10k: A Column By Len Johnson

First, the championships themselves, which also served as selection trials for the African championships and Commonwealth Games. There’s always been conjecture about how committed elite athletes in many Commonwealth nations are to the Games, but from the results in Nairobi, there’s no doubt the Kenyans are committed to the African championships.

Hardly surprising, perhaps, when you consider Kenya is the host nation. Then again, you need only look back to football’s African Nations Cup earlier this year to see the commitment of African athletes to their nations. Back then a swag of the world game’s biggest names _ Michael Essien, Didier Drogba, Emmanuel Adebayor among them _ turned their backs for a month on the European leagues which pay them a fortune in favour of turning out in their national strips.

The top names turned out for, and won, at the Kenyan national titles. In some past years, the stars have either not run or merely ‘put in an appearance’, relying on reputation and an admittedly-flexible selection policy to make the team. This has usually been justified in retrospect, with the ‘final team’ named after the trials turning out to be nothing more than a first draft.

Maybe not this time, if the winners are anything to go by. David Rudisha (800), AsbelKiprop (1500), Richard Matelong (steeple), Janeth Jepkosgei (800), Nancy Lagat (1500), Milcah Chemos (steeple), Vivian Cheriuyot (5000) and Lineth Masai (10,000) all won their events. Rudisha and Jepkosgei churned out quick two-lappers (1:44.23 and 1:58.95 respectively), Kiprop ran 3:33.69 in a 1500 final which was apparently paced by his younger brother, Masai produced a big negative split to win the women’s 10k in 32:03.85.

But it was the men’s 10,000 which was the real eye-opener. There is some conjecture at just what distance the impact of high altitude kicks in _ 800, probably not; 1500, probably; 5000, almost certainly _ but there is no doubt it has a profound affect at 10,000.

Before last weekend, the fastest track 10k run at altitude was Paul Kosgei’s 27:44.14 at Nairobi in 2002. No fewer than nine men beat that, with Wilson Kiprop winning in 27:26.93 from Geoffrey Mutai (27:27.59) and Matthew Kisorio (27:28.13). For the record, the others under Kosgei’s previous ‘record’ were Titus Mbishei( 27:29.13), Jacob Cheshari (27:32.43), Lucas Rotich (27:34.55), Paul Tanui (27:36.76), Philemon Limo (27:36.94) and Kiprono Menjo (27:37.42).

Watching the championships was Renato Canova, the Italian coach who guides Saif Saaeed Shaheen, Moses Mosop and 2009 women’s world cross-country champion Florence Kiplagat, among others. He posted some commentary on LetsRun.com (see http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=3597396 ).

The point that grabbed me was Canova’s remarks about the disappearance of the 10k offthe international circuit. Hengelo, which regularly staged a 10k showcasing Jos Hermens’ distance stars, dropped its race this year. Brussels has the Diamond League final this year and faced with the choice between staging the 5000 metres final and its traditional 10,000, went with the shorter race. So another quality 10k is gone.

Canova points out that the all-time lists have stopped progressing _ the most recent entry into the top 13 performers on the men’s all-time list was four years ago _ and that those who could run 26:45 and faster are being drawn into the marathon.

“We can speak about 10,000 only next year,” says Canova, “when somebody can be interested in running this event in (the) world championships.”

Those “somebodies” seem likely to be drawn from a shrinking pool of athletes. The east-Africanisation of track distance running has been a reality for some time, but new qualifying standards announced by the IAAF, along with the decreasing number of qualifying opportunities, will do nothing to slow that trend.

The qualifying period for the 2011 Daegu world championships is to be shortened, with athletes having to post qualifying performances in most events between 1 October 2010 and the closing date. In line with past practice, events such as the 10k are offered a longer period, from 1 January this year.

So far, so good; but the sting in the tail is a tightening of the men’s standard for 10,000 to 27:40.00 (from 27:47.00 in 2009; the women’s standard is unchanged).

So the standards themselves haven’t tightened that much, but taken in conjunction with the declining number of opportunities and the flight of most non-African nations out of distance events, it makes for a much darker outlook. According to the 2009 world lists, only nine men’s races (plus the world championships race) had winning times faster than 27:40, and eight women’s races (plus world championships) faster than 31:45.

It’s a severely limited number of opportunities to achieve a qualifying time. I doubt there would be fewer events in any other world championships discipline which produced an A-standard performance.

It’s not the role of the IAAF to do something about this situation. It sets qualifying standards across all events at roughly the same level (it used to be approximately equal to the 50^th best performance in the world).

But if ‘somebody’ _ national federations, high performance programs, coaches, athletes, fans of track distance running _ doesn’t do something about reversing the current trends, then track distance running could be heading down the plug-hole.