William Amponsah took his emerging status as a budding African long-distance sensation to the next level after placing 8th in the 2022 edition of the Great North Run held in the United Kingdom.
The race saw over 60,000 elite runners including half marathon world champion, Kiplimo, who recently won double gold at the 2022 Commonwealth Games, Olympic 10,000m champion Selemon Barega and Amponsah’s role model, Kenenisa Bekele.
There was a huge improvement from Amponsah as we have seen the entire year following his huge half marathon Personal Best (PB) of 1:03:15. But why any performance in the Great North Run is a big deal and what kind of competition is it?
About the Great North Run
The Great North Run is the largest half marathon in the world, taking place annually in North East England each September. Participants run between Newcastle upon Tyne and South Shields. The run was devised by former Olympic 10,000 m bronze medalist and BBC Sport commentator Brendan Foster.
The first Great North Run was staged on 28 June 1981, when 12,000 runners participated. By 2011, the number of participants had risen to 54,000. For the first year, it was advertised as a local fun run; nearly thirty years on it has become one of the biggest running events in the world, and the biggest in the UK.
The Great North Run starts in Newcastle upon Tyne on the A167 road (the central motorway), on the edge of both the city centre and the Town Moor. The last mile (1.6 km) of the route runs along the seafront road to the finishing line at South Shields. And this year, there was a record number of participants in the region of 60,000.
Racing with a mentor
Amponsah’s all-time role model, Kenenisa Bekele, was present at the Great North run. For the uninitiated, he was the world record holder in both the 5000-metre and 10,000-metre events from 2004 (5,000m) and 2005 (10,000m) until 2020. He won gold in both the 5000m and 10,000m events at the 2008 Summer Olympics.
At the 2004 Olympics, he won the gold medal in the 10,000m and the silver medal in the 5000m. In fact, Kenenisa won the 10,000m title at the World Championships in Athletics in 2003, 2005, 2007 and 2009, matching Haile Gebrselassie’s four-in-a-row win streak. Amponsah narrated his encounter.
“I think before we even got to the start, I saw him and then he was just sitting down, so I greeted him. He said hi, I told him I have been watching him since JHS. I was so glad to see him and even after the race, I got the opportunity to take a picture with him”.
Finishing 8th in 60,000 elite runners
Amponsah coming into the competition had broken the existing 5000m national record at the Commonwealth Games weeks earlier. In Birmingham, Amponsah run a time of 13.51.63 and placed 13th in the 5000m final. That performance secured him a ticket and his work was cut out – he indeed had his work out but succeeded.
“Every year, my times improve and that’s exactly the goal I have set. I want to do better than my previous year – so that has been my focus and Mr Todd also speaks to me a lot. In our place, everyone says, ‘win it, win it’ but sometimes it takes time. It’s always in my mind that I have to make progress in every race. Every progress I make gets me closer.
“When we started, I planned to run my own race. So when we all started, I realized that I could move together with them to some point, so I just had to keep up with them. So as we were going, I was okay. I was inside them, I saw Kiplimo because I had raced with him in the Commonwealth Games [and] I had already told Mr Todd that I’ll finish in the top 10, so as I was going all that was running through my head was ‘top 10’. When it got to the last 3k, I knew I was eighth and I could even hear people say it – you are 8th, top 10!
“So I knew – but someone was chasing me, if you check the time. I run 1 hour, 3 and 15 and the person did 1 hour 3 and 16. So I was determined to stay there and as the guy kept chasing me, I was forced to go faster – I was so excited. In the last 400m, he kept coming at me, but I continued pumping. So I was excited when I crossed the finish line. I said ‘wow, you did it.”
Source: Myjoyonline
