The Gold Mine Effect by Rasmus Ankersen

Author:Rasmus Ankersen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: business/personal development, anthropology, high performance, talent, sport
Publisher: Icon Books
Published: 2012-05-19T16:00:00+00:00

How to delay being tired

Every time I asked European athletes who train or have trained in Iten about their experience of the Kenyan method, I was met with resigned looks and shakes of the head: ‘They just push, push, push and then keep pushing,’ they said.

You can see fear in the eyes of Western athletes who go to Iten to train when the subject of the Kenyans’ merciless interval running training comes up. When European and American athletes come to train, they often ask the coach: ‘How many intervals are we going to have today?’ No Kenyans ever ask that question. Nobody knows how many intervals they will have to run and nobody asks how many are left. They run right to the edge of collapse, perhaps lying in a ditch retching afterwards, only to get up to run once more.

Another good example of the Kenyan refusal to discount anything as impossible is the game ‘Catch the Impala’, one of their ‘alternative’ training methods, particularly popular among the Nandi people.

The impala is a type of antelope and a supremely fast animal, but it doesn’t have much staying power. If you run after it, it will stop at some stage to rest. Then, before you get too close it will start running again. Assuming the impala manages to have these rests, this stop-and-start chase can go on for about 40 km. After that point the impala is very tired and if you have the speed and endurance you may be able to get close enough to pat it on the backside. To the Kenyans, ‘Catch the Impala’ is the ultimate test of manhood – as the former Olympic 800 metres bronze winner Mark Coty once said: ‘When I returned home to Kenya, they actually respected me more for my ability to catch an impala than for having brought home an Olympic medal.’

The idea that a person running on foot would be able to catch a wild animal as fast as the impala seems incredible; so incredible that most of us would dismiss it as impossible. By not accepting what we would consider to be obvious human limitations, the Kenya runners make the impossible possible.

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