Compiled and edited by David Prokop, Editor of BestRoadRaces.com 
(photo 2013 CIM marathon)

HE’S LOVIN’ IT

“(The Double) is a very good race, I love it! When you finish the 10K and you have to recover, you know you still have 5K to run. When you run the 5K, that pain (of recovery) is gone. And when you finish (the 5K), you feel better than if you just ran one race. (The feeling of accomplishment) is almost like you ran a marathon.”

-- Julius Koskei (pronounced Kos-kay) of Kenya, expressing his feelings about the Double Road Race™, a few weeks after he set a new world record in the event at the Indianapolis Double, Aug. 11, when he ran the 10K in 29:48 and the 5K in 14:43 for an aggregate time of 44:31:09. The 31-year-old road racing veteran became the first person ever to go under 30 minutes for the 10K of the Double.

THE BEST IS YET TO COME

“I think I could do 28:50 for the 10K and 14:10 for the 5K.”

-- Julius Koskei again, when asked how fast he thinks he could run the Double under optimal circumstances, i.e., if he was specifically trained for the event, at the peak of fitness and running all out.

REALITY BITES   

“On paper it’s possible (to run 28:50 and 14:10 in the Double), but in reality it’s much more difficult to run a good 5K after running the 10K than you might think. Like when I looked at (Liudmila Stepanova’s) record beforehand, I thought, ‘That’s a pretty soft record.’ But after running at San Juan Bautista, I have so much respect for what she did. (My) 10K felt extremely relaxed until the last mile, which was uphill. The 5K was a bigger struggle than I expected, to be truthful. Considering I’ve run 15:49 (for the 5K) and I ran 17:21 at San Juan Bautista, it shows how hard it is to come back and run a 5K after a 10K. No one practices that.”

--Sarah Crouch, 24, of South Lake Tahoe, Calif., the women’s world recordholder in the Double Road Race™, when told that Julius Koskei had said that at his best he thought he could run 28:50 for the 10K and 14:10 for the 5K in the Double. Crouch set a new women’s world record in the San Juan Bautista Double on Sept. 28 when she ran the 10K in 35:02 and the 5K in 17:21 for an aggregate time of 52:23. 

SELF-AWARENESS AND CONFIDENCE

“When I go (make a move), I know I can hold the pace to the finish.”

-- Geoffrey Mutai of Kenya, after winning the ING New York City Marathon, Sun., Nov. 3. He had surged at about mile 21, which immediately splintered the lead group and opened an initial gap for him. His countrymen Stanley Biwott soon regained contact, but then faded and Mutai ran to victory on his own.  In Kenya Geoffrey Mutai trains with such remarkable marathoners as new world recordholder Wilson Kipsang (2:03:23) and Dennis Kimetto, who has run 2:03:45.  Of course, Mutai himself has run the fastest marathon ever, the 2:03:02 at Boston in 2011 (4:42 per mile!) – a time that has not been ratified as a world record because of the elevation drop on the Boston course.                             

DARING THE IMPOSSIBLE

“I felt really comfortable out there so I hope that bodes well for lacing (‘em) up again tonight. That’s what it’s all about, just trying to get out there and see if you can do a little more than you think you can and hopefully inspiring people to push themselves.”                                                                                                              
– Michael Wardian, 39, of Arlington, Va., after winning the Rock ‘N’ Roll San Antonio Marathon, Sun., Nov. 17 in 2:31:19, then jumping on a plane and flying to Las Vegas where he would run the Rock ‘N’ Roll Las Vegas Marathon that evening! At Las Vegas the three-time U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials qualifier with a marathon best of 2:17:49 would complete his truly epic challenge by finishing 10^th in 2:57:56 despite experiencing stomach issues.

LETTING THE RACE COME TO YOU

“I was a minute behind and I started cutting it down. I was running pretty consistent and I was hoping he would just come back and it worked out.”

– Michael Wardian again, after winning at San Antonio, describing how he let Moses Luevano, 21, of Boerne, Tex., build a big lead before catching him at 17 miles and proceeding to the finish line on his own, winning by more than three minutes, although it wasn’t necessarily an easy effort given the warm temperature and high humidity. Luevano would finish second in 2:34:44.

A MAN WITH THE KICK

“ I’m a track runner. I knew the closer and closer we got to the finish, the more it was my race. I had a kick and went for it with one mile to go.”                                                       
-- Jason Brosseau, 28, of Colorado Springs, Colo., after winning the Rock ‘n’ Roll Las Vegas Marathon, Sun., Nov. 17 in 2:35:26, pulling away from 46-year-old Andrew Duncan of Las Vegas over the final mile. Duncan finished 10 seconds back in 2:35:36.

It is a lot warmer than last week and the forecast for the Double looks good...good quotes again!!!!
Bob Anderson 12/17/13 12:04 pm

It is a lot warmer than last week and the forecast for the Double looks good...good quotes again!!!!
Bob Anderson 12/17/13 12:04 pm

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WORKING TOGETHER

“From mile 16 to 23 I was working with (Andrew Duncan). Great guy! He kept talking the whole way. (After we got the lead from Yon Yilma at 23 miles) he was motivating me and told me (Yilma) was coming back. I wasn’t even looking (back). I was just trying to stay alive. But him telling me the leader was coming back just kept me rolling and rolling.”                                                                                                                                     
– Jason Brosseau again, describing how he and Andrew Duncan worked in tandem as Yon Yilma, 25, of Edmonds, Wash., opened a gap and led for most of the race, passing the halfway mark in 1:13:29 and 20 miles in 1:55:45, before he faded. Brosseau and Duncan, who were running together at 20 miles (1:58:27), caught Yilma at 23 miles and battled the rest of the way before Brosseau pulled away in the last mile.

THE BRIGHT LIGHTS

“My goal was to win this race again. I love the lights in Las Vegas. The lights give me power.”                                                                                                                                  
-- Rumanian Olympian Nuta Olaru, 43, who now lives in Boulder, Colo., after winning the women’s race in the Rock ‘n’ Roll Las Vegas Marathon, Sun., Nov. 17 for the second year in a row with a time of 2:58:46. Olaru won last year’s race by a mere two seconds, but this year she finished more than six minutes ahead of the second-place finisher, Jennifer Benitez of Carol Stream, Ill., who ran 3:04:48.

NEW DEFINITION OF FUN                                                                                                 

“It’s a lot to do that (two marathons) back to back. So I was pretty happy (with my   finish). I felt kind of good, I ran a pretty fast first half (1:18:23), but my stomach started to go early and my gel was just sloshing around, and then I had to stop a few times to go to the bathroom, which is a no-no in the marathon. I’m so happy to break three (hours) with all those issues, but, man, it was fun (running two marathons back to back).”                                                                                                                
– Michael Wardian, after completing his second marathon in one day on Sunday, Nov. 17 by finishing 10^th in the Rock ‘N’ Roll Las Vegas Marathon in a more than respectable (under the circumstances) 2:57:56. Earlier in the day, of course, he had won the Rock ‘N’ Roll San Antonio Marathon in 2:31:19. Only 10 hours later he would be on the starting line in Las Vegas! A truly hard-to-believe endurance challenge and accomplishment. In running back-to-back marathons in 2:31:19 and 2:57:56, he raced 52.4 miles, at an average pace of 6:15 per mile.  His total time for those 52.4 miles was 5:29:15. Given his pace per mile, he would have run 50 miles in the vicinity of 5:13:45! And if you split those two marathons into four half-marathon segments, he would have averaged about 1:21 for each one!

ROAD WARRIOR                                                                                 

“I am always up for challenges, and, heck, yes, I would do it again.”                                
– Michael Wardian again, when asked after finishing in Las Vegas whether he would ever consider attempting such a feat again. And why not? If it wasn’t for an upset stomach, something perfectly understandable in a situation like this, he might have indeed accomplished something hard to fathom, which is win two marathons in one day in quality times! Surmising what might have brought about his stomach problems, he thought he probably drank too much water between the two races and didn’t eat early enough before the Las Vegas run. Wardian has run several back-to-back races, but never before had he run two marathons in one day. Next year he hopes to win South Africa’s Comrades Marathon, which is approximately 56 miles in length and therefore not a marathon at all, but the world’s most famous ultramarathon.

FIRST VICTORY IN AMERICA

“At mile 16 I felt like I had the win if I just continued to run my race. I was excited to win my first race here in the United States.”                                                                       
– Ethiopia’s Abebe Mekuriya, after winning the 20^th annual Philadelphia Marathon Sun., Nov. 17 in 2:17:34. His time was less than a minute off the race record of 2:16:47 set by Joseph Ndiritu of Kenya in 2003.

SLEEPLESS IN THE TWIN CITIES

“If I didn’t have to sleep in the airport (Friday night), I hope I could have beaten him (Weldon Kirui). When I tried to push in the race, my body was very stiff.”

-- Julius Koskei of Kenya, speaking the day after the California International Marathon, run in freezing temperatures in Sacramento, Calif., Sun., Dec. 8, where he was outkicked  at the end of the race by his younger countryman Weldon Kirui, 25, as they ran 2:14:31 and 2:14:33 respectively. Despite the fact he says he doesn’t run well in the cold, Koskei might indeed have emerged victorious if he hadn’t been forced to spend the night at the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport when his plane arrived too late for him to catch his outgoing flight on Friday evening. By the time he arrived in Sacramento, it was 5:40 Saturday evening – and the race was the next morning, in the type of freezing temperatures he never experiences where he lives and trains in Kenya! Still he ran 2:14:33, losing by only two seconds. His personal best in the marathon is 2:10:15, which he ran in Frankfurt, Germany in 2008. As mentioned previously, he set a world record of 44:31:09 in the Double Road Race™ in Indianapolis, Ind., on Aug. 11 by running the 10K in 29:48 and the 5K in 14:43. He will run in the second annual Pleasanton (Calif.) Double, Sun., Dec. 22.

ON A WARMER DAY…

“Maybe we could have run around 2 hours, 10 minutes.”                                                   
– Julius Koskei, when asked how fast he thinks he and Weldon Kirui could have run the California International Marathon on a warmer, more suitable day, especially for Kenyan runners unaccustomed to the cold.

CALIFORNIA FREEZIN’

“(The cold) affected me a lot. Even now I’m not recovered, because when you run in the cold you use a lot of energy.”                                                                                                 
– Julius Koskei again, the day after the Sacramento International Marathon, responding to a question of how much the cold affected him in the race.