The secret of the world's top marathoner: It's not how far; it's how fast

Published May 2, 2004 12:00AM


Women Outside, Fall 1998Strategies Teglamaniacal The secret of the world’s top marathoner: It’s not how far; it’s how fast By John Brant GEAR \| TRAVEL \| FITNESS \| HEALTH \| STYLE FITNESS: Longevity \| STRATEGIES \| Regimens World records come and go, but stress fractures of the vertebrae, chronic leg problems, and yes, menstrual cramps can forge an icon. Such is the case with four-foot-eleven, 86-pound Tegla Loroupe, presently the fastest female marathoner in history: Last April in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, she bested Ingrid Kristiansen’s 13-year-old world record. Loroupe, a 25-year-old Kenyan, lowered the standard by an impressive 19 seconds, to 2:20:47, bringing her closer than any woman has been to shattering the elusive 2:20 barrier in marathoning. How she got there in seven weeks is where the icon-forging comes in. Last November, at the start of the New York City Marathon — which Loroupe won in 1994 and 1995 — she unexpectedly began her period. Beset by excruciating cramps, she managed to finish a disappointing (for her) seventh. And the cramps didn’t fade. Days later, she consulted a physician in New York who concluded that cramps weren’t her problem; rather, stress fractures in her spine were. He told her to wear a back brace for 23 hours a day for several weeks. Loroupe took about three weeks off from training, but the leg problems started to take their toll; for the next three months, she was not her running self. In late January, she ran a marathon in Osaka, Japan, eight minutes behind her personal best — an eternity in this sport. The regimens of most elite runners can seem overwhelming, even nutty. On one end of the spectrum, Uta Pippig, Loroupe’s rival for most-decorated active female marathoner, runs as many as 170 scientifically calibrated miles a week. Loroupe, on the other hand, has always been much more blithe. “I run because I like to, not because I am forced,” she says. She’s so loose that she can’t easily quantify her training program, though it seems she typically does about half of Pippig’s weekly routine. Her constants are an easy run of nine miles or so each morning, followed by a breakfast of a porridge called uji (Kenya’s national carbo-loading secret); once a week, she’ll run 15×1,000-meter intervals. If her training can be defined at all, it’s by the flexibility with which she views it. So when Loroupe decided, only seven weeks beforehand, that she wanted to defend her title in Rotterdam, her solution was typically inventive. Under the guidance of her coach, Volker Wagner, she focused not on endurance, but on speed work: lots of intervals, lots of sprinting, a long run only twice a week. And from her lowest point as a runner, Loroupe rallied in spectacular fashion, without sacrificing her health, sanity, or abiding joy in her sport. “We didn’t increase her total mileage that much,” Wagner says. “She just ran those miles hard.” At the race itself, Loroupe was still 40 seconds off world-record pace with only 12 kilometers remaining. So as the crowd roared its encouragement and approval, she began running … hard. She made up the time, finished with tears in her eyes, and realized that her ambitions have not yet begun to crest. “The last few kilometers,” she says, “there was a very strong headwind. Without the wind I might have run 2:18.” Her next chance to do so: the New York City Marathon in November.

Women Outside, Fall 1998Strategies
Teglamaniacal
The secret of the world’s top marathoner: It’s not how far; it’s how fast
By John Brant
GEAR | TRAVEL | FITNESS | HEALTH |
STYLE

FITNESS: Longevity | STRATEGIES | Regimens

World records come and go, but stress fractures of the vertebrae, chronic leg problems, and yes, menstrual cramps can forge an icon. Such is the case with four-foot-eleven, 86-pound Tegla Loroupe, presently the fastest female marathoner in history: Last April in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, she bested Ingrid Kristiansen’s 13-year-old world
record. Loroupe, a 25-year-old Kenyan, lowered the standard by an impressive 19 seconds, to 2:20:47, bringing her closer than any woman has been to shattering the elusive 2:20 barrier in marathoning. How she got there in seven weeks is where the icon-forging comes in. Last November, at the start of the New York City Marathon — which Loroupe won in 1994 and 1995 — she unexpectedly began her period. Beset by excruciating cramps, she managed to finish a disappointing (for her) seventh. And the cramps didn’t fade. Days later, she consulted a physician in New York who concluded that cramps weren’t her problem; rather, stress fractures
in her spine were. He told her to wear a back brace for 23 hours a day for several weeks. Loroupe took about three weeks off from training, but the leg problems started to take their toll; for the next three months, she was not her running self. In late January, she ran a marathon in Osaka, Japan, eight minutes behind her personal best — an eternity in this sport. The regimens of most elite runners can seem overwhelming, even nutty. On one end of the spectrum, Uta Pippig, Loroupe’s rival for most-decorated active female marathoner, runs as many as 170 scientifically calibrated miles a week. Loroupe, on the other hand, has always been much more blithe. “I run because I like to, not because I am forced,” she says. She’s so loose that she
can’t easily quantify her training program, though it seems she typically does about half of Pippig’s weekly routine. Her constants are an easy run of nine miles or so each morning, followed by a breakfast of a porridge called uji (Kenya’s national carbo-loading secret); once a week, she’ll run 15×1,000-meter intervals. If her training can be defined at all, it’s by the
flexibility with which she views it. So when Loroupe decided, only seven weeks beforehand, that she wanted to defend her title in Rotterdam, her solution was typically inventive. Under the guidance of her coach, Volker Wagner, she focused not on endurance, but on speed work: lots of intervals, lots of sprinting, a long run only twice a week. And from her lowest point as a runner, Loroupe rallied in spectacular
fashion, without sacrificing her health, sanity, or abiding joy in her sport. “We didn’t increase her total mileage that much,” Wagner says. “She just ran those miles hard.” At the race itself, Loroupe was still 40 seconds off world-record pace with only 12 kilometers remaining. So as the crowd roared its encouragement and approval, she began running … hard. She made up the time, finished with tears in her eyes, and realized that her ambitions have not yet begun to crest. “The last few kilometers,” she says, “there was a very strong headwind.
Without the wind I might have run 2:18.” Her next chance to do so: the New York City Marathon in November.