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NEW YORK ROAD RUNNERS MEDIA CONFERENCEMarch 2, 2011Galen RuppAlberto SalazarMARY WITTENBERG: Hello, Galen and Alberto, and all of our friends in the media. I think this is simply a huge announcement today. We are simply ecstatic to welcome Galen Rupp to a New York road runner event and to our quickly growing major New York City Half Marathon on March 20th. We have looked forward to hosting Galen for many years. We have, Alberto, I think it's fair to say, we've stayed patient, and we have not pushed until it was the right time for Galen to run here, and we're just really, really excited to welcome Galen to New York and introduce our fans here to one of the best our sport's ever seen and certainly a favorite here at New York Road Runners. To be able to welcome Galen into this galaxy of stars of top American makes it just truly an extraordinary opportunity for all of us and something we're really, really excited about and excited to watch. We haven't even gotten to the international stars yet, other than Jo Pavey, and already with a list that reads Meb and Abdi and Ryan Hall and Kara Goucher and Patrick Smyth and Jason Lehmkuhle, and the list goes on and on and on. This is a big -- Galen's introduction is the introduction of a headliner among headliners. So, as always, we treat debuts here very, very seriously. Our commitment to Alberto and Galen is that we will take extraordinarily good care of Galen and promise a setting very worthy of him. So Galen, we welcome you with open arms. GALEN RUPP: Well, I just want to say that I'm really, really excited to have this opportunity. I couldn't be more thrilled that the first half marathon I'm going to do will be in New York. Obviously the people over there are great. Several of my teammates have run over there, and they've had nothing but great things to say. So I'm just really happy that this opportunity presented itself. RICHARD FINN: Thank you, Galen. Alberto, would you want to make another comment too before we owe it up? ALBERTO SALAZAR: Yeah, I'm obviously in favor of Galen running this race. It was the one that I popped it on him given the change of the schedule over the last few weeks. Galen had been scheduled a 10,000 meter in Christchurch, and because of the tragic earthquake there and heartbreaking loss of loved ones for people in Christchurch, the meet was of course cancelled. And I felt that Galen had done a significant amount of training much more based on higher mileage and focusing on the 10K versus in the past we've really been more 5K based. We're focused in. And I thought this half marathon would be an opportunity for him to really see what all that training had amounted to, and he had good results. He broke the American record for 5,000 of course indoors. But I really feel his strength is at a place where he's way ahead of where he's been before. And it's not a matter of just taking advantage of that conditioning to hopefully do something very good. In my mind, the half marathon is a way for him to test himself, to put himself in a race that is out of his normal comfort zone which is the 5K to 10,000 and to go in there and test himself against literally some of the best in the world at the half marathon distance. And it's not going to be easy. I mean, you could go and just stick with 5 and 10's. But I think putting himself in situations out of his normal comfort zone is something that ultimately will make him better when he goes into his normal races like the 5 and 10. So I look at it as not just an opportunity to do well given the condition he's in, but also an opportunity to improve himself as a runner by challenging himself at a distance that he's never run before. RICHARD FINN: Thank you. We'll start with the questions. Q. I just wanted to make sure, first of all, Alberto, Galen was already in New Zealand, right, when this -- not in Christ church, but another area of New Zealand when this earthquake happened, correct? ALBERTO SALAZAR: No, we weren't. We had flown from London on Sunday the 20th, and we arrived in Melbourne late evening Monday. We were scheduled to do a bunch of Nike promotional activities the next two days there, and then we were going to fly to Auckland on Wednesday or Thursday. But the earthquake happened early Tuesday morning and at that point we learned that the meet had been cancelled, so we never actually arrived in New Zealand. We then just flew out on Wednesday morning, so we were there basically a day and left. Decided to go back home to Albuquerque. (No Audio) we did consider running the 5K the next week. But I couldn't stay because I had some commitments back home in Portland, and Galen didn't want to stay an extra nine days. He felt that he could go and race against Lagat and sort of get that sort of tactical experience of running against one of the world's best and then run this half marathon as well. So we thought that combination was better. To run the 3K in Albuquerque then the half marathon, as opposed to staying to run the 5K, and then going to run the half marathon. I didn't think that was a good option because it wouldn't have allowed him to do a couple of workouts to prepare him more for the half marathon. Q. You mentioned that he did have a lot of strength training behind him, but how much does this decision affect the kind of workout that you had planned say for the period after what was going to be that 10K? And does this affect any tentative plans you had for the outdoor track season? I mean, is possibly the first race of that season going to be changed because of this decision? ALBERTO SALAZAR: It might end up being a few weeks later, but the plan before, if he had run the 10K, was to take a couple of weeks off right then. Now it's really just changed. He's still going to take those few weeks off, but we're going to wait until after the half marathon. It really means that by the time he resumes heavy training -- usually he takes time off. I like to give them you a month off to build back up to where they were before. At that point if he takes a month to build back up after two weeks off to his normal training levels, high levels. He'll still have eight or nine weeks until the U.S. Outdoor Championships, and that's plenty enough time to be ready for that. So I just felt that really the six of one, half dozen of the other. He's going to take a two week break. Whether he takes a two-week break 14 weeks before the outdoor championships or 12 weeks before, it really doesn't matter. Q. Can you talk a little bit about all the travel you've done and how that might have affected or not affected your fitness and your ability to compete? GALEN RUPP: Obviously, it was a lot of time on an airplane. But to be honest, I slept most of the time when we were flying. I don't think it really affected me all that of much. We still would run. We'd get up early if we had an early morning flight from beforehand and make sure that I got a run in afterwards. Then if we had layovers, I'd maybe jog a little bit in between the layover and make sure I did stretches. I don't think it really affected me that much, to be honest with you. Q. I was leafing through Galen's bio, and I wondered is this actually the ten-year anniversary of you two working to go, Galen and Alberto? GALEN RUPP: Oh, shoot, yeah. Well, started as a freshman in high school which would have been 2000, so it will be 11 years now. Q. And this obviously is going to start some speculation about whether or not you might consider broadening your horizons and running more road races. I just wanted you to address that. Is this more or less kind of a lark or a visit to the road side, or is this something that if you have good sensations on the road, might lead to more road racing? GALEN RUPP: I mean, I'm still pretty young. I'm only 24, so I don't want to get too far ahead of myself and thinking about the marathon. It will definitely be something that I'll do at some point, but I still have a long ways to go on the track and I want to keep focusing on doing that moving forward in the present. Q. At this point have you narrowed your goals in terms of what you want to qualify for at the Olympics? GALEN RUPP: We're still keeping our options open, to be honest with you. Yeah, I mean, probably the 10K and 5K are what I want to focus on going into the Olympics. Q. I wondered if you had any plans to compete at Hayward Field this spring prior to the U.S. Championships, whether it be the Prix Classic or others? GALEN RUPP: I think there is a definite possibility that I'll do that. Obviously, I love running down there. I think it's unlike any other place in the U.S. in terms of the way they hold track meets and the fans down there. Hopefully, I'll get a chance to run down there. Q. And that could be at any point? ALBERTO SALAZAR: To be honest, we haven't looked that far, but certainly Prix Classic would be a great race, a great tune-up for Galen prior to the U.S. Championships. It's about three weeks before. There is going to be possibly a 10K on a Saturday night. The night before, whenever Prix is, the night before. I doubt Galen would run that, even though it would be a great chance for a really fast time. To do that three weeks before the U.S. Championships, I don't think would be a smart move. Given the fact that he's going to take a break now after this half marathon to hurry him back to be in top shape at Prix to go for a really fast time I don't think would be smart. But they'll probably have a two miler, I think two mile during the race itself, during the meet, the regular meet. So he would probably run that. Then I would say there would be a good chance he'll run something else prior to that twilight meet or something. He wouldn't run any of the probably early April 28th type slots or anything. Because if he takes time off, he'll only be starting to run again basically on April 1st. So he won't compete in April, maybe Twilight meet May 6. I've talked to Benny about possibly sending a 4x-mile relay team down to support runners like Galen from the U of O to help push the Ducks to a national record. Q. It strikes me that in a way you're following the pattern similar to your training partner Dathan Ritzenhein, when he broke the record of the 8K outdoors in 2009, and went on to run a great half marathon at the World Half Marathon Championships. Could you compare the kind of training that you've been doing this time of year with what Rich was doing? Also, maybe comment a little bit on the 5K A.R.? GALEN RUPP: I'm not really sure what Dathan was doing beforehand. We did some stuff together leading up to the World Championships. But after that, I took a break, and he obviously kept training and ran great at that World Half Marathon. But I know that he comes from a real strength background, and that's always been a good part of his training is doing a lot of strength work. I know that what I've done over the winter is probably pretty similar to what he was doing then. So hopefully it will translate to a good half marathon for me in New York. Q. How would you compare the kind of training that you've been doing now in this build-up to what you expect to do for the summer? Is it kind of different or is it pretty much the same and it's just two different build-ups in the year that are fairly equal, or are you kind of holding something in reserve for later? GALEN RUPP: I think it's going to be pretty similar. We've always going back to when I was younger, we've always built up my mileage really slow. But I think looking at last year and stuff, we realized that we definitely needed to (No Audio), and how it would affect workouts and all of that. But things have gone really well. So we're just going to try to keep it going through the summer. Q. The 5K, obviously, I gather you felt you were ready to run that fast, and how did the race feel for you? GALEN RUPP: It went really well. I think just having the chance to run fast there, the pace went out really well. It wasn't too fast in the beginning, and I kind of hung back from the start and then we picked it up gradually in the middle and then towards the end. My training had gone really well to that point, so I knew I was ready to run a fast time, and I was just happy that I was able to get that record back. Q. How much do you and Alberto discuss preparation for a marathon at some point? GALEN RUPP: We haven't really talked much about running a marathon at all. This half marathon, when he brought this up was literally the first time we've ever talked about doing something longer and on the roads. So it hasn't really been something that we've talked a lot about. Q. How much of an interest is it to you to have a marathon in your future? GALEN RUPP: I definitely want to run one at some point. It's just a matter of when and how it fits into my development and scheduling. So I try to let Alberto worry about that more than me (laughing). But I definitely want to run one at some point in the future. Q. In the last couple of months you've run cross country, you've run indoor, you had a plan to run an outdoor meet and now a road race. Can you explain or Alberto how you're making different choices of races to plan for? ALBERTO SALAZAR: It's really not any plan. It's kind of we have a hat with a bunch of different races and we draw out of it (laughing). Running is running. Whether you're running a cross country race, a 5 mile cross country race which Galen ran in Edinburgh, or a 10K track race which he was going to run outdoors in Christchurch or a couple of indoor meets, and now a road race, the training, other than perhaps being a little different for the different distances is pretty similar. Definitely the first is only different in terms of with three weeks to prepare specifically for it after the U.S. Championships, there obviously isn't a lot to do. His mileage will stay pretty much the same for the next few weeks, and he'll do a few longer workouts more geared on getting the rhythm of the half marathon pace as opposed to sort of the much more intense type that you do for the shorter distances right from the beginning. So it really isn't that much different, it's just a different surface and that's about it. But your training is really pretty similar. Q. Does moving around to those different environments speak a little bit to what you said about not being too set into a comfort zone? GALEN RUPP: Yeah, I think just, again, going off what Alberto said. If you can run fast for 5K or 10K, it shouldn't be that much different whether you're running indoors, outdoors or cross country. Some guys might be a little better at cross country and track. Some guys might be better at track than cross country. But there really shouldn't be that much difference in how well you run. I think just being able to do a lot of different things just helps prepare you for anything. Nothing really -- as long as you're not thinking too much about it, you should be fine. Q. How disappointing was it not to get a chance to run the 10,000obviously, it looks like you're probably close to an American record 10,000 shape and that was the big goal. So how disappointing was that to see that race cancelled? GALEN RUPP: I couldn't be too disappointed not running, especially considering what happened down there. Those people and what they're going through have much bigger problems than worrying about some silly track race. Q. For the New York race do you have any time goals? Your 10,000 equates to something close to 60 flat. Have you thought about a time goal or are you just going to try to run with other people in the race? GALEN RUPP: I'm just looking to compete and get in there. There are a lot of good guys in the field, and I just want to be competitive. Q. You said you hadn't announced the internationals yet really. Do you know when those announcements might come and can you give us a preview of any other Americans popping up or anyone? RICHARD FINN: We hope and expect to make an a announcement this weekend. We're looking to make an a announcement from the European Championships, so that would probably give you an idea that we're looking at several of the top Europeans. There will be several recognizable faces coming back to New York in the half marathon that we will be announcing this weekend, either Saturday, Sunday or Monday. We're not quite sure. So we'll try to keep in touch with everybody. And I think most of the U.S. standouts and participants have been announced through our previous announcements, including Serena Burla, Patrick Smyth, Jason Lehmkuhle, Abdi, Meb, Ryan and Kara. Q. There have been a couple of questions about the variety of races that Galen does. And I know this is a career and the big choices that they've made. But it is it also something that he obviously from an early age has enjoyed doing. So when I think about him doing cross country, now he's going to do the roads and he was able to change his plans from doing a 10K to run against Bernard. Can we say a lot of the reasons for making these choices, Galen and Alberto, is just that it's fun and you really enjoy it? GALEN RUPP: I think that's definitely part of it. I like having different challenges, and I like just having the opportunity to compete against really good opponents. I think that's the only way you really get better is by sometimes going in a little over your head or just trying to do stuff where you're not in your comfort zone and it forces you to do great things. Q. On that same point, do you see -- I mean, these guys work hard all year long. Do you see for people like Galen who don't obviously shy from competition, but do you see these races as rewards for all the work that they've done? ALBERTO SALAZAR: Yeah, absolutely. I really believe that running has to be fun, first of all. So as an athlete, you would ask what constitutes fun for a particular runner? Training can be fun for some people, at times can be fun. But for most of my athletes, they really like racing. I believe racing is what it's about. There are some people that are very successful that don't race a lot, they race infrequently and that seems to be how they run their best. My philosophy is that you shouldn't overrace, but you should race a lot. Any other sport, people compete at any other sport a lot more. I believe that the psychological part of becoming a great runner means that you need to practice. Not only training, but you need to practice racing, and that means running a significant amount of races. So I believe it's in Galen's long-term best interest in terms of development, to run somewhere in the vicinity of 20 races a year. He might not run any faster, whether he runs 20 races or ten races a year in terms of actual times, but I think his development as a racer, ultimately will be that much better. You look at someone like Bernard Lagat, who is perceived by many as perhaps being the best tactician who is out there in distance running right now, and he runs a fair amount of races throughout the year. The other thing is he's been around for a long tile, so he's run so many races. So I have to believe it's those experiences that he's gained over time that are one of the reasons that he's such a great tactician. Q. You guys have sort of reconstituted yourselves as the Oregon Project and brought that back. Can you explain what your thinking was behind that? ALBERTO SALAZAR: The Oregon Project was always a sort of ad hock, just informal name for the group, the running group that was started here at Nike by Tom Clark who was the president of Nike at the time, and myself back in 2002. And the Oregon Project was never a name that was registered with USA Track and Field or anything like that as an official club. It was just the name of a program that was started to try and develop American distance runners. Originally just based on the marathon, and then later looking at all of the track distance races as well. So it was always this name and the name of this group, unofficial name. A couple years ago we added -- my motto was always you had one coach working about seven or eight athletes. So we brought in Jerry Schumacher, and he brought in his great athletes and he's added several since then, and has been very successful and has shown that when you provide one coach with a limited number of athletes, but better resources, that you can be very successful. So his group has been very successful. Both of our groups ran under the banner of the Oregon Track Club Elite this last year, even though we were informally known as the Oregon Project. The decision was made by Nike in this last few months to half year that Nike really wants to tell the story of different training groups, and authentic training groups and their stories. And Jerry and my group are definitely different. We both train out of the Nike campus, but he could just as well or I could just as well be in another state. They are a totally separate group. So my group is known as the Oregon Project, because the Oregon Project was built around my philosophies and my beginnings in coaching eight years ago. And Jerry's group has a totally different identity, and he has totally philosophies of training and so forth. So it really isn't authentic to call us both the Oregon Project. What Jerry's group will be called, I don't know. Nike will decide. For instance, the Elite will have a different story in Eugene. And the OTC Elite is also an elite track club with some of the greatest American distance runners. That story is more not only about great athletes, but about tradition and history of the Oregon Track Club and the University of Oregon, Hayward Field, the magic of Hayward Field. The Oregon Project, my group, is more what we would call the cutting edge, scientific, technology stuff that I believe is important. Jerry's group and what that group will be called, we don't know. It may be some idea of Wisconsin, and the heartland, and old school running. Whatever it is that Jerry and Nike believe is sort of the story that Jerry and Nike want to tell about his runners. So truly what it comes down to is Nike wants to promote these different running tribes sort of that are out there. And rather than having everybody the same, I think it's much more effective. To me it's always been boring. I've argued with Nike for 30 years over having a race the Prix Classic and having 9 of the 12 guys all running the exact same Jersey and they're from nine different countries. To me I get the idea that want to sell the Nike brand, but I think if we could do it in a more diverse way would be more interesting. So that is the challenge. Nike did it in World Cup soccer this year, where all the shoes that the Nike teams wore were different in terms of color waves, but they all had a heel pattern that unified them. And people recognized it was a Nike shoe and a special new model. So that is what Nike's going to do in running now. Q. One of the things when Galen broke the American record in the 5K, one of the stories was that you're now working with Mo Farah, (No Audio) and would you consider him to be part of the group? What is the relationship there? ALBERTO SALAZAR: Yeah, Mo has been training here since be January. When did he come? Yeah, he came after the cross country meet. So he came here on January 10th or 12th, so I've been coaching him since then. People might ask well how can someone that is not an American athlete be part of what you call the Oregon Project? I'll be honest, bringing in one top elite foreigner that I think helps our other runners run great is good for my other American runners. I wouldn't want to have a second or third one, because then at some point I think it is taking too much of my attention and energy away from developing top American athletes. I have been approached by several top foreign athletes over the last few years wanting me to coach them, and I've had to decline because I said as great as it would be to work with a world champion or record holder of some sort, my goal is to develop top American runners. In most cases he's someone that I met several times. He was very persistent in wanting to work with me, and he's such a nice guy that at some point he just kind of wore me down. Everybody liked him so much, and we decided he's going to be a great addition to our group. He'll help push our athletes. I think what he and Galen did in Birmingham just really sort of proved that to me. The two of them worked together. The original plan for pacemakers went out the door. Everything was different than it was supposed to be, so as a result the two of them just improvised and start to trade 800's. They both were trying to beat each other in the end, but they knew by working together that they could both get records, so that's what they did. So it was just -- it's been a great addition to our group, that's why I like Mo. So, yeah, Mo will run for the Oregon Project. Again, he's a UK athlete, but that's all right. Q. Does he primarily train with Galen? How much training do you do together with Mo, Galen? GALEN RUPP: In January we were doing a lot. We were doing most of on our hard workouts together. I mean, it was great. It's great to have another guy that is just focusing on the 5 and 10K, and someone that is better than me right now and who can really push me and bring me to new levels. So I'm really excited to have him out here. Like Alberto said, he's just a great guy. He's someone that everybody here agrees. Even if we weren't runners, he'd be someone that we want to hang out with on the weekends and we'd be good friends regardless. So I think as far as chemistry perspective, he just fit in really well. It's going to be a great partnership. Q. Speaking of training partners, do you train at all with Alan Webb? GALEN RUPP: Yeah. I've trained a lot with Alan. I think over the last couple of weeks he's been focusing more on 1500's, and I've been out of town a lot so we haven't been able to run together, obviously. But before that we were doing a lot of stuff together. Alberto would adjust workouts sometimes where we do most of it, and then maybe at the end I would do a little longer, and Alan would do more shorter sufficient. Obviously I need the longer stuff, and he needs more of the shorter stuff being an 8 and 15 guy. But for the most part we were doing a lot of is it stuff together. Q. Looking ahead to this half marathon, it's going to be clearly a new environment. Other than that turkey trot that you did in San Jose, it's really your first time on the road. I wonder what are you looking for to most about this race, running through the streets, in the big city, crowds, how are you thinking about the race? What are you looking forward to the most about it? GALEN RUPP: We're just trying to keep it simple as far as (No Audio), stay as relaxed as we can and just see how it goes. But I'm really looking forward to it. I think talking with Kara and Dathan about the atmosphere, you know, there is definitely a mystique about New York whether it's the marathon or the half marathon. I think having great crowds and running through New York City is really something that gets you fired up, so is I'm really excited. RICHARD FINN: Did everybody get that? I know we lost a little bit of that right there. Was there anything else that we might have missed? GALEN RUPP: I think just keeping the race simple, going out with the leaders and seeing how relaxed and just competing is the big thing. There is definitely a mystique about New York whether it's the marathon or half marathon. I'm just super excited to be running there. I've heard great things about the crowd and running through New York City obviously, all that stuff just really gets you fired up. I couldn't be happier to be running there. MARY WITTENBERG: I'll share that we heard a lot of words that we really believe in and build our plan around here at New York Road Runners. Competition, versatility, chemistry, differentiation, entertainment, fun, mystique, and we'll promise you all those things here, Galen. So we're excited to have you here. We want everybody to know we'll send this out, but we are expanding our viewing opportunity throughout race week. So we'll, again, have our New York Road Runner live streaming show on Thursday and Friday of race week from 12 to 12:30. We'll have our daily cool down at night with Jerry Tollison Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday at 7:00 p.m. and race day we'll have a live stream broadcast from 7:30 to 9:00. All of you can get to it at NYRR.org, and Richard will send it. But as always, thank David and Sam who worked really hard on this, as well as Richard in getting Galen here and giving us this opportunity as well as Richard and Drea and our full team. But really, Alberto and Galen, thanks to you. We're really excited about this. So have a good couple of weeks. And as always our friends in the media, thank you, and we look forward to March 20th. RICHARD FINN: Thank you, everybody. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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