Rick Broadbent for times onlineHaile Gebrselassie may not have a tattoo or tiara, but his career has been marked with little miracles and he is arguably the greatest living sportsman. Only the advancing years seem capable of catching him and for the first time yesterday he came close to suggesting he may hang up his spikes after the Olympic Games in London in 2012.
As he prepares for Sunday’s New York City Half-Marathon, the 36-year-old Ethiopian admitted the need to improve to fend off the challenge from Sammy Wanjiru, the Kenyan 13 years his junior who is threatening the Gebrselassie hegemony.
Wanjiru won the 2008 Olympic title in Beijing while Gebrselassie stayed at home, snubbing the smog and wary of derailing his world record attempt in Berlin the next month. Wanjiru filled his boots and then ran the fastest marathons ever in Britain and the United States. Sadly, the eagerly awaited meeting will have to wait.
“I hope we run together in 2012,” Gebrselassie said. “That’s the best place for it. The Olympic marathon. Maybe we will see each other before. Who knows? London is my top priority. If I could have the world record or an Olympic gold, I would choose the gold every time.”
It has been suggested that Gebrselassie would not run in an autumn marathon, most likely Berlin, if Wanjiru were also in the field. He denies any power of veto. “You cannot say I don’t run against this man,” he said. “I have no objection.” However, he conceded that it can hinder record attempts. “It can be a problem because it is better to focus on the time than the person,” he said.
There is no retirement date, but London has become an all-consuming goal. “It is difficult to put a date on when you stop,” he said. “If you plan to stop in 2012, it may not happen and it will affect you. I will let it come when it comes, but for me, London is now the biggest plan.”
There is plenty of life in him yet. In Berlin, in that post-Olympic race, he took the world record to 2hr 3min 59sec, a huge 27sec inside his previous mark, at a mind-boggling pace of 4min 43sec a mile. On paper he is a minute faster than Wanjiru, but demands more. “I need more speed, which is why I am running New York,” he said.
Gebrselassie’s profile is such that he took part in last year’s football World Cup draw in Cape Town, alongside the likes of David Beckham. A proud Ethiopian, he talks of football’s greatest show visiting his homeland within 25 years. His routine remains unlike any other. He wakes at 5.30am, trains until 9.30am, has a shower, works in his office until 4pm and trains until 6pm.
He runs 20 miles a day when preparing for a marathon and, despite the US’s impressive showing in last November’s New York City Marathon, expects Africa to continue to dominate marathon running.
“In East Africa life is a marathon,” he said. “People run to school and it becomes natural. In the USA the life is more leisurely and you go to school by car and then play on computers. Why are they good at sprinting? Because it is a technological event and they have all the technology they want. We don’t.”
Gebrselassie’s best time for a halfmarathon is 58:55, set in Phoenix, Arizona, four years ago. Wanjiru is the king of half measures, with a 58:33, and Gebrselassie will be pleased to get close to the 59:24 he set in winning in 2007. He said he would like to run the full New York City Marathon in the next couple of years and believes that he has more records within his sight, but it is London that may provide the icing on one of sport’s most sumptuous cakes.
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