Olympian Meb Keflezighi wants to blend in with the crowd at Cherry Blossom race
By Kelyn Soong March 31 at 1:25 PM
Imagine diving into a pool and swimming alongside Michael Phelps at a
swim meet; or suiting up to play in the same basketball game as LeBron
James; or perhaps bouncing nervously opposite the net of Roger Federer
at a tennis tournament.
Chances are those scenarios are purely hypothetical, the dreams of
average athletes worldwide who can only wonder what it’s like to
compete against or alongside the best. But on Sunday morning in
Washington, an elite runner will be among the nearly 17,000 amateurs
at the Cherry Blossom Ten Mile Run.
For a group of runners, Olympian Meb Keflezighi will be their guide,
giving them words of encouragement and inspiring them with his smooth,
effortless stride. For at least one morning, there will be no barriers
between a professional and his fans.
[I trained for a day with professional runners. It wasn’t pretty.]
Less than two months after qualifying for his fourth Olympic team at
the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials in Los Angeles, Keflezighi will be
making his 10-mile road race debut in the nation’s capital. The event,
which is in its 44th year and also includes a 5K run-walk and 1K kids’
run, has been on his bucket list for years, but it has often
conflicted with other races on his schedule.
Meb Keflezighi shakes hands with spectators after winning the 2014
Boston Marathon. (CJ Gunther/EPA)
With the Olympics in August and the trials behind him, Keflezighi saw
an opportunity to come to District, where his extended family lives,
and use the 10-mile race as a tempo run. Keflezighi took three weeks
off to recover after his second-place finish at the trials in
mid-February and only recently began running 10 miles or more during
workouts.
On Sunday, Keflezighi will be pacing runners in the
six-minute-per-mile pace group with the intention of helping others
break the one-hour mark.
“I love doing those kind of things and interacting and hearing amazing
stories,” Keflezighi said. “People enjoy running next to me, and I
definitely sure enjoy doing that.”
Now known simply as a “Meb,” the 40-year-old Keflezighi has not always
been the gregarious personality that he grew into as his running
career progressed. Born in Eritrea as one of 11 children, Keflezighi
and his family moved to San Diego in 1987 when Keflezighi was just 12
years old.
Sporting a large Afro and struggling with the language barrier,
Keflezighi kept to himself. It wasn’t until physical education class
in middle school that the ice began to break and Keflezighi, who
became a U.S. citizen in 1998, discovered his passion for running.
“Throughout Meb’s life, he’s just kind of blossomed into being the
public figure that he is,” said younger brother Hawi Keflezighi, who
is also Meb’s agent. “And as he’s gotten more popular, starting from
his middle school all the way to high school to college and after
college, it’s kind of been a bridge for people to get to know him and
for Meb to get to know other people.”
[Q&A: At age 40, Meb Keflezighi still runs to win]
Meb Keflezighi during the USOC Olympic Media Summit on March 7. (Todd
Warshaw/Getty Images for the U.S.O.C.)
Phil Stewart, the Cherry Blossom Ten Mile Run race director since
1991, met Keflezighi briefly in 2007 at the U.S. Olympic Marathon
Trials held in New York City. They kept in touch and Keflezighi
eventually told Stewart of his desire to run the race in D.C. one day.
The Cherry Blossom event has attracted high-profile elite runners and
is part of the Professional Road Running Organization Championship
Circuit. Former winners include Ethiopian Lelisa Desisa (2011), a
two-time Boston Marathon champion, and American Bill Rodgers, a
four-time winner (1978-1981) who is best known for his four Boston
Marathon victories. Olympic gold medalist Joan Benoit Samuelson, 58,
is expected to run the women’s race this year.
But even with the prestige, Keflezighi stands out.
“The sport is much bigger than it was in the 1970s,” Stewart said. “In
many ways, Meb has transcended from someone revered in running circles
to even broader. The American public and most of the people know him
as Meb; they may not even know his last name.”
Ben Beach remembers running next to Rodgers one year nearly a decade
ago. Beach, a 66-year-old Bethesda resident who is the only person to
have run all 43 editions of the 10-mile run, recalls that the former
Olympian snuck by him over the Memorial Bridge.
It was a fleeting moment, but one that Beach still recalls fondly.
Beach, who has also run 48 consecutive Boston Marathons, understands
just how special running with a professional runner can be.
“It’s exciting to run with somebody who’s an Olympian and who’s
outstanding,” he said. “I think it’s great that he’s doing that.”
[Keflezighi surprises Hilary Dionne at Boston finish line]
Heading into the home stretch at this year’s U.S. Olympic Marathon
Trials on the winding roads of downtown Los Angeles, Keflezighi
clutched onto a small American flag with one hand and repeatedly
pumped his fist in the air with the other.
He pointed at spectators along the course and implored them to cheer
even louder. They obliged.
This is the Keflezighi that fans have come to adore — the one with
unbridled enthusiasm even when the stakes are the highest. In addition
to his silver medal from the 2004 Athens Olympics, Keflezighi became
the first American man to the win the Boston Marathon since 1983 when
he won the race in 2014, one year after the bombings — further
cementing his status as an emotional and fan favorite.
At the Las Vegas Rock ‘n’ Roll Half Marathon last year, Keflezighi
paced a group that included a woman who handed him her phone. Her
husband was stationed in Afghanistan and she wanted Keflezighi to
leave him a voicemail. The woman began to cry tears of joy as
Keflezighi thanked her husband for his service. It is moments like
these that Keflezighi says he treasures.
“I really enjoy it, I really do,” he said. “Whether it’s hearing those
stories or trying to give them feedback on their form or mechanics and
things like that. . . . I love it personally. I enjoy winning. I enjoy
going very fast, and I try to run to the podium or finish top 10, and
things like that. But there’s also another natural high just running
with people.”
Kelyn Soong is a news aide in the sports department. He writes about
tennis and running and contributes to The Early Lead and D.C. Sports
Bog.
Received on Fri Apr 01 2016 - 21:49:45 EDT