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Lead Stories: Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Regarding London Marathon, Ryan Hall Says “Practice Makes Perfect”

Posted January 17th, 2008 at 5:00 PM by David Monti

Section: News & Results, Marathons

Running gracefully up and down the hills of Central Park at last November’s USA Olympic Team Trials - Men’s Marathon, Ryan Hall’s run to victory looked effortless. Although his 2:09:02 clocking was a Trials record, he surely would have run faster had he not spent most of the final mile celebrating. Nonetheless, he still won by more than two minutes, breezing through the final half of the race in 62:45, the fastest half-marathon ever run in Central Park.

But the Trials was only the first of three major marathons Hall will run over a period of less than ten months. Instead of sitting out the spring marathon season to rest his legs for the Olympic Marathon in Beijing on August 24, Hall has instead decided to contest the Flora London Marathon. In the April 13 race, the most competitive spring marathon in the world, Hall will be up against marathoning heavyweights like Martin Lel, Abderrahim Goumri, Felix Limo, Jaouad Gharib, and Stefano Baldini. He finished seventh there last year in 2:08:24, a USA debut record.

When asked in an extensive interview conducted by e-mail if he was concerned about packing three marathons into a relatively short period of time, Hall quipped: “Practice makes perfect.”
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