News20 Apr 2006


In London, Kastor downplays favourite role

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Deena Kastor wins the 2005 Chicago Marathon (© Victah Sailer)

London, UKEarly on Sunday morning, Deena Kastor will take one final glance over her shoulder at her bedroom in the Tower Hotel, close the door and then start looking ahead to becoming only the seventh woman in history to run a marathon in less than 2hr 20min.

Kastor, the Olympic Marathon bronze medallist in Athens two years ago, wears the mantle of race favourite for this Sunday's Flora London Marathon slightly uneasily, although it is well-earned after the manner of the American's recent performances, including victory in Chicago last year.

But in the absence of the injured World record-holder, Paula Radcliffe, Kastor's request for a male pacemaker to take her to halfway in 69min 45sec, and her stated intention to run negative splits suggests that, however "more open" the women's race may now be in the absence of Britain's IAAF World champion, Kastor's rivals such as Kenya's Margaret Okayo, Constantina Tomescu-Dita, of Romania, and Ethiopia's former World 10,000m champion, Berhane Adere, making her "serious" marathon debut, will have to have the stamina and determination, as well as the desire, to keep with Kastor all the way to the finish in The Mall.

The Mall's most famous local resident, Queen Elizabeth II, is celebrating her 80th birthday this week, and her neighbourhood is already decked out in red, white and blue to mark the occasion. Kastor wants to make Sunday's race a procession for herself.

Kastor - 'With Paula out it's changed the dynamic a bit'

“Paula was absolutely the pre-race favourite and when I heard she was not running I was pretty disappointed," Kastor said today. "I chose the London Marathon because of the quality of the field and was excited to come and race against the best - with Paula out of the race it’s changed the dynamic a bit."

Kastor believes that the absence of Radcliffe makes the event much more wide open. "She always takes it out aggressively. It will probably be more tactical now."

A return to 'patient' tactics

Kastor, 33, admits that her own "aggressive" running, where she "threw in some faster miles in the middle of the race" in Chicago last October, as she made a bid to better the US record 2:21:16 which she set when third in London in 2003 "pretty much back-fired" as she struggled to hold off the fast-closing Tomescu-Dita by just 4sec at the finish. “I ran out of speed at the end of the race.”

Today, she indicated clearly that she would not be doing that on Sunday, with a return to the patient tactics that won her the Olympic bronze in Athens.

"All of my preparation has been about running in control and doing a negative split," she said. “It will be a hard adjustment to make but hopefully it will be successful.”

“I always aimed to run fast here anyway. I am excited about my fitness levels and am definitely in shape to break 2:20."

She welcomed the presence of male pacemakers in the race.  “I always train with a group so having the men there will ensure I have people around me like that. It’s something I tend to thrive off.”

But Sunday's race could be the American's last at the marathon for two years. "I'm forgetting about the marathon from Monday," said the woman whose meticulous preparations see her live much of the year at 8,000ft altitude at Mammoth Lakes, California, but who descends some 3,000ft each day for her training runs, many of which still have to be done wearing specially adapted crampons to allow her to run in the snow. Kastor is already looking ahead to bidding for another Olympic Marathon medal in Beijing, and she aims to do so by working on her track speed in the interim.

“I am going to cut down on my running and get some speed back into my legs,” she said.

With such a public race plan for Sunday, Kastor has laid herself open to attacks by her rivals. Certainly Tomescu-Dita, winner of the IAAF World Half-Marathon in Edmonton, plans to exploit the information to her own ends. "I won’t go out as fast as Deena, but I think I can catch her," the Romanian said.

“We’ll see who’s the best. The marathon is a long race and a lot of athletes here are very strong. I just want to produce my best for this race.”

With Margaret Okayo - the winner here two years ago - and Adere also likely to be in the mix, Sunday's race now offers a compellingly competitive contest.

Steven Downes for the IAAF

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