Steeple

By Len Johnson

For a home crowd of Berliners, nothing was going to surpass a German gold medal. So Steffi Nerius topped the bill with her first throw of the competition win in the women's javelin.

The best championship steeplechase ever won might run a close second, even with locals knowledgeable enough to recall that a German, Patriz Ilg, won the steeple at the first world championships in Helsinki. (Italy's Francesco Panetta won in Rome in 1987, so it was not until Moses Kiptanui in Tokyo in 1991 that Kenya first won its 'own' event at a world championship).

After the drama of the previous night's women's race, when six runners were still in contention at the final water jump, four men came to the last 150 metres with a real chance of taking the gold medal. Even more of a surprise, one of them was 'Bob' Tahri of France, who was in among the Kenyans and looking a real chance to beat them.

Ezekiel Kemboi, the Athens 2004 Olympic champion and second at the past three world championships, burst clear out of the water to win and Richard Mateelong, Olympic bronze medallist last year, got home second. Tahri fought off Paul Kipsiele Koech for the bronze medal.

The times were sensational. Kemboi's 8:00.43 was the fastest world or Olympic championship ever; Mateelong was a couple of steps back in 8:00.89. Tahri was right on his heels in a European record 8:01.18 and Koech a non-Usain Bolt sprint margin back in 8:01.26.

Kiptanui held the previous world championships record at 8:04.16 in Gothenburg in 1995 and Julius Kariuki holds the Olympic record at 8:05.51, set in Seoul in 1988. So this was quality running indeed.

The race went off at a sprint, slowed marginally as if pausing for breath, then rattled home at near world record pace over the last five laps. Tahri was always a factor, which added crucial intrigue to the mix.

Kemboi figures in the only other steeple I can think of that may have been more exciting, if not quantitively better. That was in the 2003 Paris world championships when Saif Saaeed Shaheen, formerly Stephen Cherono of Kenya, set off at seemingly suicidal pace with a Qatari teammate. They ran the first lap in under 60 seconds.

Soon Kemboi reeled them in and he and Shaheen kept going at a slower, but still amazing pace for another lap or two. They then slowed to such an extent that the field regained them, before settling down to a decisive final lap which Shaheen ran in 57-point while the lead changed hands several times. Shaheen won, but it was one hell of a race.

If, as for this purpose we must, we consider Shaheen a Kenyan, the added factor in this race was the possibility of a non-African win. It didn't happen, but it always looked like it might. A few years from now, this might look like a race in which a non-Kenyan snuck in for a minor medal. Those who saw it will always know it was much more than that.




 

Len Johnson was The Melbourne Age athletics writer for over 20 years, covering five Olympics, 10 world championships and five Commonwealth Games. He is the author of The Landy Era, From Nowhere to the Top of the World, and a former national class distance runner (2.19.32 marathon) who trained with Chris Wardlaw and Robert de Castella.