The Boston Globe from Boston, Massachusetts • 42

42 THE BOSTON GLOBE FRIDAY, APRIL IS, 1994 BOSTOH til A A II 9 aren 'tAmeiic nm i ai 't i-- ai- 5T1 DMARATHON Continued from Page 37 Beardsley. Meyer won Boston, Wei-denbach won Boston, and the age of megabucks entered the race in 1986 when John Hancock Financial Services started to pump in $1 million-plus in prize money and services annually. There continue to be notable US performances but the marathon is a world stage these days and Americans generally aren't the major players. Bob Kempainen was runner-up in New York last fall as was Ken Martin in 1989. Paul Pilkington won Houston in 1990 and Los Angeles last month.

Steve Spence won the bronze medal at the 1991 World Championships in Tokyo, and Keith Brantly was fifth in New York last fall, after, a ninth in Boston last April. Exceptional has been Mark Plaatjes, who became a US citizen and the first American since Shorter to win a gold medal in a major international competition when he won at the World Championships in Stuttgart last The fact he grew up and trained in South Africa before trying to run Boston in 1985 when he was excluded because of the international ban on South African athletes only made him tougher. "It was great for the US," says of Plaatjes' World victory, "but people need to be aware that his training and who he is as a runner was developed before he moved to the US. But what he does prove is that you can be living in this society and working here and living with the distractions that are here in the US and still be a great marathoner. "When you look at the great people coming up, I think Kempainen is real smart about his training.

I'm not sure how fast hell run yet, but I'm sure he's a Todd Williams holds great potential. Then you have guys who have banged around at the marathon. Bill Reifs-nyder, Keith Brantly, Steve Spence. I don't know that they're going to make a breakthrough. "Training for the marathon beats them up, it's the same thing that happened to me.

It ruins you as a runner, and injuries begin. You always start to think about your next marathon, rather than going back to just running and racing. If I were coaching those guys, I'd tell them, Tou're not marathoners, but you can be great distance runners. You've got to be racing 10K, 15K, 20K and 25K, and then every now and then when you're on a roll, jump into a marathon every 18 months. If you're hot, you're hot.

If you're not hot, stay away from it' look at American dis-, tance running right now, we havp. a small crop of people who can come out and run well and be good marathoners. Let's say Williams runs a marathon and does well. Kempainen is there. Spence did well in the 1991 Worlds.

Plaatjes won. The pressure on them is to run marathons, and it beats them up. "When you look at the African nations, there's a huge amount of talent for them to pick from, so it doesn't necessarily have to be one guy. Somebody may run well one year, then it's Ibrahim Hussein, who won Boston in 1988, 1991 1992 and Lisa Weidenbach wins the 1985 Boston Marathon. 7 A look at how American women runners against foreign competition in the past six Year Overall winner, country Time 1993 Olga Markova, Russia 2:25:27 Kim Jones 1992 Olga Markova, Russia 2:23:43 Jane Welzel 1991 Wanda Panfil, Poland 2:24:18 Kim Jones 1990 Rosa Mota, Portugal 2:25:24 Maria Trujillo 1989 Ingrid Kristiansen, Norway 2:24:33 Kim Jones 1988 Rosa Mota, Portugal 2:24:30 Louise Mohanna UPI FILE PHOTO HI have fared in major United States races years.

Top American Pos. Time 2 10 2 3 3 19 2:30:00 2:36:21 2:26:40 2:28:53 2:29:34 2:46:09 YORK Time Top American Pos. Time Time Top American Pos. Time Year Overall winner, country 1993 Uta Pippig, Germany 2:26:24 Ellen Gibson 16 2:50:17 1992 Lisa Ondieki, Australia 2:24:40 Jane Welzel 14 2:41:22 1991 Liz McColgan, Scotland 2:27:32 Joan Samuelson 6 2:33:48 1990 Wanda Panfil, Poland 2:30:45 Kim Jones 2 2:30:50 1989 Ingrid Kristiansen, Norway 2:25:30 Kim Jones 2 2:27:54 1988 Grete Waitz, Norway 2:28:07 Joan Samuelson 3 2:32:40 A look at how American runners have fared in major United States races against foreign competition in the past six years. 0 Year Overall winner, country 2:29:05 2:30:12 2:30:55 Kristy Johnston 8 2:39:45 2:32:55 2:30:16 Kim Jones 2 2:32:31 2:34:52 Li Year Overall winner, country 1993 Krlsty Johnston, US 1992 Janls Meeker, US 1991 Veronique Merot, France 1990 Maria Trujillo, US 1989 Veronique Merot, France 1988 Linda Zinlan, US Year Overall winner, country 1993 Cosmas Ndeti, Kenya 2:09:33 Keith Brantly 9 2:12:58 1992 Ibrahim Hussein, Kenya 2:08:14 Doug Kurtis 19 2:17:03 1991 Ibrahim Hussein, Kenya 2:11:06 Paul Zimmerman 12 2:15:32 1990 Gelindo Bordin, Italy 2:08:19 Darrell General 14 2:15:28 1989 Abebe Mekonnen, Ethiopia 2:09:06 Herb Wills 10 2:17:40 1988 Ibrahim Hussein, Kenya 2:08:43 Bill Rodgers 28 2:18:17 Time 1 ON Time Top American Pos.

Time Top American Pos. Time fcw tMamB0tr SfeMe WbfaAM Time Top American Pos. Time i ncv re uie ueuuie i uinm mane uie sport or the American marath- oners to improve, they've got to want ff Coogan, who grew up in Attle- boro where he ran at Bishop Feehan High School before attending the University of Maryland, speaks for the future from Boulder, where he trains with Plaatjes South African David Tsebe. "I think you can see it," says Coogan. "Ev- eryone sees Spence get a bronze 1 medal and says, 'I can run with Steve But sometimes you get demoralized by the Kenyans.

"You see Plaatjes winning in Stuttgart and Kempainen finishing second in New York, you say, .3 know I can enmnpfp with r.hpm' That's what is keeping me going right now. I don't think the Kenyans Move wic uiajauiuu maaicieu. liie run with a little too much reckless abandon." Brantlv is Dresentlv one of the top US marathoners. Monday wilt be his seventh marathon but only the third in which he'll feel as though he belongs in the top echelon. He was ninth at Boston a year ago (2:12:58) and improved to fifth in New York last November.

"I wanted to experiment with higher mileage," says Brantly.1"! started in January running 120 miles a week way over my normal mileage. Then I injured my left Achilles. It showed me that's the limit I tan do. I dropped down to about 100 miles per week. That's perfect for me.

Every time I had a workout since it went perfectly. I've recovered well, and I'm not overtraining." Brantly came to Concord last year to train with some Kenyan runners, and the lessons were well learned. "I learned a couple of things," he said. "I got a little different perspective. I learned you can't be a part-time world-class runner.

You can't expect to live at home all the time. The Kenyans reiterated the fact you have to get away at times. You can't be distracted by the day-to-day routine of running a household. "They adjust very well to the situation. If they're tired they don't run that afternoon.

They take a less pragmatic approach to their running. They enjoy it. The Americans are far from out of it on the world scene. A lot is expected from the Americans, but we're only one country among hundreds that have world-class marathoners. "Our best marathoner is probably Todd Williams, and he hasn't run one yet.

Then again we've made assumptions about this before. To make assumptions that a person who runs a fast 10K can move up to the marathon isn't necessarily smart. If you think that because you can run four miles at 4:20 you can run a marathon, that isn't necessarily true, especially if you haven't been doine the distance." Burfoot, the editor of Runner's' World magazine who won Boston hi 1968, has done a lot of research on the marathon. "I think US marathoning is on a short upswing," said -Burfoot. "We have Kempainen, Brantly and Pilkington.

That's not to say well see an American winner. Monday. Running is one of the verjj' few truly world sports. People caijf do it anywhere and no one country is going to be dominant in it "There was Bill Rodgers Frank Shorter and Craig Virgin 1. in the late 1970s and then Alberto Salazar, but it wasn't a world sport then.

Now it is. We always had Japanese men. Now we have the Japanese women. I'm among those who are willing to see a genetic component at work. It's smallness.

You i 1 see the Koreans, Japanese and the Kenyans and what they can do. TVe' read research that says small body size is important" Tommy Xeonard the running guru who founded thlFalmouth Road Race and is presently talking -up his hometown race on May 15 in Westfield, peers out from his post as" resident dispenser of beverages at the Back Bay's Eliot Lounge and has the final word. As usual, he takes; a detached view of the situation. "They're not hungry," Leonard says of the US corps of "They're wrapped up in Nintendo and skateboards. When was the lastT time we had a high school 4-minute miler? Kids are driven to Little League.

Kids ride school buses. -I had to walk five miles in raging bliz-; zards to get to school. Kids are too soft a bunch of marshmallows." dropped out last year in his attempt to become a rare four-time champion, comes from the Kenyan tradition. "He'd run Boston, and then you wouldn't see him again," says Meyer. "He might run Honolulu, but it wasn't the same kind of effort.

He might run in Japan, but there wasn't the same focus on it. Look at the times. He geared his whole life to win Boston. "Now you have all these nations coming in. South Africa, the Eastern bloc countries, Korea.

We're competing against the rest of the world. We're not a society that mar-athoning as an important sport. To the rest of the world, it is. "Our country looks at basketball; the rest of the world doesn't look at it that way. It's running.

The Olympics are about running. The fans know split times. They know people. They know exactly what these people are capable of doing. They're a very educated audience for running.

They're not in this country. "The Boston Marathon is important to the rest of the world. People here don't understand that If you run well at Boston, there's instant respect in Europe, Africa and Japan. "What spoils us is well have one guy do well. Plaatjes wins the World Championships.

Everybody says, We're doing fine in the marathon. We had somebody But a lot of the top runners didn't focus on it because it doesn't increase their paydays later on. "If you go to the Olympics and take second, third, fourth or fifth, it helps your reputation. Just as if you run well in Boston. It impacts your ability to earn money.

The World Championships only does that for one person. The field wasn't there. I don't want to be cruel to Mark, but it's not the same field you're going to get at the Olympics or at the Boston or London Marathons, where there's money on the line." Weidenbach, who owns the dubious distinction of finishing fourth-and-out in the first three women's US Olympic Marathon Trials, says it was a simpler and quieter time when she won Boston nine years ago. "It's not as exciting as it was then," she says. "It's more of a business now, but I really love what I'm doing, and I want to hang onto it for as long as I can.

You have to sacrifice things like having a family for the things that go into being an athlete." There is the recognition that women's marathoning has grown out of that simplicity and become more global, placing the US in a different light than it was a decade and more ago when there was the presence of Grete Waitz and then Ingrid Kris-tiansen of Norway, and just a few dominant woman runners who didn't live on US soil. "The world has gotten so much larger," says Weidenbach. "Back in the mid-'80s, it was unheard of for the Eastern Europeans, the South Africans and the Kenyans to compete. They were not in the sport "Now the first American in some races is in 17th place. It's a whole different ballgame.

You used to see races where the top four finishers were Americans. Now you're lucky to get one in the top four. Marathoning has definitely gotten bigger. I think the changes have been for the better. Competition is what it's all about.

We're just not breeding young up-and-coming marathoners. "There's no young blood coming into the sport, and that's what scares me. I was one of the youngest US Olympic Trials runners in 1984, 1988 and, believe it or not, 1992. What's going to happen? Who's going to come in and assume the leadership role? I don't know why that is." Rodgers, who won the unofficial world championship in Fukuoka in 1977, thinks that what breeded success in the past was that so many marathoners trained together. He was a charter member of theGreat-er Boston Track Club, with which Meyer and Salazar ran (under the tutelage of Bill Squires) in the glory days of the 1970s and early '80s.

"I think we ought to look at some of the things that have worked before," says Rodgers. "It brought us success before. Bill Reifsnyder trained with John Treacy. Keith Brantly trained with the Kenyans last summer in Concord. Fd like to see a group of Americans get together a couple of times a year.

Tom Fleming did some of that when he was 20. He trained witlj a lot of the Year Overall winner, country 1993 Lyubov Klochko, Ukraine 2:39:49 1992 Madina Biktagirova, Russia 2:26:23 1991 Cathy O'Brien, US 2:29:38 1990 Julie bphording, US 2:32:25 1989 Zoya Ivanova, Russia 2:34:42 1988 Blanca Jaime, Mexico 2:36:11 1993 Andres Espinosa, Mexico 2:10:14 Bob Kempainen 2 2:11:03 1992 Willie Mtolo, S. Africa 2:09:29 Ed Eyestone 11 2:14:19 1991 Salvador Garcia, Mexico 2:09:28 Pat Petersen 21 2:20:29 1990 Douglas Wakiihuri, Kenya 2:12:39 Mohamed Idris 22 2:22:23 1989 Juma Ikangaa, Tanzania 2:08:01 Ken Martin 2 2:09:38 1988 Steve Jones, Great Britain 2:08:20 Mark Nenow 8 2:14:21 Year Overall winner, country HOUSTON 1993 Ritva Lemettinen, Finland 2:33:18 Linda Somers 2 2:34:25 1992 Linda Somers, US 2:37:41 1991 Midde Hamrin, Sweden 2:36:21 Betsy Frick 9 2:50:26 1990 Aurora Cunha, Portugal 2:30:11 Kellie Cathey 5 2:35:58 1989 Lisa Weidenbach, US 2:28:15 1988 Lisa Weidenbach, US 2:29:17 2:13:21 Robert Stolz 6 2:17:51 2:13:12 Matt Carpenter 16 2:19:44 2:12:28 Paul Pilkington 8 2:15:21 2:11:13 2:10:04 DonJanicki 3 2:11:58 2:11:44 MarkStickley 7 2:17:13 Year Overall winner, country 1993 Frank Bjorkli, Norway 1992 Filemon Lopez, Mexico 1991 Carey Nelson, Canada 1990 Pairi Pilkington, US 1989 Richard Kaitany, Kenya 1988 Geir Kvernmo, Norway Year Overall winner, country 1993 Joseildo da Silva, Brazil 1992 John Treacy, Ireland 1991 Mark Plaatjes, S. Africa 1990 Pedro Ortiz, Colombia 1989 Art Boileau, Canada Time Top American Pos. Time 2:14:29 1 2:12:29 2:10:29 2:11:54 2:13:01 1988 Martin Mondragon, Mexico 2:10:19 Brad Hudson 6 Jeff Merganti 20 Ivan Huff 10 Steve McCormack 10 Greg Meyer 5 David Olds 17 2:20:00 2:22:29 2:17:25 2:18:51 2:16:46 2:19:24 Time Top American Pos.

Time Robert Pierce Bob Kempainen John Turtle 3 2:16:13 2 2:12:12 3 2:12:23 Paul Pilkington 3 2:15:43 Year Overall winner, country Time Top American Pos. Time Madeline Tormoen 4 Mary Thompson 22 2:53:13 2:52:57 Gretchen Lohr Janis Klecker 4 10 2:41:41 2:43:38 Time Top American Pos. Time University. more are stunned by it. I think it's good to have one or two marathons under your belt.

We have some great talent out there. Kempainen reminds me of Tony Sandoval. As medical students, running is not their No. 1 thing. But Kempainen knows he has to prepare as well as anyone.

"He's Kempainen got a great competitive background, but to run against this field could be a mind-boggier." Geoff Smith from Liverpool, who won Boston in 1984 and 1985, is now a US citizen and, at 41, is hoping to win the masters division Monday. He has an international perspective on what has happened in recent years. "It's a matter of competing with the third-world nations," says Smith. "It's economics now, and until we find someone who wants to put in the hard work and wants to win, we're not going to be able to compete. "I've talked to a few kids, and IVe said, 'Look, if you want to compete with these guys, go and see what they're That's the best advice you can give to any kid.

If you want to make a living at running as compared to work, you've got to want to work "I was giving a talk to high school kids in Rochester, N.Y, recently and one of the questions was, 'Who did you admire I said, 'Most of the people I admired were the guys I ran with back in Liver-pooU We learned to run together, but we did it for fun. Dave Murphy (a two-time Falmouth winner) and I came to America, but the 20 guys we ran with are still out running. 1993 Ed Eyestone, US 2:14:34 1992 David Mungai, Kenya 2:15:33 1991 Malcolm Norwood, Australia 2:12:10 1990 Maurilio Castillo, Mexico 2:11:01 1989 Do Jankki, US 2:12:18 1988 Daniel Boltz, Australia 2:14:10 dtofe Year Overall winner, country Source: Dr. David E. Martin, Georgia State older guys.

"The Kenyans, Japanese and Koreans all do it. It would be worthwhile. We have some people. Pilkington and Kristy Johnson won Houston. We seem to demand a winner.

For the Japanese, the marathon is important They want to be the best in the world. They had to prove it in Fukuoka. Can you imagine if it was as important here? We had 11 years between Johnny Kelley's win 1957 and Amby Burfoot's win 1968. "We ought to try some things and work with our athletes. We have isolation.

We should support our athletes. I think we should have a US distance coach. So many of our people don't show an interest in the marathon. Like Marty Liquori said, Track and field is the opera. The marathon is rock 'n' Too many of our best runners, like Lynn Jennings, Bruce Bickford and Mark Nenow, don't get involved in the marathon.

"It's a mistake. You can't just up and become an Alberto Salazar. If you wait until you're 35 or 37 like Carlos Lopes (Portugal) or Emil Zatopek before running marathons, you might be successful, but they are the few. I'm not sure why so many runners are seduced by the track. It's a choice.

Runners like Joan Benoit and me weren't fast enough to medal on the track, so it was easier for us to move up to the marathon. John Treacy (who won the Olympic marathon silver in 1984) couldn't win a medal in the 5,000 or 10,000, so he turned to the marathon. "Sometimes you're in for a rude awakening," said Rodgers. "We all fafl in the marathon, and I think a lot 1993 Luis Antonio Santos, Brazil 2:13:14 1992 Jose Cesar de Souza, Brazil 2:16:14 1991 Joseildo da Silva, Brazil 2:14:33 1990 Martin Pitayo, Mexico 2:09:41 1989 Paul Davies-Hall, G. Brit 2:11:25 1988 Alejandro Cruz, Mexico 2:10:57 Source: Dr.

David f. Martin, Georgia State 1 Time Top American Pos. Time Jeff Jacobs 6 2:15:59 No US men under 2:20 David Mora 4 2:15:44 Ed Eyestone 5 2:10:59 Ed Eyestone 4 2:14:57 BuddCoates 16 2:14:58 University. AP RLE PHOTO V336D Mark Plaatjes wins World Championship In Stuttgart In 1993..