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ING NEW YORK CITY MARATHON

November 7, 2010

Mary Wittenberg

NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK

RICHARD FINN: We have New York Road Runner President and CEO Mary Wittenberg to answer a few questions about today's race, today's news, today's events. And she'll rush back and welcome hopefully our Chilean miner, Mr. Pena to the finish line. Mary, your thoughts?
MARY WITTENBERG: Thank you, Richard. What a day. I think once again the theme is you can't script sport. You can't want anything too much. You've got to set the stage and let it all play out.
So far we're having a simply phenomenal day. You know, we don't care about being the biggest, we care about being the best. At the same time so far, safe and sound. We've got over 45,000 runners on that course.
The crowds Fourth Avenue now is competing with First Avenue for throngs and throngs and throngs of crowds. I have never seen it like that.
I know it looks sunny and beautiful, and it is right now, but it was cold. So many parts of Brooklyn are in the shade. In so many parts of Brooklyn you're actually on Fourth Avenue pretty far from the athletes, none of that mattered. Just tons and tons of people out there for hours and hours. So that was a great sign of, I think, actually your work, with unprecedented media coverage.
The energy at the start seemed sort of extra high to me. We've never been more buttoned up transporting 45,000 people seamless. Usually there are lots of fire drills behind the scenes, so the stage was set.
We knew coming in to this as of yesterday afternoon that Haile Gebrselassie had a problem. So it's at that point that we've been there before with other athletes, but it's at that point that you realize you might not have the dream finish. Because as much as we don't root for any one athlete, and we really don't, when the greatest ever runs in your race, you want the greatest ever to have a really spectacular day. So we knew the odds of that were shrinking greatly.
We also knew that the odds of him not starting were quite high as of yesterday. So that was after what was an amazing week, that was the only sort of hesitation or hiccup or hesitation about today that was in our minds other than taking care of 45,000 people.
The races I thought were just mind-blowing races. On the men's side, I thought Gebremariam would be on the podium. Several people said to me, are you kidding? He won't make it to Central Park, it's his first time. I think he was made for this distance. I don't know if I've ever seen an athlete look so easy at the finish. So we're looking at a future star in this space of the marathon. And obviously now he goes in the ranks from one of the best ever from cross-country to track to the marathon.
Everybody was there for so long. I called Richard in Brooklyn and said this is everything we ever wanted it to be. So long story short, great day. Lots and lots of great performances. Mutai, again, he's just right on the edge of the big win every time and just so strong. So that was impressive. A huge run for third place in Kosgei. I thought Meb was impressive in fifth. I thought for Dathan, really solid American day. Proud of the Americans. They're still learning, but still good to see Jorge and Simon and those guys, Tim Nelson, all going for it from the beginning. That's a great start.
In the women's race, again, you cannot want too much. Your next American champion, it will come when it comes. I thought a simply stellar run by Shalane.
I said to Jerry last night, you know, solid, the first one's just about solid. We've all been to finish lines. I've been right there when a lot of our top women and men have finished before. Shalane -- and usually it's the Grete style that they'll never do this again -- when Shalane came up from her sort of on-the-ground, she looked up and said, "I really appreciate the opportunity." Then she got on her feet and she said, "wow, Jerry really prepared me well. I feel great." So there is lots, lots more ahead for Shalane, so that was great.
Edna Kiplagat has been so strong. A name that she just hasn't gotten the credit that she deserves for a long time. This is a race that in most instances the winner comes from someone you've seen coming on a long time in the marathon, and Edna proved that out today. So I thought that was impressive.
And Mary Keitany, what a battle between she and -- this is why in New York it's gold, silver and bronze. I know we all write about winning and that is sort of our culture. But I think we're an Olympic event, and the races for second and third are really meaningful here. I thought that was a really meaningful race.
Both ran really impressively. This race showed that for the first time debut marathoners can compete here. The first time in a long time we've seen debut marathoners from Gebre to Mary to Shalane run so well here.
Otherwise we were having a great day until I was in the TV booth and I heard that our great champion, dear friend was retiring. So I ran over. I've never left our course before. And I'm very happy I'm a runner because I literally ran over to the Sheraton and had a good talk with Haile.
I told him we aren't open for accepting resignations, certainly from our race tonight, and we had a good chat.
RICHARD FINN: Questions?

Q. Did the injury happen while he was training in Ethiopia, something on the flight or after he got here? When you talked, do you think he'll retract? Is this more emotion than reason? Do you think he'll retract it? He told us he was definitely going to quit.
MARY WITTENBERG: First the injury, and this is -- I'll give you the facts of the injury and I'll give you my take on this. The facts of the injuries we know. First he was having, I think part of this is Haile really focused. He turned off the mobile phone. He really trained and the training was going great. He had some sort of hiccup in his leg that he can say, because I don't want to say. I think it was hamstring but I'm not sure.
But about two weeks ago he started having knee problems. He came in Thursday morning and met Pena. He was supposed to be with us Thursday night at a youth event and I knew he would never miss. And I knew something was up when they said he was sleeping. So he knew he had a serious knee problem, but he was trying to see if it would settle down. He had been on long flights.
Friday I told these guys I knew something was up with Haile, and he kept trying to deal with himself. I got a call about 9:30 yesterday morning, could we get a doctor to look at Haile's knee. So we did that, and sure enough he had extreme tendinitis and a lot of fluid. He just showed me the MRI.
So they drained his knee. Gave him a little bit of cortisone. It was very questionable whether he would start, but he really, really, really wanted to start.
So that was the end of the night. He spent the day doing that, and then woke up and was hopeful. When I saw him at the start, he said he was ready to really go give it a good, hard try.
To be honest, I knew. There's just no way, there's no way. No matter how good you are you can't win let alone like to finish on a course when it begins to feel like this when you've got a major knee problem.
So those are the facts. My take on this, and I just told him this, he lives in a whole different world than most professional athletes today. He doesn't have machines to help deal with injuries. He didn't jump in cold baths. This is a guy who has such natural talent that he's never dealt with any of that.
My take is much more of a very typical injury that should one get on top of it right away, one can deal with. But he's not accustomed to that at all. So that's my take on the injury.
My take on the situation, my advice -- I'll start with my advice. My advice was Haile, he feels so badly and he's so disappointed about today and I said that's fair for yourself. Not from our perspective, not from anyone else's perspective. Be disappointed about the day. You worked really hard and you should be, understandable. Maybe reserve judgment on the whole big future.
But his -- that's my advice. This is the kind of athlete that when you've performed to the highest of highs, he may very well decide that it's enough. But I think with reflection -- actually, it's really up to him, obviously. But in some ways maybe a good thing's enough at some point. But I'm not sure we're at that point with Haile, because it was going really well. And a knee injury with two weeks to go happens to mere mortals, you know.

Q. What reports have you heard, medical reports and others about Pena out on the course and his struggles? And your reaction to it?
MARY WITTENBERG: That from the beginning I really had hoped he would walk. I knew this was going to be tough. He was at mile 18 medical. Received ice. It didn't appear to be anything structural. It appeared to be more just cramping. So we're certainly there teed up to help him out as soon as he gets in.
One thing we keep stressing. This is already a huge victory. He was on four-hour pace for a long time. This is a very, very strong man, and we made very clear his health is first. He does not need to finish this race. But we're ready to help him out wherever he ends up. Whether it's out before or knowing everything we know, I have a feeling he will definitely be crossing that finish line.
By the way, Haile then recovered to ask what time was he going to finish? I said, would you like to join and there was a little discussion. But it looks like he's just not going to be able to, but that's kind of the bounce-back Haile that we all know.

Q. Were there any difficulties to report on the race course? Last year we had a fatality over the bridge?
MARY WITTENBERG: We didn't have any fatalities last year. But knock wood, no incidents this time, and I'm hoping this good weather day really helps us out. I just hope the athletes are really well trained.

Q. If it wasn't last year, did someone have a heart attack?
MARY WITTENBERG: 2008. We went from 2007-2008. We went from 1994 to 2007 without any fatalities. And we had fatalities in 2007-2008, and we did not have any last year.
RICHARD FINN: We'll let Mary get back to the finish line. We'll certainly have her back here if we can when Mr. Pena hopefully finishes. And we'll bring Edison here if at all possible. Any final comments?
MARY WITTENBERG: I'll end with this is the drama and compelling nature of this sport. There were incredible highs today. There are always going to be lows. Then there are some performances right in the middle. But so much was really good, and we'll have to have the benefit of time to truly reflect on it all.

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