Innholdsfortegnelse for May 2023 i AW - Athletics Weekly Magazine

MAY 2023 Something refreshing has broken out in recent weeks – the kind of habits which would be wonderful to see more athletes adopting as competition hots up this summer. There's nothing new or complicated about it, just a dash of honesty and a sprinkling of personality which will go an enormously long way. Sifan Hassan was disarmingly brilliant at the TCS London Marathon which she won in such style (p22) but it was not just on the roads where she excelled. The Dutchwoman scored highly in her dealings with the media over that weekend, openly laying her cards on the table in a way which allowed us to really see the human behind the athlete. Her admission about wondering why she was running a marathon in the first place…

Track and field in the UK has been known for achieving success at major championships over the years. However, for some athletes, the impact of competing in elite sport – in particular dealing with the high expectations of performance and individual pressures – can take its toll on their mental health. Mental health was one of most talked about topics following the Tokyo 2021 Olympic Games, where prominent figures such as Simone Biles and Naomi Osaka were open about their experiences of issues such as anxiety. Since then, 400m British recordholder Matthew Hudson-Smith has also publicly discussed the mental toll of performing at the highest level and the challenges it brings. Athletes being willing to speak out has helped to stimulate discussion around their training and competition environments, as well…

AW INTEVIEW MARY NGUGI When people are used to living in a certain way, it takes time to change that,” says Mary Ngugi, reflecting on the progress of Nala Track Club, the girls-only running camp she founded and officially launched in Kenya in October of last year. The 34-year-old is speaking from experience. She has witnessed female athletes being abused, harassed and intimidated by men. “I've grown up in a homestead where you see that the man is always the one who is making the decisions,” she says. “Also, growing up in a camp where it's mixed with boys, I saw all those kinds of things. It doesn't have to be violence or whatever, but you can see that you don't have a voice. Maybe you're doing something and they look…

Athletics is a sport that gives with one hand and takes with the other. It gifts us some of the proudest moments of our lives when it makes us champions, and alternately devours everything we have when we lose. It is governed by the distribution of measurements, medals, money and glory in return for hard work and talent (where competition is honest). These in turn are governed by the national and international associations that ultimately dictate the rules athletes must abide by. As athletes we are the protagonists in control of our own performances, without whom there would be no show, but often we end up with very little say in how the decisions which so hugely affect the course of our lives are made. Organisations such as the Athletes…

AW SPOTLIGHT COMBINED EVENTS “When I look at the World Athletics Competition Performance Ranking,” says Walter Weber, Sporting Director of the annual Hypomeeting Götzis, “I see that Hypomeeting is ‘only’ in third place. But only combined events at the Olympic Games and World Championships are better than at Götzis.” The annual celebration of combined events in the small Austrian town of Götzis at the end of May provides a masterclass in how to showcase world-class athletics. Every detail of the meeting is designed to create the conditions for athletes to perform at their best, with no ill-thought-through gimmicks to generate artificial theatre. And therein lies the secret. When that singular focus on the athlete is enhanced by an understanding of how to narrate the ebb and flow of the multis, and…

AW PERFORMANCE NEWS DOES THE SUPER SHOE FIT? As this and other issues of AW have highlighted, carbon-plated (CFP) super shoes are very much here to stay. Millions of endurance athletes use the footwear to take advantage of the now well-documented performance benefits they bring. Not everyone adapts well to these technologically advanced tools of the running trade, though, and it's less common to read about the related injuries which some individuals can experience. An opinion piece recently published in the journal Sports Medicine acknowledges how prevalent carbon shoes are becoming but also highlights five injury cases by way of urging athletes to be mindful that using them is not entirely without risk. “We need to consider how to prevent injuries when athletes adopt this new footwear,” said lead author Adam…

AW PERFORMANCE GLUCOSE MONITORING When Sifan Hassan crossed the finish line of the TCS London Marathon, she was wearing the Nike super-shoe prototypes on her feet, a pair of green shorts and a singlet on her body and a huge smile on her face. Barely noticeable on the back of her left arm was a small, white biosensor, too. This device was a continuous glucose monitor (CGM), made by Abbott, and which works alongside an app created by a company called Supersapiens. Currently all the rage in endurance sport circles, it is effectively the world's first human fuel gauge. In recent years athletes have been able to measure, among other things, their heart rate, body weight, sleep patterns, stride length and cadence. Yet now, thanks to this collaboration between Supersapiens and…

TCS LONDON MARATHON, London, April 23 The 43rd edition of the London Marathon might have been the best yet, with course records, exciting senior races, huge crowds despite the rain and a record 48,599 finishers. The major talking points are discussed from p22, but there were also UK masters records for M70 Mike Sheridan (2:59:13) and W60 Treena Johnson (3:00:19), while American Jenny Hitchings (2:45:27) set a world W55 best. Elite men: 1 K Kiptum (KEN) 2:01:25; 2 G Kamworor (KEN) 2:04:23; 3 T Tola (ETH) 2:04:59; 4 L Gebresilase (ETH) 2:05:45; 5 S Tura (ETH) 2:06:38; 6 E Cairess (Leeds C) 2:08:07; 7 B Robinson (AUS) 2:10:19; 8 P Sesemann (Leeds C) 2:10:23; 9 M Farah (NEB, M40) 2:10:28; 10 C Thompson (AFD, M40) 2:11:50; 11 F Lara (USA)…

Missed opportunity for road relays Of all the National Road Relays I have seen – and I have missed only one over the past 64 years – I don't think I have seen a higher quality race than this year, when Central, Highgate and Kent produced magnificent performances. We (Swansea) thought we had a chance of a medal and our time would normally have been comfortably good enough, but we were well behind in fourth place. There was one major change this year. The trophy was not awarded to the first club to finish – but rather the English champions – which was a shame. There was no issue with Swansea receiving it after winning in 1994, though since the English Road Running Association (ERRA) were asked to organise the…

AW DIGEST PICTURE THIS Sha'Carri Richardson (left) made sure this year's Diamond League series got off to a memorable start after she saw off Shericka Jackson and Dina AsherSmith to win the 100m in Doha earlier this month. The American sprinter clocked 10.76 (0.9), her fastest time in two years. It was also fitting that Richardson bettered the meeting record of Tori Bowie, the 2017 world 100m champion and Olympic sprint relay champion at Rio 2016, who passed away at the age of 32 on May 3.…

Finding the right athlete/ coach relationship is – and always has been – an inexact science. While an authority figure who barks orders might be the perfect person to inspire some individuals, there will be plenty of others who run a mile from that kind of pressure and respond far better to a softer approach. I was very lucky with all of the coaches I worked with during my career but I've witnessed some others in action with whom I think I might have come to blows had they been leading my development! It's such a crucial relationship – especially in an athlete's early and more formative years in the sport. The importance of getting it right really can't be overstated. The tireless work coaches do must always be applauded,…

AW DIGEST MARATHON “ SOMETIMES I WAKE UP AND THINK: ‘WHY THE HELL DID I DECIDE TO RUN A MARATHON?’ HASSAN THE DRAMA QUEEN “Sometimes I wake up and think: ‘Why the hell did I decide to run a marathon?’” is one of the best quotes from an athlete of this or any other year. For an elite distance runner to openly be echoing what so many of the masses must have been thinking on the eve of the London Marathon was as surprising as it was refreshing. Sifan Hassan, who had never previously competed over 26.2 miles, single-handedly added brightness and warmth to the pre-event press conference with her honesty. Even though she is the 5000m and 10,000m champion, she made no secret of the fact that she was far…

Nor Kw Karsten Warholm 45.94 Karsten Warholm won't die wondering. This is a man completely committed to his cause and it doesn't need an expert observer to recognise this most elemental of athletes transfers every ounce of his being to the track. Exhibit A: the 400m final at this year's European Indoor Championships in Istanbul. The man who is best known for being the 400m hurdles world record-breaking Olympic champion is pretty useful over the flat, too, and was the undoubted favourite to take gold. He wasn't about to start playing the percentages, though, and catapulted himself out of the blocks like a man possessed. The first half was covered in a near suicidal 20.84 (an outright 200m PB), with the second lap clocked at a considerably more painful 24.51…

AW INTERVIEW RHASIDAT ADELEKE The shock was almost immediate. Rhasidat Adeleke was barely two weeks into her time at the University of Texas when she was faced with her first racing assignment. It was January 2021 and there had already been a lot for the then 18-year-old to contend with. The girl from Tallaght, just south of Dublin, had arrived in Austin mid-semester to start her scholarship and was just getting her bearings when the time came for a competitive test. Adeleke is an athlete around whom there has been high expectation for some time. European under-18 200m champion at the age of 15, she had become accustomed to being well ahead of the curve – and winning. The reality of her new surroundings was about to change all of that.…

AW PERFORMANCE What treatment options, other than shockwave therapy, are there for a chronic insertional Achilles tendon? There's soft tissue in the tendon and also bone working away here, so we have contact between those two. The key factor here is centred around doing asymmetric exercise, then heavy and slow resistance plus eccentric exercises. Asymmetrics are where you've got a very high muscle contraction but no joint movement. For the Achilles tendon that will be standing with your heel raised but no movement. You could vary the degree of height on the different sets but you would have to hold it still for 45 seconds and repeat that again for a minimum of three and a maximum of five times. If that isn't taxing, you can add a weight such…

FIXTURES MAY 20 ● N ight of the 10,000m PBs London nightofthe10kpbs.com MAY 21 ● AJ Bell Great Manchester Run greatrun.org ● Loughborough International lboro.ac.uk ● European Race Walking Team Championships, Podebrady european-athletics.com MAY 27 ● BMC Grand Prix – World Athletics Challenger, Manchester britishmilersclub.com ● Loughborough Throws Pathway International lboro.ac.uk ● USATF Los Angeles Grand Prix usatf.org MAY 27-28 ● Hypomeeting, Götzis meeting-goetzis.at ● England Athletics Senior & U20 Combined Events Championships Manchester englandathletics.org MAY 28 ● Rabat Diamond League diamondleague.com ● Edinburgh Marathon edinburghmarathon.com ● Ottawa International Marathon runottawa.ca ● Scottish National Athletics League Aberdeen scottishathletics.org.uk ● UK Youth Development League Upper – Northern/Midlands/ Southern, Various ukydl.org.uk MAY 29 ● Bruce Longden Coaching Foundation Hurdle Festival Chelmsford brucelongdenfoundation.com MAY 30 ● Trafford Grand Prix, Stretford traffordac.co.uk ● BMC…

More than 130 junior athletes kept a mock Olympic flame moving non-stop around Weston-super-Mare Grand Pier for 24 hours recently in a bid to raise money for North Somerset AC. On the seventh annual running of the event, the athletes faced wet and windy conditions but raised around £12,000. Event organiser and head coach Chris Millard said: “The emotion felt at the end of the 24 hours, knowing that the team had successfully kept the Olympic Torch moving around the Pier without stopping for 24 hours, is high.”…

BUDAPEST ON TRACK The track for the World Championships in Budapest was unveiled last month as the host facility nears completion. Although the stadium roof structure has long been part of the panorama of the Danube, media were shown the freshly-laid Mondo surface and completed grandstands. The 35,000-seat grandstand will be dismantled after the biggest sporting event in Hungary's history and the temporary spectator area will be replaced by one of Europe's most picturesque running circles for recreational runners, while professional athletes will still be able to train in the athletics centre. Jake Wightman insists he will be at his best to defend his world 1500m title in August, despite having had to miss weeks of preparation through injury, writes Tim Adams. He spent five weeks in a protective boot…

The sprinter moved from Ireland to England to explore his full potential on the track. In opting to defend his European indoor title, a combination of graft, talent and experience took him to an Irish record of 45.52 – and a gold that he still treasures Before that year, I was a full-time student in Dublin and training in the evenings. Looking back, you could probably argue that athletics was more of a hobby at the time, as opposed to something that I wanted to make a career out of. But I moved to Loughborough and everything changed in terms of my approach to training. Now, I was in an environment where it was all on my doorstep. I could literally walk to training, come home, grab something to eat…

AW SPOTLIGHT WMTRC After its inaugural staging in Thailand last November, the World Mountain and Trail Running Championships (WMTRC), is heading to Europe – specifically the Alpine stage of Innsbruck-Stubai – for its second edition. Once again, World Athletics’ vision of working with the different elements of mountain, trail and ultra running to create a true global championships will take centre stage. While Thailand, which had been postponed due to Covid, was deemed to be a success, this year's event being held in one of the traditional mountain heartlands means hopes are high that competition – and attention – levels will rise and that more nations and athletes will embrace the concept. There is the added challenge of accommodating these championships in a packed calendar of commercially backed races which attract…

SAUCONY Saucony.com PEREGRINE 13 £130.00 The most established trail model in our line-up, the 13th edition of the Peregrine continues to offer a great blend of cushioning and grip in a shoe that seems to become more comfortable with each update. The 28mm stack of PWRRUN foam provides road-shoe-like levels of cushioning but, when combined with the brand's PWRTRAC outsole, the aggressive grip transforms it into an off-road option capable of taking on the harshest terrain. Despite the deep stack height, the Peregine weighs in at just 260g, so it never feels heavy, even when wet. The upper is light, breathable and soft but features welcome added protection around the toe bumper. This is a competitively priced option that will give you confidence for off-road ventures. SALOMON SENSE RIDE 5…

QUIZ 1 In which year was the first World Athletics Championships held? And where? 2 When Portugal's Rosa Mota won the marathon at the 1987 World Championships with a championship record of 2:25:17, how far behind her was the runner-up? 3 How many major championships silver medals had Germany's Christina Obergfoll won before she finally claimed gold in the javelin in 2013 in Moscow? 4 Who said this following her European Indoor title: “Things are just good. I'm happy. I'm enjoying training. I'm enjoying my group. I'm having a really nice time. I've always said that makes such a difference and it's working out really well for me.” 5 Who are these four faces (above right)? 6 In which Olympics was the photo finish first introduced? 7 Jake Wightman started…

AW DIP FINISH A new club called Warriors Pentathlon & Athletics Club believes it is the first to win national titles from England Athletics and GB Pentathlon after its under-15 boys team won the English 5km road title at Sutton Park and their under-11 girls squad the Pentathlon National Laser Run in Bath last month. The Merseyside club, which launched in January but has around 100 members already, is encouraging athletes to swim, run and shoot by entering competitions as diverse as laser running, biathle, triathle and winter triathlon. “We believe athletics offers a solid foundation to compete across multiple sports,” says club coach and founder Ronan Kearney. “We have been attracting talented athletes from football, swimming and athletics, who can see that combining skills and learning new skills is…

Guinness world records were smashed in London last month for the fastest marathon dressed as a three-dimensional dinosaur (4:36:43), a runner carrying golf clubs (4:14:59) and for two runners handcuffed together (2:53:33). In total 45 out of 71 official attempts were successful, with the quickest fancy dress record-breaker being Alex Grady, who ran 2:38:52 dressed as a boxer. The slowest and most painfulsounding, meanwhile, saw Johannes Teunissen run the fastest marathon wearing clogs with 7:08:37, whereas Becky Lafford also endured an uncomfortable 26.2 miles with 3:59:57 wearing wellington boots. There were many weird and wonderful attempts but perhaps the strangest was Charlie Fitton setting a record for the “most underpants worn by a female during a marathon”. She sported 25 pairs. Away from the record-breakers, though, kudos goes to Sam…