The King of the Mile
By JERE LONGMAN
ABAT, Morocco -- The photograph is wedged into a corner above the fireplace. It is unlike the other framed items in Hicham el-Guerrouj's room, the autographs of 16 other men who have held the world record in the mile, the magazine cover proclaiming him the mile's new king, the fist-pumping joy at winning his second world championship in the metric mile. These are all tokens of victory. What el-Guerrouj keeps on equally prominent display is a reminder of forlorn defeat.
Entering the final lap of the 1,500-meter race at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, he collided with the eventual winner and fell to the track. He got to his feet and continued to run, but he finished 12th, dead last in a race that he believed he would have won. He began to cry and a photographer caught his agony, producing the picture that el-Guerrouj keeps in his room at the Moroccan track and field institute: his left hand to his face, eyes closed, lower lip drooped in a disconsolate sob.
"I thought it was the end of my career," said el-Guerrouj, who was 21 at the time. "This photo gives me the power to work very hard, to break the world record, to win the gold medal."
Ten minutes after the race, King Hassan II of Morocco reached him by cellular phone at the Olympic Stadium. "You are the best," said the king, who died in 1999. "For us, you are the winner."
The Moroccan news media treated el-Guerrouj's fall in the same understanding manner, and Nike, his sponsor, even paid the $50,000 bonus it had promised for a gold medal, he said.
"The king is responsible for all Moroccans, and for him to say that I was still the best gave me a lot of confidence," he said. At that moment of the phone call, he said, "it was as if another el-Guerrouj was born."
A month later, el-Guerrouj defeated the Olympic champion, Noureddine Morceli of Algeria, and in the following years he took Morceli's world records, running the 1,500 in 3 minutes 26 seconds and the slightly longer mile in 3:43.13. He has lost only one race since Atlanta, and he will be a clear favorite to win the metric mile at the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney, Australia. He will turn 26 on Sept. 14, a day before the Olympics begin. He looks younger, with his boyish haircut and long thin face. God willing, he said, kissing his hands and putting them to his face, a gold medal would be a remarkable birthday present.
El-Guerrouj is the most accomplished athlete in this north African constitutional monarchy, which has long challenged Kenya and Ethiopia for distance-running supremacy on the continent. He is also a symbol of possibility for the young in a nation where 70 percent of the 30 million residents are under 30, where half the population lives on less than $50 a month and the illiteracy rate is 50 percent. He is considered the most visible ambassador of Morocco, which is using sport -- including a revived national tennis program -- in hopes of increasing its international prominence and is seeking to be host to the 2006 World Cup of soccer as a means of reviving its sluggish economy.
For decades, Morocco has had trouble with its international profile in sports. When Nawal el-Moutawakel became the first Arab woman to win a gold medal by taking the 400-meter hurdles at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, and the great Said Aouita followed with a victory at 5,000 meters, many people confused Morocco with Monaco, said Aziz Daouda, the technical director for the Moroccan track and field federation and the business manager for its top runners. With the accomplishments of el-Guerrouj, he added, one kingdom is no longer mistaken for the other.
"We are a country of Lilliputians," said Brahim Boulami, who finished seventh in the 3,000-meter steeplechase at the Atlanta Olympics. "We are not big and famous. Hicham for us is like NASA and Boeing are for the United States. It is good to be first in the world at something."
The Stringent Life of a Runner
Rabat was unseasonably hot in mid-March, the temperature reaching 97 degrees, so el-Guerrouj decided to spend a few more days training in the mountain resort of Ifrane, above the heat and humidity and pollution of the oceanside capital. This was el-Guerrouj's 40th consecutive day in Ifrane, living with other runners in a converted hotel, training on a local track and in the cedar forests outside of town.
In a year, he will spend four months at altitude, for the quiet and the increased benefits in oxygen-carrying capacity. The rest of his training is done at sea level in Rabat. He is one of 92 athletes, men and women, in Morocco's elite training program, which provides for the athletes with 17 coaches, 3 doctors and 5 physical therapists. Nutritionists take care of the meals, the federation serves as his business manager and the training centers in Rabat and Ifrane both contain small mosques where el-Guerrouj, a devout Muslim, prays five times a day.
"He's one of the few people in the world blessed with unbelievable talent, he works incredibly hard, he's got a good support system and excellent coaching," said Steve Holman, America's top miler. "They take care of everything. He doesn't have to worry about anything but training as hard as possible, and clearly he does."
If it is an athletically pampered life, it is also one of austere isolation. El-Guerrouj dates a university student. They plan to marry after the Sydney Games, but they see each other only once every month or two, according to his coach. He owns a villa and a spacious apartment in Rabat, but he prefers to live in one well-appointed room at the national track and field center, a curtain separating the bedroom from the living room. He makes $2 million a year, according to Moroccan officials, but prefers to drive a tiny Honda sports utility vehicle, rather than the Mercedes that some of the other top athletes drive.
Mostly he lives the stringent life of a runner, training twice a day and sleeping and watching tapes of his races on television. He takes only three weeks off from training a year, although he took more time before this season after undergoing surgery for hemorrhoids that bothered him last summer.
"In my mind, if I don't do the same things as before, if I don't stay in my environment, I won't be as good," el-Guerrouj said. "I want to be close to the people, to live a simple life. In my country, there are many poor people. You can't be bigger than the others."
He trains with a small group that includes his coach, Abdelkader Kada; his brother Fethi, who is 20; Mohammed Amyn, one of the world's top 1,500-meter runners; and Hocine Benzriguinat, Morocco's military cross-country champion. The others are there to challenge el-Guerrouj with their legs but not with their egos. El-Guerrouj is the undisputed leader and it is their job to pull him along, to make sure that his needs are met.
He and his entourage are inseparable. The others train with him, cheer him at the track, eat their meals with him, go to the movies with him, travel around Rabat with him, bring him coffee and tea, help him with his tie, answer his phone. Kada, too, serves as a buffer between el-Guerrouj and the stream of Moroccans who approach him daily for a handshake, an autograph, a plea for financial aid. Privately, his coach and training partners say, el-Guerrouj is generous with them, giving them money or assisting with a new car.
"He is Mr. Peace, always so easy," Benzriguinat said.
Morocco has been winning Olympic medals in distance running for 40 years, ever since Rhadi Ben Abdesselem finished second to Abebe Bikila of Ethiopia in the marathon at the 1960 Rome Olympics. After el-Moutawakel and Aouita earned gold in Los Angeles in 1984, Moulay Brahim Boutaib won the 10,000 meters at the 1988 Summer Games in Seoul, South Korea. Khalid Skah followed with a victory at 10,000 meters at the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, Spain.
"With his records and great performances, Aouita made us dream for decades," said el-Moutawakel, who is now a member of the International Olympic Committee. "He was like Muhammad Ali. He would say something and do it the next day. El-Guerrouj makes us dream, too. On every corner of the street, they know his records, his split times. He is breaking barriers, making our dreams come true, making us so happy that you lose your mind."
This day in Ifrane would be el-Guerrouj's last before he returned to Rabat for several weeks. After a morning jog, his evening workout began near dusk, under a gunmetal sky and a fingernail moon in the cedar forests. At this mile-high altitude, he would run 20 times 350 meters in 53 or 54 seconds, up a grade of 12 to 15 degrees to build strength and endurance. Amyn paced him through the first 300 meters, then stopped as el-Guerrouj kept running up the hill, carried by the elegant explosiveness in his legs, which begin with narrow ankles and build to a grapefruit bulge in his calves and a long wedge of muscle in his thighs.
Kada, his coach, did not bother counting each of the runs up the trail. He knew that el-Guerrouj would do what he had been instructed to do. "He needs a coach to tell him he is doing too much, not too little," Kada said.
After 15 repeats, the sky was dark and the lights of el-Guerrouj's Honda were turned on so the top of the trail would be visible. They kept running, invisible at the start now, their presence announced by the scuff of shoes on dirt and the exertion of their breathing. Finally, they became silhouettes as they neared the lights of the Honda, then Amyn stopped at 300 meters, doubled over, gasping for air, as el-Guerrouj kept running up the trail, briefly visible in his shirt and tights as he passed through the beams of headlights.
"He is a very serious professional runner," said Salah Hissou, the 1999 world champion at 5,000 meters and an occasional training partner of el-Guerrouj's. "He doesn't want to be a normal athlete. He wants to be a great athlete. He could do 20 competitions a year, but he only does 7 to 10, so they will always be high level."
In the Hearts of All Arabic People
Such is the pervasive suspicion about performance-enhancing drugs in track and field that any great performance brings immediate skepticism. There are rumors, never proved, that el-Guerrouj uses EPO, a drug that increases oxygen-carrying capacity. He vehemently denies this. There is no way to know the truth, because there is no approved test for EPO. The International Olympic Committee has fallen so far behind in drug research and testing that the innocent cannot prove their innocence.
"It is work, not doping," el-Guerrouj said. "People who say that are not big athletes. I don't think they are training 11 months a year, or running in the dark with the headlights on. I train very hard, until I am sick. Sometimes I train like a foolish man who has no mind."
After the night training run, el-Guerrouj returned to the athletes' hostel, where he was greeted by two men who wanted a photograph taken with him. Earlier in the day, two women had approached the hostel, wanting money to buy a sheep for an important Arab festival.
"He is in the hearts of all Arabic people, a symbol for our young," said Abdulkarim Titi, the president of a soccer club in the city of Tiflet and one of the men waiting for a photograph. "He is a simple person. He runs for his country, his people, his flag."
El-Guerrouj sent word that he would pose for a photograph in the morning. He had to attend a dinner at the nearby apartment of Abdelkader Mouaziz, the winner of the 1999 London Marathon. Mouaziz's new condominium was decorated with traditional Moroccan rugs, and Arabic music played on a stereo, but Mouaziz is a runner, after all, and a Nike swoosh had been welded into the door of his wood-burning stove in the living room.
A group of a dozen runners gathered around the dinner table, and el-Guerrouj proclaimed, "Real Moroccan food!" as Mouaziz brought in a huge salad and a platter of tagine, a dish of beef and beans whose sauce is sopped up with spongy bread.
Among the runners at the table was Patrick Ndayisenga, the national record-holder in the marathon from the central African nation of Burundi, who had come to Ifrane to train with the Moroccans. He said he had been amazed to see el-Guerrouj, a miler, training like a marathoner, running 13 to 15 miles in an hour and a half. El-Guerrouj also trains like a sprinter, running sometimes with a weighted jacket, dragging a tire, and he does bounding drills to increase the propulsion in his ankles. The mile has come to resemble the brutal pace of the 800 meters and el-Guerrouj better than anyone has perfected the grueling training for speed and endurance.
"When he presents himself at the start, the other athletes in their minds are running for second place," Ndayisenga said.
After dinner, el-Guerrouj sat with his coach, Kada, who served as translator, and he spoke of his upbringing in Berkane, a citrus-growing region in northeast Morocco, near the closed border with Algeria, where his father ran a small restaurant. He had been a soccer goalkeeper as a boy, but he came home dirty every day and, with seven children, his mother struggled to keep his clothes clean.
"She told me not to play anymore," el-Guerrouj said.
When he was 14, he entered a cross-country race and finished second. A year later, he won his age group at the national cross-country championships, left school and went to the national training center in Rabat. His mother, Fatna, disapproved. "I told her I was able to be Aouita, or better," el-Guerrouj said.
Six years later, at 21, he was preparing to take the lead in the Olympic 1,500-meter race when he fell. As he stumbled to the ground, he felt as if he were in a dream, and he could hear the crowd groaning as he hit the track. The collision with Morceli was an accident, nothing more, el-Guerrouj said. Four years later, he is prepared to run again, and this time he believes he will win.
"He needs this medal," said Daouda, the technical director of the Moroccan track federation. "He is the world record-holder. He can't miss this. If he does, it will be a big problem. Psychologically, it will be the end of his career."
Back at sea level in Rabat, el-Guerrouj ate lunch in the national training center, where there is a six-foot-high photograph of him in the lobby. There is a metal globe in the middle of the cafeteria, atop a fish pond, the globe symbolizing that the runners who eat here are the best in the world.
He told a story from his youth. When the family was out of bread, they sent him to his father's restaurant. It was a mile away, he said, and the family would tell him, "Run fast, Hicham; you have seven minutes until the bread is cold." When he returned home, he said with a laugh, his brothers and sisters would clap as if he had just crossed the finish line of a race.
Following His Faith by Helping the Needy
El-Guerrouj dressed in a suit for a meeting of Unicef, the United Nations Children's Fund, and for three hours he sat and watched slides and listened to a discussion about the plight of Morocco's children. The infant mortality rate is way down, but children as young as 6 are in the work force, and 50 percent of the girls still do not go to school in rural areas.
El-Guerrouj is president of an association in Berkane that sends doctors into the countryside and provides scholarships for children. He recently purchased 130 wheelchairs for disabled youth and, during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, he and another man paid for his father to cook for 400 people each evening in his hometown. Helping the needy is one of the five pillars of the faith of the Koran. El-Guerrouj, along with el-Moutawakel, is one of four goodwill ambassadors to Unicef in Morocco.
"There is so much fatalism in the villages; people say, 'I'm poor, I will stay poor forever,' " said Olivier Theo Degreef, the Unicef representative in Rabat. "But he is an example of, 'If I fight, this is what I can become.' "
Sitting still had made him stiff and tired, but el-Guerrouj insisted on his evening track workout. He would run 10 times 1,000 meters, or two and a half laps, in 2:32 or 2:33, with two minutes' rest between. Benzriguinat, the military cross-country champion, would pace him through the first 600 meters, and el-Guerrouj's brother Fethi and Amyn, his other training partner, would follow at their own comfortable speeds. It was dark now, and pale illumination came from street lamps around the track. In the backstretch, el-Guerrouj was hardly visible, except for the flash of his spikes. He is taller than his listed height of 5 feet 9 1/2 inches, 6 feet at least, and there is the grace and power of incessant stalking in his long strides.
Four, five, six times, he repeated 1,000 meters, and the others could not keep up, doubled over, agony in their breathing. Another pacemaker was brought in, but none of the other runners could finish all 10 repeats. They were reduced to cheering for the world champion, yelling at him in French and Arabic, "Come on, Hicham, go, go," and he sailed through his 10th repeat in 2:29 with a satisfied sweat on his neck. Benzriguinat kissed him on the head.
"That's why he is the champion," Benzriguinat said. "You see how he has killed us in the training. Three people, we are all finished, and he is still strong."
The closer Sydney gets, the farther away Atlanta seems. But of course, he can never forget. Every time he breaks a record or wins an important race, the television shows him falling in Atlanta and the newspaper articles refer to his disappointment in 1996. "I think it is a part of me," el-Guerrouj said. But he has made a promise to himself. If he wins in Sydney, he will remove the crying picture from above his fireplace.
"I will put up a photo of Sydney," he said.
A photo of victory.