Paul Tergat has been one of the world’s greatest distance runners with five World Titles at cross country, a 10K world record, and a hatful of honours at half marathon.In 2002 Paul made his debut at marathon. Both he and arch-rival Haile Gebrselassie were beaten by Khalid Khannouchi who clocked a new world record but it was clear that Paul had great potential at the distance.
In 2003 his potential was fulfilled with a world record run of 2hr 4min 55sec in the streets of Berlin, incredibly his pacemaker Sammy Korir came in just a second behind to clock the second fastest run of all time.
We caught up with Paul and asked him about his career to date.
Tergat on training
Unsurprisingly Tergat places a huge emphasis on the importance of proper training. He certainly believes in training hard but also stresses the importance of the training having a purpose and being suited to the end target.
Paul said: "Nothing can compare with training. Training can be frustrating and very hard. If you think about the time you spend training it is difficult. For any athlete or sportsman to achieve anything good you have to put in a lot of work. For an athlete you have to train very hard to reach the top. You may be talented but without training you will never realise your true potential.
He said the most important thing is that an athlete must focus their training what their goal is, whether it is cross country, track or marathon.
Paul said: "In cross country make sure you are training on the country, on hills and roads. Also train with a group. Then move to track go on track to get used to speed and used to spikes again.
"If you are going to run well on the track you have to get used to speed to be able to sustain speed - there are no short cuts.
"I don't think you will be able to compete and stay with the changes at the last stage of the race if you don't have speed. The last 400 or 200 - that's where the race is won.
"If a move is made at 3K you don't have to worry because they are exerting a lot of pressure on themselves. But from 8K you have to have stamina and 200m speed - to be able to sprint. May be not a 23sec or 24sec 200m but you need to have speed to keep up with the pressure of the last stages. If someone is going to win they must have worked very hard. So speed is always the most important thing. The way you start a race doesn't matter, the way you finish does. There is nothing else that will give you an edge.”
Tergat on targeting races
Paul believes in focussing on specific races and making sure your body is ready on that chosen day: "One fortunate thing for me is that I have really enjoyed very good health throughout my career, apart from one or two set backs. Once you have known the kind of training your body is able to take you can understand how to plan the races well.
"May be in Olympic year or for top championships some people are not able to put it together. Some may be ready in December but through by February or March so after the first 3K or 4K in the championships they find they are struggling. Planning is the important thing.
“You also need to understand what your body is able to take. If you are sick or injured you should stop and seek medical attention or you may ruin your body completely.”
Tergat on marathon preparation
As world record holder Paul is often asked about his training for the marathon. He explained the regime that took him to the sub 2hr 5min clocking: "When I am in regular training for a marathon or major championship it is two times a day training and the amount of mileage or kilometres is not less than 200K per week. 210K, 220K maybe 200K - at altitude [1600m altitude]. It may not be fast but it is regulated. I go out for 2hrs training and get it done.
"I live half an hour from Nairobi. I live and train where there are a lot of hills. I usually don't think of the course [for the race] so much. The night before the race I will drive around the course in a car just to get an idea if there are any sharp corners.
"When I am doing track I use training here [Northern Italy] when I am doing the meetings. It gives me the opportunity to not have so much pressure of flying from back in Kenya. I spend between 4-5 months in a year here [Northern Italy].
"I sometimes run 35K of very competitive training, almost at the pace of real competition. May be the coach is there. You need to get used to taking water and the technical part of races: To take water and drink without it distracting your thoughts.”
Tergat on breaking the marathon world record
Paul's mind was focussed on the world record in Berlin but he knew he had to do it his way: "When I was training for the world record I didn't want to think of anyone's WR, I didn't want to use anyone else's splits. I decided to run my own regulated pace. I had a lot of confidence in myself and decided I needed negative splits. In the last part I didn't want to hear the voice of my coach [telling him he was dropping off schedule]. The first half was more regulated and the second half the best pace I was able to do.”
Tergat on his early career
Paul's career has seen him enjoy success on different surfaces as well as at different distances.
He said: "One thing I'm very happy to say is that I've had a lot of experiences in my running career. When I first started building up in cross country I built up to have good stamina and it was good for the track. After that I was able to do track. That helped me a lot.
"Every year I have been trying to make sure I run one half marathon a year. It has helped me to be where I am at marathon. For a long time I have been doing that. "It might not work for all athletes but it worked very well for me. I don't want to put in people's minds a programme that they have to work like me. You have to do what is good for you and your body and that is the most important thing.
"Before I took up running seriously I was working hard in school. I never knew I had talent or a special gift. I believe all of us are given gifts in different ways. I was hoping to be a pilot. I was focussed on joining the Kenyan Air Force to be a pilot. I tried to get the qualifications I needed to join the air force, I got those and joined. Most of the top runners from Kenya used to come from the military. I met people who I'd been watching for many years and admiring but never had the opportunity meet them. I had been following athletics, athletics in our country is the main sport.”
Paul had kept cuttings of athletics news and had a passion for the sport. But early on it was not so obvious he would go on to the future successes: "I realised I had a special talent when I was 19 years old, before that I never knew I had a talent. I had a good coach. I was struggling to keep pace with the top guys. It took a while to be able to catch up and keep close to those guys.
"I made my first national team in 1992 and flew with the national team. It was my first international.
"My first race was the military championships, I was 12th. I kept training and at the national championships I won. At the international cross challenge in Nairobi I won again. It made the whole difference in my career. It gave me the motivation and hope that I would be able to beat the top guys. At that time I believed most of the top athletes were from Kenya. I won one race or two races and climbed the ladder. In our country there are so many athletes coming in every other three months. To be there for one year or two years is very difficult."
Tergat on athletics in Africa
Paul told us about his heritage and the mentality of Kenyan athletes: "I come from a small community. I was probably one of the first athletes from the area about 100K east of Eldoret. It is arid but beautiful countryside.
"If you follow the topography between Morocco, Kenyan and into South Africa this is where the good athletes in the long distances come from. If you go to the western part of Africa that is where the good soccer players or sprinters come from.
“Naturally we work very, very hard. The sport is individual but also we train as a team. When you train as a group the strong get stronger and the middle become strong also and even the weaker become stronger and stronger. Even if you are not very strong you gain a lot of experience in terms of training and competitions.
Tergat's attitude to success
Paul told us: "I believe in taking one thing at a go. You take one goal at a time. Any success that I have achieved in my career you can never put that as the last. When you have achieved one thing you know this - there will be a challenge from the left and right. People will be anxious to unseat you. To be able to stay there you have got to sit down and not squat [he was quoting a Kenyan saying meaning you have got to make yourself hard to move from a position of success]. When you are sat down people look for a way of moving you out. Don't squat or people will push you out.”
However being too hung up on not being beaten can be counter productive: "Putting pressure on yourself does not help. It means that you become anxious and get distracted. Whatever you are looking to achieve as a goal - you lose that [if you over-pressurise yourself]. Anything I have done has been done with a lot of commitment and patience. It has never been easy. In running you must be very committed and ready to sacrifice a lot.
"I come from a very close community. We are able to do things in a communal way. It makes me appreciate what I have done and what I have achieved more than ever before. Whatever I can do, or you can do, part of your roots is where you came from. Whatever point of the ladder you are on you are always able to look back on where you came from. This is a plus. Some of the people I was at school with may not have the opportunity to come close to where I am. I look at what I have achieved as a person, I have a simple life, and look at what I have achieved and it keeps you humble.
"The marathon is the mother of all running. Of any marathon I have finished there's none I have finished with anything left. It humbles you. Sometimes you need someone to unlace your shoes after the race because it is very difficult.
"The primary thing is once you have been lucky yourself, as an individual or a group, it is very important that you should try to give back to the less fortunate people among us or in your community.
"In so far as I have been able to do what I have been doing my focus is "Will there be someone after me to fill my shoes?" I am trying very hard to make sure that, even if they are from my own pack and trying to unseat me, the athletes are coming through.”
Tergat on his work with the UN and charities
Paul believes it is important for those who enjoy great privileges to use their position for good: "I have been fortunate to be involved in other charity organisations. I am working hard. You see I come from a community where education has not been a priority before. So many things like water and eating and these things [have to be the priority] But I feel the most important thing is education. I am looking at ways [to improve education]. The kids are the people who really matter.
"In any society to achieve anything in terms of economic growth it has to have its own members qualified academically. We have been doing things to send young guys to the USA to pursue their education and I hope that they will come back, not forget their home, and bring their education back into their own community.
"The UN is a different organisation I am working for. I have also done a lot of work for Operation Smile. It is an organisation that focuses most of its resources and funds to developing countries. Most of the funds go to children who have tumours and deformities. In some countries in Africa they view this as an omen or curse. If a child is born with a tumour or deformity they hide them away - they hide them in the kitchen or bedroom. Since joining I have been able to do a lot of campaigning to make sure in the countryside they should bring out these children to be assisted. The project comes to our country once in a year.
"The campaigning is done before that, then it is a question of going to do the operations and then leaving. I have seen something I will never forget - the smile of those parents seeing their baby being normal again after half an hour. Most operations only take half an hour. The child has a lot more confidence in themselves to pursue their dreams in education or anything they feel they are good at in life.”
Tergat on his successes
We asked Paul which of his successes he rates most highly and how he had found the move up to marathon. He said: "All of them are favourites. I have done cross country and won five times [the world cross]. I have been on the track for several years and had a world record in the 10K. I have achieved a world best, if not a world record at the marathon. It took me a long time - five times before I won one marathon. I can say I really enjoy running on all surfaces.
"The first time I ran a marathon was at London, purposely, because of the field I saw on the start line there. I saw everyone would be there. I saw this as important. I have believed for many years that your best times come with the best competition not a one man show. When everyone is there I believe in the competitive nature of myself. I believed that London would be a good opportunity to return good times.
"At one point I knew I was capable of running 2hr 4min. It was not something I wanted to say but I knew in my heart I thought I was capable of it. The landscape of the marathon is going to change altogether. Most of the athletes who are good on the track are going to run a marathon.
"I think track and field athletes bring a different discipline."
But Paul is not expecting the world best to go under 2hr 4min yet. He said that the track runners moving to marathon would not find the switch easy either due to the increase the mileage needed to run well at marathon.
He spoke of his own experience: "Something was bothering me. I came to the marathon but I had not won any single marathon and that is the most important thing. I didn't have anything to prove in cross country so I decided I needed to focus on the marathon challenge. For me I needed to focus more on in terms of working out and winning the one marathon.
"No one athlete is just going to move from track to marathon - it's very, very hard. Your body still has a lot of speed that is like a wildfire in the forest. You need like a steady fire that can be sustained for a time. Since moving I think I have that speed [sustainable for 42K]. The marathon will cut you to size. At 38K you realise, 'Where is that speed?' I do that in training but you feel the cramps coming in from 38K or 39K to 42K. You can feel you are running very fast but someone outside says you are in fatigue and slowing, you need encouragement. Fast track runners have to approach it cautiously. That's very, very hard, it takes one or two marathons. Your first two or three marathons are crucial or you won't have the motivation.
"The only thing to do is to increase the mileage - it is very simple. But you have to be very cautious again - otherwise you will be injured.
"The marathon record is the ultimate for me. When I came to the marathon I never knew how tough it would be to get to the top. My first marathon was so frustrating I thought of quitting, and going back to cross country and track. After my first one I spoke to my coach and he advised me that my first one was not the end. I realised after the first one that something was missing but I didn't know what. But it was the mileage. I was able to increase my mileage - now Paul Tergat is there.”
© Adcidia™ 2010 (Article99.com)
