Matt Gabrielson of Team USA Minnesota will run the marathon for the U.S. at the World Championships in Berlin on August 22. He was second in the USA Championships at the Twin Cities Marathon last fall in 2:17:38. His previous marathon was a 2:19:53 for 20th place in New York City in 2006. Gabrielson was eighth in the 2008 U.S. Olympic Trials in the 5000 and has a personal best of 13:30.68 in that event. He hails from Belmond, Iowa, where he won four state track titles in high school, and is a 2000 graduate of Drake University, where he was a five-time Missouri Valley Conference champion, including victories in the flat 3000 indoors and the 3000-meter steeplechase outdoors. Gabrielson represented the U.S. at World Cross Country in 2005, 2006, and 2007. He won the 2006 TC 10 Mile in 48:54. Gabrielson is an assistant cross country coach at Edina High School and works part-time at PC Running Company in Eden Prairie.Reading your blog, it occurs to us that it's cool to have the kind of life where Meb Keflezighi shows up in town and calls and says "let's go for a run.
Matt Gabrielson: Yes, I'm not going to deny that, especially since he had just run a blazing time at (the seven-miler in Davenport, Iowa, which Keflezighi won). He's coming into form. He was in town (Minneapolis) for a wedding, an Eritrean wedding on two separate days. He called me up and said, "would you like to run? I need a place to run." We met at the trail with Antonio Vega, my teammate, and thrashed it out. It went by so fast because we talked the whole time. It was awesome.
That's what's great about Minneapolis, is that there are so mainly trails in the summertime. The Minnesota Valley Wildlife Refuge is along the Minnesota River. We just ran on flat-as-pancake dirt trails for 17 miles. You're basically in the forest on a five-foot wide trial. Actually, it was kind of funny because we saw a few snakes and I noticed Meb kind of get scared and jump once, and it was a gardener snake. It's not going to hurt you at all. You can see anything from wild turkey to deer, anything, in there.
You say you talked all the time. What were the topics?
MG: Everything. Training. Actually, we talked a lot about his recent injury history. His hip actually BROKE during the Olympic Trials Marathon. We also talked about the training I've done, and family stuff, and women - everything kind of came up.
Let's talk about your progress. Was the USA Championships last fall your last marathon?
MG: Yeah, my second and also my last marathon.
Why did you decide not to do a spring marathon? Were you not ready, or did you decide since you were going to Berlin it was not a wise thing to do?
MG: To be honest - and this kind of backfired to me - but I wanted to run around 28:00 for 10k. I wanted to focus on 10,000 meters. That was why I didn't do a spring marathon.
How did that decision backfire on you?
MG: Well, I didn't run as fast (for 10,000) as I wanted. I think I put myself in a little bit of a hole, trainingwise. We did some things maybe above and beyond what we should have done, trying to just force things a little bit. I remember at one point, in a ten-day stretch, we had done 18 miles of things on the track at 10k pace. I was just a little bit tired. I ran the Brutus Hamilton (Invitational at Berkeley) in April and the pre-Prefontaine 10,000 the night before (before the regular Prefontaine Classic). Jorge Torres was rabbiting for his brother Ed. Ed ran fantastic at night. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to hold on. I think I ran 28:44 and then 28:55 - not what I was looking for.
Would those have been good enough to get you into USA Championships?
MG: Yes. I opted out of USAs for a couple of different reasons. One is because I wanted to run Grandma's Half Marathon (actually the Garry Bjorklund Half Marathon in June in Duluth) just to run a half marathon, And two is because I just wasn't confident in my 10k fitness at that point.
Was that half marathon your most important 'set up' race for Berlin?
MG: No, not necessarily. I actually just did a local 10k (the Heart Summer 10K) as a fitness test - no tapering or anything, I still ran 130 miles that week.But I ran more than 10k because I ran off course. We were supposed to be on this bike path off the road and they didn't really have anybody loudly enough directing, so I ran a little bit more, I'd say 25 seconds or so. I think I would have run 29:30 (he ran 29:58), which isn't great but it was pretty good considering the week and running by myself for the most part.
The reason I did Grandma's (Bjorklund) was because I thought I could run a fast half marathon out there. It didn't happen because the weather didn't cooperate and no one wanted to run as fast as I did. I had 80 meters on the field at three miles. I was running 4:50s, trying to run 1:03something. There's was a 1:01 Kenyan in there. I ended up fourth. Three others guys used and abused me for nine miles. They wouldn't lead, and when I tried to let them lead, it would slow down. But I didn't want it to slow down anymore because I wanted to run fast. I ended up running out of a little juice at the end.
How much contact have you had with the other American men who are going to do the marathon at the World Championships?
MG: I think we're ready to go, actually. I talked to Justin Young the other day, via Facebook, and he said things were going well. And Ed Torres, I talked to him right as he was being named as a replacement for the team (for Fernando Cabada - this information has not yet been released by USATF). He was excited and was confident he'd be ready to go. He's had some personal things to deal with recently (his mother was seriously injured and his junior high coach was killed in a car crash), so I'm not sure how that has affected his training. I haven't talked to Nate Jenkins; I do keep up on his blog and it seems like things are going in the right direction. And Dan Browne said we was doing pretty well and his fitness is right where it needs to be. I think everyone's healthy, for the most part, and looking forward to representing the U.S.
That 130-mile figure you mention; have you been putting in a lot of weeks at that level?
MG: I probably had a couple of weeks between 130 to 140, and then a bunch at 120. And by a bunch, I mean maybe four. This week will be relatively low, anyway, about 110 to 115, and then we'll take off for Berlin and sort of relax a little bit, I guess.
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