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Lead Stories: Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Short of Conditioning, Keflezeghi Withdraws from London Marathon

Posted March 18th, 2008 at 11:45 AM by David Monti

Section: News & Results, Marathons, Olympics

Meb Keflezighi with wife Yordanos and daughter Sara in Honolulu Short of conditioning, reigning Olympic Marathon silver medalist Meb Keflezighi of San Diego, Calif., has withdrawn from next month’s Flora London Marathon. In a statement released by his brother and manager, Merhawi, the man who has twice made the podium of the ING New York City Marathon confirmed what had been rumored for several weeks.

“Meb Keflezighi has decided to pass up on the 2008 Flora London Marathon,” read the statement. “Meb is short of the conditioning he and Coach Bob Larsen would like before racing in one of the finest and competitive marathons in the world. Meb and Coach Larsen feel it would be too risky to rush the workouts in preparation for London, during an Olympic year. While Meb is disappointed he will not have a chance to set a significant personal best in London, he realizes it is better to be cautious during the Olympic year. Meb will now give his complete focus on preparing for the USATF Olympic Trials.”
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Increasing Stride Length

Posted May 18th, 2007 at 12:30 PM by Jim Fortner

Section: Running & Training, Training Tips

Jim Fortner is a weekly, guest contributor. Make sure to also check out his own personal running and advice site: “Jim2’s Running Page”.

Stride length should not be increased by reaching your foot forward. That only moves your foot plant point in front of your center of gravity and causes a braking action, slows you down and adds to injury-causing stresses. The desired ways to increase stride length are to increase the time your foot is planted on the ground, thus delaying the push-off point, and a stronger push-off, which will increase forward momentum.

I believe there are four primary ways to do this. One is to increase leg strength, which Norman suggested and you have explained probably isn’t what’s holding you back. The other three ways are through improving running form, speed work and stretching.

Running form - The key here is to keep your center of gravity forward, especially your hips.
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Podcast 41: Post-London Interview with Meb Keflezighi

Posted April 23rd, 2007 at 1:55 PM by Adam Jacobs

Section: News & Results, Marathons, Special Features, Interviews, Podcasts

Episode 41 of The Final Sprint Podcast features my exclusive post- London Marathon interview with 2004 Olympic marathon Silver medalist Meb Keflezighi. Meb, who also joined us a few days ago for Episode 40, was an American favorite at yesterday’s London Marathon and ran among the leaders until an injury forced him to withdraw from the race.

In the interview Meb takes us through his race: from the pre-race prayers with Ryan Hall and his family podtrac_survey_120x60_v2 - to what went wrong, trying to fight through the pain and the disappointment of being forced to withdraw in order to prevent serious injury.

Download the podcast to hear Meb discuss these topics, as well as, the effects of the warm weather; why so many other elites were forced to drop out (i.e. - Stefano Baldini [hamstring], Khalid Khannouchi [foot] and Haile Gebrselassie [breathing/chest]); the record-setting, debut performance of young teammate Ryan Hall; and turning his focus to the 2007 Olympic Marathon Trials!

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Host: Adam Jacobs
Guest: Meb Keflezighi
Producer: Greg Cherniet
Music: Ryan Ahlwardt & Darnell Perkins
File size: 11.1 MB
Length: 00:16:10

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Will achilles tendinitis
ever heal?

Posted December 8th, 2006 at 3:00 PM by Martha Jones

Section: Running & Training, Injury & Rehab, Health & Fitness, Injury & Rehab

Achilles tendinitis means you feel pain in the large tendon that extends from in the back of your heel to your calf muscle. It hurts most when you get up in the morning and when you start to walk or run. It will heal only if you stop running and find another sport that doesn’t hurt when you do it, such as cycling, swimming, or pulling on a rowing machine. Read the rest of this entry »