News

Red-eyed Emperor - 29/11/08

HAILE Gebrselassie is always a man in a hurry - but next time he comes to Melbourne to run, he promises to take his time. The great Ethiopian distance runner - the most accomplished road and track endurance athlete the world has seen - admitted that he had not allowed enough time to adjust to jet lag before contesting yesterday's inaugural Great Australian Run.

Predictably, it didn't stop him winning comfortably. But it slowed him enough to scuttle any ambitions he might have had of adding another world record to the 26 he has already set in his formidable career.

Gebrselassie, 35, completed the 15km hitout through the Albert Park Grand Prix track and the city streets in 42min 40sec, more than a minute outside the 41.29 all-time mark for the distance set by Kenyan Felix Limo in 2001.

Gebrselassie, whose best of 41.38 was set in the same race, shrugged off a determined challenge by Patrick Makau, a 23-year-old Kenyan who specialises in half-marathons, winning by 35sec. Australian Olympic 5000m runner Collis Birmingham, 24, was another 21sec adrift in third place, passing his more celebrated training partner Craig Mottram in the latter stages.

Kenyan marathon world champion Catherine Ndereba won the women's race even more easily, clocking 50.43 to defeat fast-finishing New Zealander Alice Mason (51.27) and Australian marathoner Lisa- Jane Weightman (51.31).

Australian Benita Johnson, the favourite in some eyes, was fifth in 52.09. Some 4000 fun-runners - and a few walkers - were strung out behind, many lured by the opportunity to say they were at least in the same field as an all-time great such as Gebrselassie, even if he vanished into the distance within three minutes of pole vault champion Steve Hooker firing the starting gun.

Dressed in bright yellow the holder of the marathon world record - he ran an amazing 2:03.59 in Berlin two months ago - presented a spectacular sight, as is usually the case when you're watching the best in the business at any sport.

He pushed his jockey-sized frame - Mottram stood literally head and shoulders above him on the start line - along at better than three minutes per kilometre, upping the ante still more when he decided to drop young Kenyan Makau with 4km to go just to make sure he didn't get involved in a "dangerous" sprint finish.

It looked so effortless, but Gebrselassie admitted he was feeling the pinch after getting only two hours sleep. He spent the night watching TV and reading a book and finished the race with a headache. Because of business interests and his dislike of being away from his family too long, he left it as late as possible to make the 24-hour journey, arriving at tam on Friday and spending much of that day working on promotional activities. "I expected to run a fast time however when I started I didn't feel so good," he said.

"It affected me a lot. I made a mistake. I should have come five or six days ago. Next time I will come earlier." Asked if he was disappointed at not breaking the record, he said: "A little bit ... but I won the race, I ran 42 minutes, it's not bad. I'm OK."

No-one was arguing with those sentiments. Known both as The Boss and the Emperor of Ethiopia, Gebrselassie was no doubt well rewarded to put on a world-class show and that's what he did, much to the delight of a small contingent of expatriates from his own country.

The Great Run, a Britishbased mass-participation initiative that has a strong charitable component, boasted the most impressive field, in both genders, of any road race held in Australia other than the Olympics, and generated an impressive atmosphere.

Gebrselassie's ever-smiling presence had everything to do with that, so it was music to the ears of all concerned - especially local pavement-pounders - when he said he would "absolutely" be back next year. And the earlier the better.

29th November, 2008. Great Australian Run Media Team.