Ryan Hall Ready to Return to Streets of New York for 2011 New York Half Marathon
By Chris Lotsbom
March 17, 2011
(c) 2011 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved
New York (17-Mar) -- Storylines flood the sixth running of the NYC Half-Marathon, which will be contested here in the streets of the Big
Apple on Sunday. One of them surrounds Ryan Hall, the American record
holder in the half-marathon, who will be racing for only the second time
since deciding to coach himself at the end of last year. He last raced
here at the 2009 ING New York City Marathon where he finished fourth.
"I'm excited for this race," said Hall, who has been training in
Flagstaff, Ariz., since breaking away from the Mammoth Track Club and
coach Terrence Mahon.
Hall said his transition from being part of the Mammoth Lakes, Calif., team to being self-coached has gone smoothly.
"Sometimes I think you're in a situation that's not working out and the
temptation is to change everything, when really you just need to tweak
it five percent," Hall continued. "I learned a lot from Terrence over
my years there, and what I did worked initially and worked for a while.
But I just needed to kind of tweak it a little."
The biggest change for Hall has been the extra recovery which he has
allowed after workouts. Taking more easy days and having more
flexibility has given Hall the freedom to do what his body tells him, he
said.
"Terrence was really good about taking my feedback and applying it to
workouts. But I knew every Tuesday was an interval day, and if you
didn't do your intervals Tuesday then you missed your interval chance,"
described Hall. "I felt like we were really married to this seven-day
schedule, where it was like we had to fit in intervals, tempo run, and
long run in seven days, and I needed more rest between workouts." He
added: "But I loved training with the Mammoth crew."
Hall, who is preparing for the Boston Marathon next month, is running in
his second race of 2011. He placed second in 62:20 at the USA
Half-Marathon Championships in Houston on January 29.
"I'm realizing more and more that getting completely healthy is a
process, and it takes time and patience," Hall added. "Maybe more time
than I initially thought, but every week is getting better and better."
Hall said he does not plan to return a month early to Boston like he did
last year before running 2:08:41 to become the fastest American ever to
run the Hopkinton to Boston race. Instead, he will come from altitude a
few days prior to the race, something he is testing out here.
On Sunday, Hall will be facing an extremely talented American and
international field, which features eleven Olympians and seven men who
have run sub-61 minutes. Former ING New York City Marathon champion Meb
Keflezighi, three-time Olympian Abdi Abdirahman, and half-marathon
debutant Galen Rupp are also competing. International entrants include
Gebre Gebremariam (Ethiopia), Mo Farah (Great Britain), Marilson Gomes
dos Santos (Brazil), and Peter Kamais (Kenya) will be toeing the line in
Central Park.
The NYC Half will feature nearly 10,000 runners who will begin with a
loop of Central Park, then head through Times Square, to eventually
finish on the West Side Highway in Lower Manhattan.
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