Organizers of the ING New York City Marathon coveted
Haile Gebrselassie’s participation ever since he took up marathon racing
eight years ago. Now, finally, the Ethiopian is set to join 45,000
other runners on the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge on November 7 to contest
the 2010 race.
In addition to being a massive coup for the race, it also represents somewhat of a paradigm shift for Gebrselassie.
For
the past four years, he has chased world records at the pancake-flat
Berlin Marathon each September, setting the existing record of 2:03:59
in 2008. And, he has won in Dubai on three consecutive occasions, most
recently last January. Over his marathon career, he has also racked up
an enviable record measured no less by the fact that his 10th-best time
is a staggering 2:06:52. Most of these times have been achieved with the
aid of pacemakers.
There will be no official pacemakers in New
York and the course record held by another Ethiopian, Tesfaye Jifar, is
2:07:43—surely evidence that a world record is out of the question.
There must be another reason for the departure.
“If I win in New York, it’s New York. It’s like London; it is the one everybody wants to win,” Gebrselassie says. Simple.