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2008 has been a stellar year for 29 year old Martin Dent. A win at the world's biggest foot race, the Sydney City to Surf, a victory at the Australian Cross Country Championships, and gold in the 3000m Steeple at the Australian titles, to name just a few of his victories. We catch up with Marty as he gears up for a crack at the Fukuoka marathon this December.

RunnersTribe: First off, congratulations on your results so far this year. It must rate as one of your best years ever?

Marty Dent: Thanks very much. It's been a pretty amazing year so far. There has hardly been a race that I have been disappointed with. It's very pleasing for me, that at 29, I am still consistently running best performances in a lot of the races.

RT: How was winning the Sydney City to Surf? Do you class that as one of the highlights of your career to date?

MD: Winning the City to Surf was amazing. It is definitely my career highlight to date. Considering that the Olympics were on at the time, the amount of recognition I received was a bit of shock. During the following week I did numerous interviews and now months later, people are still coming up and congratulating me. I am pretty sure I would have had to medal in the Olympic steeplechase to match the same level of recognition I have received.

I was very motivated to run well at the City to Surf after a disappointing race at the Gold Coast Half Marathon (Michael Shelley put more than a minute into me). It was also pleasing that, despite the absence of Team Tanzania, I ran about the same time that they have been winning the race with over the last 5 years.

 

Winning Sydney's City to Surf, 2008

RT: Congratulations on becoming a father last May. This new addition to your family definitely doesn't seem to have had a negative affect on your running! You seem to take juggling work, running and family commitments in your stride?

MD: Being a father has been great. Elye is now 5 months old and is getting bigger and learning new things all the time. It is also great having another purpose to your life motivating me to be my best even more. The support from my wife has also assisted me so I can to pursue my training with out compromise.

I have had to learn to be even more organized and this has assisted in ensuring my training is very structured. I was a bit slack getting up for morning runs before Elye arrived, but now I find it a lot easier getting out, especially as I am often awake anyway! I work for the Government (like most people in Canberra) at the Department of Finance. I work part time (30 hours per week) which makes getting to training easier, especially in winter. I also do some of my running in my lunch breaks.

RT: I know many people in the distance running community were disappointed about the details surrounded the selection process for the Beijing Olympic Steeplechase. What are your thoughts on the matter as well as the inconsistencies with the whole process?

MD: In the end I accept that I didn't run fast enough to be selected, but there were numerous things along the way that really frustrated me. I felt the criteria was not applied correctly, consistently and communication to athletes was pretty poor. It seemed unfair that selector discretion worked favorably for some athletes, whereas for others (like myself) it did not.

I consider Youcef Abdi's performance in Beijing as probably the best of the entire team, two PBs in a distance event is awesome. Pete Nowill, Youcef and I have all beaten each other over the last 2 years a number of times and it was a shame that there weren't three of us in Beijing.

MD: That was even more disappointing than the Olympics. To run an A-qualifying standard in Australia then not get picked was hugely disappointing. I felt I had done as much, if not more, than many others who have been picked in Australian teams over the last 20 years. Then to be told that's its not good enough was not fair. Steeplechase is not like many other events where you get multiple qualifying attempts over and over during a season (some you get six in one night!). That season we only had one quality race in good conditions and I managed to put it together. It also meant a missed opportunity which might have assisted me for Olympic selection.

RT: You are self coached which is quite rare these days. Why is this so? Was it a matter of not being able to find an adequate coach?

MD: I have been training pretty hard since I was 13 years old and have had a number of great coaches. I have also trained with most of Australia's best runners over that time. So with that experience, putting together a balanced training program has not been that difficult. Especially as with my last coach I was very involved in setting my training. I am the sort of person that doesn't like getting told what to do, so these days it works best for me to set my own training.

I currently have a great training group. A couple of us put together a training program in advance and the rest of the group usually fit their sessions around what we are doing.

RT: You have a reputation as being a tough arsed trainer. Can you give us an overview of your common routine during an intense training period?

MD: My training is a mix of things I have learned from my coaches and training with other runners. I do not believe it is really that important what exact training you do, but more the consistency and intensity of training that makes the big differences. A typical week looks something like this.

Monday:    AM 16km
                   PM 8km often at lunchtime
Tuesday:    AM 8km
                    PM Track e.g. 16x400 or 8x1km
Wednesday:    Midday 20km
Thursday:    AM 8km
                      PM Grass e.g. 3x(2k,1k) or 5km then 6x300m hills
Friday:    AM 12km
                PM 8km sometimes
Saturday:    AM Road e.g. 7k solid, 7km hard, or 15km tempo
                     PM 8km
Sunday:    Long run 25-35km
 

This would give something like 160-190km. I don't often repeat sessions, as I find it difficult, and often unproductive, chasing PB sessions all the time. I usually put as much as I can into sessions, but every now and again I will roll through a session a bit easier. I see my long runs as strength building rather than recoveries. So they often get difficult towards the end, but usually from getting tired rather than running any faster (plus the courses we run over on Sunday's all finish with some serious hills).

RT: So what races do you have planned over the short to medium term future?

MD: At the moment I am focused on running well in the Fukuoka Marathon on 7 December. It has been 4 years since my last marathon in Chicago. I wasn't running anywhere near as well in the road races back then, so hopefully I can step it up in a few weeks time.

 

Leading the National Cross Country Champs

RT: All the best in Fukuoka. So is the marathon your main priority now, rather than the steeple or shorter road races?

MD: I will see how Fukuoka goes.

If I am fired up after it I will try and get into shape for a marathon in April. Now AA have released the World Champs selection criteria stating that the marathon team won't be announced until May, I will have to wait till then to see what I am doing in regards to the rest of next year.

If, after Fukuoka, I can't see myself doing another marathon for a while, I will just see how long it takes to get fit. If I get into shape by World Cross trials I would love to do that. I also wouldn't rule out defending my National Steeplechase title, it would be good fun to try and keep Youcef honest!

Nevertheless, I will race on the road when I can. Doing road races in Australia is always great fun and I always feel like the organisers really appreciate you being there.

RT: Marty, thanks for your time and all the best.

MD: No problem, love the website - its definitely in my favorites.

One of the best things about being a Marathon runner is that you have enforced breaks after each Marathon. In the past 12 months I have run more kilometres than ever before, but have had more days of no running than I have had in a long time. In the past if I was not running it usually meant I was injured. Still after week of no real running I was keen to get back out on the road and back into top shape as soon as possible.

Berlin was my 6th and I consider my best marathon. Immediately after finishing I was hit with two pieces of news – before I had even changed out of my racing shoes! The first news was that I finished 21st which although a very pleasing result, meant I had missed Commonwealth Games pre-selection by just one place. While frustrated at missing a top 20 finish, 20th place was 25 seconds ahead of me so it was not as though I had missed it by a sprint to the line. The second news was from my wife (by phone), she told me we were expecting twins in late February. I had left Australia knowing she was pregnant, but when Kathie found out the double result three days before I was to race she decided to wait until after the race to tell me. She wasn’t sure how I would react and didn’t want to divert my focus away from the marathon. It was certainly exciting and scary news – which I am still coming to terms with! Three children under two (our son Elye is now 16 months old) will keep us very busy.

Now back in Australia, I have resumed training after four weeks of taking it pretty easy. A couple of weeks in I am feeling OK. However, I am getting sore from doing sessions again despite my mileage being a fraction of what I was doing a couple of months ago. I'll start some second daily runs next week and I don't expect to have a rest day for 6 months. This build up will probably be a little slower than prior to my last two marathons as I have a bit more time. My next race is Noosa Bolt at the end of October, then probably the Great Australian Run in November and maybe my first major track race for a while at Zatopek in December. With the fast times the Australian boys have been running in the last year and no pressure on me to run fast, it will be good to race and try to be competitive against them. Following Zatopek, I plan to get into marathon training including a couple of weeks at Falls Creek in the New Year. If everything goes to plan, I hope to be on the start line in the Beppu-Oita Marathon on 7 February 2010. Hopefully the twins will time their arrival until after I get back from Japan!



Then I will be waiting until May to find out if I have done enough to be selected to head to Delhi for the Commonwealth Games in October. I expect it will be tough conditions in Delhi, but that may slow down the pace a bit at the very front and give us Australians a chance to compete for the medals.

So this weekend it is 10km tempo, 25km long run and probably some shopping for twin prams, car seats, etc, etc. Back into the routine again!

Marty


 

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