom he met at an Eritrean-American soccer tournament in 2004, gave birth to the couple's first child, Sara, just three days earlier. Keflezeghi evidently learned the concept of sleep deprivation.
"I am excited, I always wanted to do Boston," he admits. "The whole thing is to be healthy, which I am now, gunning for it and when I am healthy I can do the best that I can and the rest is in God's hands. If you do the preparations and your homework you should be o.k."
"You can't stop other guys from having the race of their lives. I try to do the best that I can in preparation and yes I do get nervous especially the day before. But I am right now visualising how I am going to do, what to expect, and the week before I will be relaxed."
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