Bedford speaks out
Lots of trade-mark hair...
It’s not off-road, but it’s very interesting. The London Marathon race director doesn’t think that the British marathon scene is as strong as it was 20 years ago, feels that the Beijing Olympic marathon wasn’t up to scratch, and that Mo Farah has “some chance” of winning the 2012 Olympic marathon.
In a fascinating article Dave Bedford speaks to Mike Rowbottom at inside the games, with the interview starting on the subject of the 2012 Olympic marathon and the possibilities (probabilities) of the LM team organising the event. However, by the end of the article Bedford is onto the lack of depth and talent in British endurance running.
With 2008 winners Mikitenko and Lel
It gets even juicier when he speaks about the decline and under-performance in the UK in the last few decades, basically laying it at the feet of poor coaching (esp. in Mo Farah’s case) and ‘lazy’ athletes who don’t put in the effort in training to take them to the world stage.
With a couple of obvious exceptions, the reason why British runners don’t run as fast as we were doing 30 years ago is because they don’t train as hard. They are not prepared to train as hard. And what we are seeing now is what happens if you only commit to a certain level. Someone training today can run a mile in 3.58. But someone today is not prepared to do the training that allows you to run 3.42. Life and health have got better, medical support has got better, but at the same time the commitment, the desire to do whatever is necessary has drifted away. Medical improvements are only papering over the cracks
…and goes on to say
There’s no question about it – if you got the 20 top British male distance runners and put them on the training for 3-4 years that a dozen of us plus were doing in the ‘70s they would be running more than a minute faster than they are now.
Bedford in his heyday
Dave Bedford is a colourful character, has done a huge amount for running in the UK – through the London Marathon – and in his exploits during the 1970’s when some said he had the talent to win Olympic gold, but never delivered. Guys like Bedford and Ian Stewart should be listened to, they have done the hard miles and been close to the top of the game. UK runners should sit up and take note, before the Africans run off even further into the sunset…
