Haile farewell

For Jos Hermens, the 10,000m final on Friday night was an event of strangely mixed emotions. The common stereotype of an athletes’ manager is of a ruthless, hard-bitten, wheeler and dealer, someone always looking for the next best deal, seeking to promote the latest talented star to attract the attention and dollars of meet directors around the world.

Mixed emotions as Championship track career ends

But on Friday night, nothing could have been further from this managers’ mind. For more than a decade now, the jewel among Hermens’ large stable of international athletes has been Haile Gebrselassie, the Ethiopian ‘emperor’ who’s achievements on the track over the last 12 years have redefined what it is to be a successful distance runner.

On Friday, Hermens and nine members of his staff watched with a mixture of pride, elation and the heaviest of hearts as Gebrselassie staged a final act to his international championship track career worthy of an ancient Greek tragedy. The 31 year-old, who was aiming to become the first athlete ever to win three consecutive Olympic track titles, was beaten by his two young friends and training partners, Kenenisa Bekele and Sileshi Sihine – two runners also managed by Hermens. He finished a tired and emotional fifth, his crown passing on, once and for all, to Bekele.

“Watching that race was very strange for me,” says Hermens, 36 hours after the final curtain came down. “It was so hard to know what to feel. Of course, it was great to see two of our athletes winning so well. But it was also a farewell for Haile; an end of something special. I even cried a little to be honest with you.”

Haile's future is on the roads, there will be no more championship track races.

Not even his family believed he was injured

In truth both Gebrselassie and Hermens’ knew the gold medal was out of reach long before the 10,000m final started, but both were hoping they could repeat their success in the World Championships last year when Geb took the silver behind Bekele. Gebrselassie had been suffering from inflamation on his Achilles tendon for five weeks before he came to Athens, a problem that became so acute after he had won a morale boosting 5000m in London on 30 July that he had only been able to jog for 30 to 35 minutes at a time.

“You can imagine how much fitness he lost,” says Hermens. “You saw the result of that in the race.” Neither Hermens nor Gebrselassie thought he was fit enough to race in Athens, but the pressure on him to compete was intense. “It was not just from the federation,” says Hermens. “Even the president of the country called him.

“Haile didn’t want to run because he knew he was not in top fitness. But he said to me, ‘Jos, even my family don’t believe I am injured’. He had problems before Atlanta and Sydney too, and won golds both times, so people just thought it was the same. They said: ‘Hey, you did it then, why not now?’”

Gebrselassie’s heroic performances in the 1996 and 2000 Olympic Games will live long in the minds of all who saw them, and have already gone down as two of the greatest distance races of all time. For all the brilliance of his 18 World records and four consecutive World 10,000m titles, it is those Olympic finals that will transcend the record books and live in the folk memory of the sport for years to come.

He may have finished ‘only’ fifth here in Athens, but Gebrselassie’s decision to run on Friday, albeit under duress, provided another iconic Olympic moment as his two teammates slowed the race down to give him a chance of a medal, putting their own victory in jeopardy.

No extra damage but road race plans are on hold

Thankfully, according to Hermens, Gebrselassie’s planned road racing career was never put under serious threat by his painful efforts to give Ethiopia a clean sweep on Friday, although he did spend until midnight the following day visiting specialist sports physios in Athens to ensure the strain of Friday’s race had caused no further damage. Hermens and Gebrselassie sought out three of the most highly respected sports doctors in the world on Saturday – Dr Andreas Goessete from Switzerland, and Drs Mueller Wohlfahrt and Lothar Heinrich from Germany – all of whom gave optimistic verdicts.

“They told us the damage has not got any worse,” said Hermens. “Haile just needs a break now. He will stay here in Athens during the Games to be treated because all the good people are here.”

His future career may not be in jeopardy, but Gebrselassie’s scheduled outings at the Great North Run and the Amsterdam Marathon, both planned for this autumn, are in serious doubt.

“We are talking to the organisers this week,” says Hermens. “But really he needs to take the time to recover and, for the first time, we have time. There’s no need to hurry. The injury has to heal completely.”

In the past, says Hermens, Gebrselassie’s famous commitment to reaching his targets means he has often started running again before he’s fully recovered. “Haile is such a very focused and goal oriented person. His mind is so strong, which is part of what makes him so fantastic as a runner, but it also means he will go through the pain when he should be resting.”

One of the things that has made Gebrselassie such a special star is that his ‘strong mind’ is allayed to one of the biggest hearts in sport. His genuine warmth and humanity, so often displayed to the world through that wonderful smile, has set him apart from many others on the international stage.

More like a father to Haile

On Saturday, as they scurried around Athens going from doctor to doctor, Hermens read out newspaper reports of the previous night’s drama, pointing out to Gebrselassie the legacy he has left to track and field. “I told him, ‘Hey Haile, this is what it means to people’,” says Hermans. “He knows it – maybe not like you and I – but even yesterday, people were coming up to him all the time. He’s modest, but he’s very proud too.”

At times, Hermens’ relationship to his most famous client seems less like manager and athlete than father and son. Hermens’ respect for Geb is not the cold assessment of an agent eyeing a sporting talent, but built of intimate knowledge of an “incredible person”. Gebrselassie has now lost his two most precious World records, his World title and his Olympic crown to Bekele, but he passes on the mantle with joy not resentment.

“He is not the type of athlete who doesn’t want anyone to be better than him,” says Hermens. “He’s delighted with Kenny’s (Bekele) success. He guides him every day, not just in athletics but in life. He is a very wise and responsible role model.”

Hermens believes Geb has the kind of wisdom that will one day make his a great politician. “He surely has to be President of his country sooner or later,” he says.” To me he is like a Mandela, he really could be that important for his country. He has the same charisma, warmth, empathy and passion, but also the same practical wisdom, a wisdom that doesn’t come from education.”

Gebrselassie’s commitment to his country is in no doubt. Indeed, it drove him to attempt the impossible on Friday in a race, he knew, would be of huge significance. Afterwards, he was drained and shattered. No-one can remember the last time he finished fifth. But by the end of those 25 laps his position hardly mattered.

“It was very emotional for him,” says Hermens of Gebrselassie’s reaction after the race. “He knew it was his farewell. For him it was such a huge step. He can always look back, but leaving something behind that has been so important to him is hard. Afterwards, he was emotional, yes, very.

“But he was also relieved. He knew he was saying goodbye and he knew he wasn’t going to get gold. So at the end there was relief. It was like he could say, ‘OK, that is over and done with, now let’s move on.’”

“After Sydney and Edmonton he had plans to move up to the marathon too. But things have been so up and down in the last two years. Now the decision is clear: track running is over and he is looking forward to four or five wonderful years of road racing. He has a lot of new goals and challenges, and is highly motivated. Definitely, this time he is really ready.”

Come with me, one last time

As his speed has waned over the last couple of years, some people have suggested that Gebrselassie should have allowed his astonishing victory over Paul Tergat in Sydney to be his final scene on the track. But Hermans doesn’t agree.

“You couldn’t write a better story book ending than what happened on Friday,” he says. “The way the other guys went back for him. That wasn’t planned, it was just their feelings for him.

“Afterwards I said to Kenny, ‘You are the new king, but what you did was fantastic’. It was the young king going back to the old king and saying, ‘Hey, come with me, one last time’. It was unbelievable. And it was good for the sport too. It showed it is not just about gold medals, but human beings.”

In Haile’s case, incredible ones.


Matthew Brown for the IAAF