Catherine Ndereba of Kenya celebrates winning the women's marathon (© Getty Images)
If Catherine Ndereba completes the full winning set of America’s three most prestigious marathons next month in New York, it will provide a fitting end to a memorable year for the Kenyan.
The 31-year-old has had her busiest year in terms of marathons, with next month’s New York City Marathon her third of 2003, and having won her first World title, something she could never have imagined when she first starting running at the age of 12.
It was at that tender age that Ndereba first caught the running bug. Her father used to run and encouraged her in those early years, but her biggest inspiration during those school days was the fact that prizes such as pencils and books were given to the fastest runners in the Physical Education class.
Such was her love for running that she would later earn the nickname ‘Crazy Ndereba’ from fellow school pupils, as she would get up early to go for a run before classes and then train again afterwards. It doesn’t seem so crazy anymore, as Ndereba was one of the few Kenyan success stories at this year’s IAAF World Championships in Paris Saint-Denis.
A championship best performance of 2:23:55 in the French capital has given her renewed confidence as she looks ahead to next year’s Olympic Marathon, hoping to make up for the disappointment of 2000. In that year she had won Boston in 2:26:11 but was still not selected for the Games, and a shoulder injury then thwarted her plans to make the team at 10,000m.
Paris was her first venture into a championship marathon, having been under pressure to take part if she wanted Olympic selection this time around, and Ndereba proved a class act.
Now, we will see a return to the US road scene for 'Catherine the Great', and she will be highly fancied to win in the Big Apple on November 2.
Ndereba hasn’t won a big city marathon since she set her then-world best of 2:18:47 in Chicago two years ago. While younger sister Anastasia has made the top of the podium during that time, winning last year’s Turin race, Catherine has had to be satisfied with fast times but three second places, so she wants to return to winning ways in New York.
One athlete desperate to beat her is her former Kenyan team-mate Lornah Kiplagat, the Dutch citizen who is chasing a $100,000 bonus for winning the New York Mini 10km and New York City Marathon in the same year. Part one of the feat is already accomplished and Ndereba plans to prevent the bonus payment becoming reality.
With three performances inside 2:20, a time only Paula Radcliffe (three times), Olympic champion Naoko Takahashi, and most recently Sun Yingjie (2:19:39 in Beijing on 19 October 2003) have achieved, Ndereba is highly consistent and looks to go one better than on her previous visit to New York in 1999.
Then, as a relative novice with just one Marathon under her belt – a 2:28:27 debut in Boston seven months earlier – she finished second to Adriana Fernandez in 2:27:34. But she really came of age at the Marathon the following year.
She became the first Kenyan woman ever to win the famous Boston Marathon and then smashed her personal best when running 2:21:33 to win in Chicago later that year.
Ndereba completed the same Boston/Chicago double in 2001, but this time it was especially good. The former prison worker ran 2:23:53 in Boston, and then in the autumn became the first woman inside 2:19 with that stunning world best of 2:18:47 in the 'Windy City'. Only a week earlier, Takahashi had become the first woman inside 2:20 but thanks to Ndereba her world mark was shortlived.
After such a high, Ndereba failed to win another marathon until Paris. Surprisingly beaten by Margaret Okayo in Boston (2:21:12) and then more predictably by Radcliffe in Chicago (2:19:26), 2002 saw fast times but no Marathon victories.
In London this year she was again overshadowed by Radcliffe’s World best of 2:15:25 but still ran a very fast 2:19:55. So Ndereba – who often trains with husband Anthony Maina, the former Kenyan prisons' cross country champion who she met in 1994 – is fully expected to win in New York next month.
If she does, she will match the feat of the great Ingrid Kristiansen who is the only woman to have won in New York, Boston and Chicago.
“I am looking to win in New York, and complete a very pleasing year. But next year is even more important. Winning in Paris has given my confidence a significant boost and I would love to win the gold medal in Athens. God helped me to win in Paris, and I hope he can do the same at the Olympics.
“But I also want to get my World record back. Believe me, I can do that. I do not agree with those people who say Paula Radcliffe has taken it out of reach of other athletes.”
