Thomson 2nd! beats Meucci by a hair.
Thomson 2nd! beats Meucci by a hair.
Come on!
I remember watching him a long time ago as a junior at Crystal Palace. He deserved that after all those years hard work. I had an impromptu race with his cousin as well a few years back in my local park
I won't call Silver or Bronze off my recent form!
Congrats to Mo and Chris! You can tell it means a great deal to the English distance running community with the way the announcers were speaking about the race.
Thompson did a great job keeping the pace honest and setting Farah up for the win. Farah for his part assisted Thompson by taking the lead and ensuring that Thompson could kick for a medal.
Important but a little overstated..
Farah has been the best in europe for the last couple of years and Thomsons recent form would have put him in clear second -
but lets be honest they are a long way off the americans in depth at this point and no where near the africans..
I don't think anyone would deny that - but the point is it was the European Championships.
I apologyze for not putting the name of Daniele Meucci as possible bronze. I have good consideration of Daniele, that is very aggressive and able to become one of the top European runners in Marathon too. The fact is that he is not very fast in the final sprint, and sincerely I supposed the Spanish runners (specifically Castillejo) in better shape than the reality.
About the tactic of the race, Mo did exactly what we agreed before the race (we spoke together at 2:00pm thru Skype). Really, I told him to speak with Thompson for increasing the pace after 7 km, but in my mind I supposed Mo and Chris going together. Instead, Ladmassen was the one going in front, and Mo had to wait without pushing, hoping Thompson could go back in the last lap.
I think many athletes suffered for the weather, hot and humid. Mo came directly from Font Romeau (less than 3 hours by car) in the afternoon of Sunday. Competing inside the first 48 hours after a period of training in altitude is ok (absolutely no good to compete during the days between 4 and 7, normally), but the problem can be the difference of temperature, not of altitude, when the athletes move to sea level, during Summer.
In any case, after the first competition the "rule" of the 4th day doesn't work : at the 4th day Mo has to run the heats of 5000 (not very difficult), and, with the two races already run, for the final of 5000m can be completely ok.
YES.
An African wins the European Championships.
Why even bother? Why not just have another GP meet!
'An African wins the European Championships.'
Shall we take away 95% of the US olympic medals over the past 40 years then?
He moved to the UK aged 9; and just to fill in your ignorance does not come from East Africa (or altitide) which is where nearly all the elite runners come from
Anyway, there are thousands of ex Ethiopians and Kenyans in the UK and they have won f all
ukathleticscoach wrote:
He moved to the UK aged 9; and just to fill in your ignorance does not come from East Africa (or altitide) which is where nearly all the elite runners come from
Untrue. He came from Somalia. He was born in Mogadishu. Somalia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somalia) is an East African nation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Africa).
Now as an American I have no right to say who is British and who is not. But if Mo Farah were American, he'd be in basically the same situation as Meb, and I'd have no problem calling him 100% American. I am sympathetic to your position--I know you're just trying to defend your fellow Brit against message board lowlifes. But please, get your facts straight.
White people are crazy! seriously.. do you honestly think that he cannot represent Britain because he was not born there.
Its 2010 and not 1910.
The Biggest Boss wrote:
I thought this was the race Sergio Sanchez was gonna go sub-27. where did that little birdie fly off too?
He is hanging out with Ritz and Teg.
Apologies - I should have specified why I made the point.
I just thought after listening to Gary Lineker et al talk for 3 weeks about how Germany only beat England due to Polish born players etc - that for some reason England/Britain would be above doing such a thing.
Just pointing out English hypocrisy.
Congrats Farah!
ukathleticscoach is hardly responsible for Gary Lineker's ramblings.
I stand corrected I thought it was N Africa! The point is Mogadishu is not at altiutude and therefore he does not have any advantage from coming there in fact if he did represent Somalia he would hold there national records for 5 and 10,000m and by a long way
whats happened to the eightland message boards? not been working for a few hours!??
Renato - what are your predictions for the men's marathon on Sunday? A Spanish win? Martinez?
come home wrote:
whats happened to the eightland message boards? not been working for a few hours!??
I heard they just hired the guy who set up the letsrun site!
I'll say it.... wrote:
Apologies - I should have specified why I made the point.
I just thought after listening to Gary Lineker et al talk for 3 weeks about how Germany only beat England due to Polish born players etc - that for some reason England/Britain would be above doing such a thing.
Just pointing out English hypocrisy.
Congrats Farah!
There is HUGE British hypocrisy. Don't get me wrong, I think Mo Farah is a fabulous runner and I'm really happy that he won last night after all of his health problems last season. He's been a contender at major championships in the past and is a hard worker and great guy. However, The UK announcers were calling Mo Farah, "the British athlete" but STRESSING that the other athletes were of East African descent. They were saying repeatedly how the Spanish athlete was not Spanish born and calling athletes "the former Moroccan and the former Ethiopian". I don't think that is fair because Farah is in the same situation as those athletes.
Oh and you should have heard the Brit announcers taking about Meb K. during their NYC coverage in '09. They felt they had to discredit him because he wasn't American born. But his situation is the closest to Farah's of anyone. He is certainly as American as Farah is British.
And remember that the UK population is over 92% white. They paint a picture of being a diverse nation when in reality this is not the case and now the continental European countries are catching them by having more open non-EU immmigration policies. Gary Linkeker's comments point to Germany's new citizenship laws especially with players like Ozil (third generation German of Turkish ancestry), Khedira (Tunisian and German parents), and the Polish born players have parents are grandparents that are ethnic Germans (it is all about those borders being redrawn after WWII) Did you know that Germany is a more ethnically diverse nation now than the UK? Kind of surprising but true.
Anybody notice how the flag which Mo had initially had a union jack and a somali flag joined together... shows how mo regards himself..