ANTHONY WHITEMAN
Major Achievements:
Personal Best's
800m - 1.45.81
1500m - 3.32.34
Mile - 3.51.90
3,000 - 7.43.61
Runnerslife interview: Meet The Guest - Anthny Whiteman
Rivalry with John Mayock
We had a strained relationship; I wouldn't say we were friends really. Probably because we were rivals it would be hard to be friends, and it might have been a bad thing if we were best mates as I am sure it drove us on to
faster times to beat each other. I think he came across a bit arrogant at times but then maybe he felt he had to come across that way as people would expect that with him having a faster time. I always had people telling me they watched on telly and were cheering for me over John, but then I am sure he would say the same!
Did you ever train together?
We never trained together as we were in two separate camps, the
problem with the UK athletics is that we worry to much about beating each other
rather than seeing the big picture and helping each other to beat the best in
the world. In countries like Kenya it is a way of life and they are brought up
training in very big groups. They get everything organised by their federations,
where over here we have to organise our set up. We can say no if we don't want
him/her in the group or we will train somewhere else, in Kenya they don't have a
say in things like that.....they HAVE to train
together.
I always had time for people, maybe because I wasn't the super star throughout my years and had to work bloody hard to get where I did. I always had time for people when I was winning big races just the same as when I started unlike some athletes I saw over the years. There are a lot of prima donnas out there!
Monaco Grand Prix
Monaco was my favourite race for a number of reasons. The story behind it was I had to miss the British Championships due to a bad reaction from an insect bite. I went through the entire doctor's tests to prove it; I had run 3.34 and was going really well at the time before I had the bite. The selectors at UK athletics decided to take Matthew Yates which I didn't agree with, he went out badly in the heats in the end. This really fired me up! Then to add to this I was made to feel like a second class athlete when I had to really beg to get in the race and then they didn't give me flights with other athletes in Heathrow so I had to travel to Luton and fly alone and make my own way to the hotel.
Daniel Komen and Morceli were in that Monaco race and were favourite's of mine. I remember feeling great as we all floated around the track. As we came to the last 200m I moved on to Morceli's shoulder thinking 'I have watched this
guy on telly for years' and just went straight past and didn't feel any lactic or pain. You only get a few races like this in your life where you just float around effortlessly. It was won in 3.29 that day and I had no clue what I ran until After the race I was talking to radio 5 live, he put the microphone in my face and said "You are now 4th on the all time UK list with
3.32"I couldn't believe it! I was so happy to be so close to my hero's growing up (Seb Coe and Steve Ovett) and was probably a good thing I didn't ever go faster than them as I felt they were a different class to me.
Retirement
It just got to the stage where everything was getting on my nerves and rather than realise how lucky I was and that I was in a privileged position I was moaning about what hotel I was in or only getting £500 to race. Running the Grand Prix races are fantastic but as you get older they come along less and less and in the end you do random races just for the money to make up the mortgage payments and your not doing it for the love anymore and that's when I knew it was time to stop.
Have you watched any athletics since you retired till now?
Until now I haven't watched athletics as I would watch it through angry eyes thinking 'I could run faster than that years ago' and silly little things like that and just didn't want to watch it at all. I sort of kept in touch a little bit reading 'LetsRun' (American website) and a bit of RunnersLifeas friend Neil Speaight was involved.
Kelly Holmes
I got together with Kelly at a race meeting. The day before we were both on the track and I asked here what she was doing, she said 2x200m in 26 seconds which was striding for me so I said I would pace her. On the first rep I did bang on 26! Then the next I remember a guy walked out on the track and we had to swerve and went through in 26.1! I turned to Kelly and said "If that guy didn't come out it would have been 26 flat again".
I was finishing my running career really as we approached 2004, Then when I didn't make the team I just said to Kelly if she wanted me to come to Cyprus to pace her sessions I would leading up the Athens Olympics. I was good
at judging pace and did it a lot in races, the next thing I knew I was in Cyprus.
I think she appreciated me being blunt and honest her, Kelly is strong minded and some people would just agree with her where I would jump in asking "Is that really right thing to do at this point" as I felt I was equal to her and hopefully it was
appreciated.
In sessions I would take her through reps, I would go around in lane one and then last in the last 100m I would move out as she pulled along side me, I would just tell her to relax and stride out etc...She got used to just sitting and think this also helped as before I trained with her she would look 'edgy' in races and go to the front.
Kelly was a very hard athlete and pushed herself really hard in training all the time, sometimes to hard. Kelly deserves everything she got and hopefully I played a little part in her success.
I remember when Kelly Holmes won the double gold I was watching Sky News who had Dolton Grant talking about Paula Radcliffe and Kelly Holmes so I emailed in saying he is a high jumper I might know more about running events! As Kelly won the gold I got a phone call saying "This is Sky News, would you be able to talk live to the presenter"I was on there for about 15minutes talking and then I was on that clip going 'Sky News on the hour every hour' for the rest of the day!
When I came back from Cyprus training with Kelly I went straight to
the betting shop to put money on Paula wining the marathon but never thought
about doing it for Kelly as I just thought it would be like cheating because I
trained with her even though I knew what great shape she was
in.
Potchefstroom, South Africa
I usually went to Pochefstroom , back then there would only be 70
people. Now there are around 500+ athletes. It was great because it was a few
years behind UK at that time so little things like needing a blood test were
simple. In the UK you would have to make an appointment where over there just
walk into a pharmacy, pay say £20 and bang you get a blood test right then. You
could buy vitamin injections over the counter and it was so easy to do rather
than back in the UK where you would have to wait quite a while for either of the
above and the hassle of it.
A Favourite session of mine out there would be 1000m (45sec recovery)
400m (lap jog) and about 6/7 sets. Once in 2002 or 2003 Me, Sam Haughian, and
Neil Speaight were doing the session, we were getting through the K's in around
2.55 and then pushing the 400m reps. Sp8y wasn't feeling great or had picked up
a knock so couldn't do the whole thing, so he said he would just take every 400m
rep. We did about 6 sets and each one would get a little faster, 61....60...59
and so on. Then on the last rep he turned to me and said "Last one guys, how fast you want it?"I just said to him "Try and drop me!" so he hammered off the line! I remember an Irish guy was timing us and
his eyes started to get bigger as he looked at the splits for 100m, then 200m.
Coming into the home straight and I hit 51.4seconds....Neil couldn't drop me but
he tried bloody hard!!
In 2002 or 2003 after that exact session above I went down to sea
level and cruised around to a 3:35. Sometimes people get to focused on wanting
to run fast reps when sometimes just doing decent quality reps but more volume
can just get you very strong and produce fast times.
I remember a few years after I first went there the Danish team turned
up. I knew a couple of athletes in the team so started talking to them and asked
how they ended up there. The coach of the distance team used to get the BMC
magazine sent to him and he had seen an interview with me in there talking about
my training in Potchefstroom and so he ended up taking his team there, it's
weird sometimes as you do interviews and think know one will be reading
them.
Did you used to run with your mouth closed at Altitude?
What happened was back home on the canals there were lots of bugs as I
would run and on the trail so I would hold my breath and breath through my nose
for as long as I could but not for the whole run! Then in South Africa the bugs
were 10x the size so me and sp8y (Neil Speaight) would have to hold our breath
again to avoid getting a pint sized wasp in the mouth. It would start only say a
minute and then after a while I could do a 3minutes and so on, being an athlete
I analysed it and I started to realise when I was really strong by how many
minutes I could run with my mouth closed! I remember once a bloody bumble bee
flew into my mouth and stung me!!
Training
I always based my weeks around the sessions and I never counted my
miles although I think my biggest ever week was around 88miles. If I had a hard
session and was suppose to do 13miles the nest day I would scrap it otherwise it
would ruin me for the next session. You have to be clear what each run is for
otherwise runs cross over and you end up running 4-5 tough runs because your not
recovered well enough which in turn ruins your week as you can't get the
quality you need.
I always did 3 quality sessions including 1 hill session every week.
It would normally be a 45seconds hill, and would get steeper and steeper with
the last 30m being something stupid like 2:1 ratio. I loved the hill sessions
and it really improved my leg speed.
Long runs were never longer than 1hour 30minutes, and never ran more
than once a week over 1hour. Sometimes on a Sunday's we did the 10k turn around,
I would run out in say 38min 10k and then get back in say 33minutes. I am sure
the GPS crowd would say it is a little short but it was a rough guide not exact
measured route.
I would do steady runs in the week but I didn't go out thinking I have
to run 'x' speed. It was all about the sessions, the rest of the week would be
recovery runs or just run brisk to feel ready for the next run, no point going
into a session tired.
Guys like Craig Mottram would do their long runs very, very slow!
Again they would say it was for aerobic benefit, it wasn't there to get speed or
over do things... just time on their feet.
Did you ever use a heart rate monitor?
I would be very rigid with my heart rate for recovery runs, especially
at altitude. I was of course tested and knew that 153 was when I would be
working outside of 'easy zone'. I set the watch up if I was doing a recovery run
and it would bleep if I went over that 153 barrier, if it went off I would just
slow down.
What was your taper like?
I would normally do say a week or so taper but only for championships
and the basic outline would be race pace but through the week I would reduce rep
number and size of the reps. So I would do say 10x400 in 57seconds and then by
the day before the race I was doing 2x200m in 57 pace. You just have to be
comfortable at race pace and get the legs ready.
Comeback
I recently started back just for enjoyment. I saw a local 5mile race
so did a few weeks training and turned up. No one knew me and I just went off in
the pack, it was weird putting on a race number again though. Coming into the
last 300m I was 2nd and just thought id hit the gas...I put 17seconds
on him over just 300m and then thought 'I might still have something
here'
I have kept fit through my personal training business, doing runs with
clients although not fast or anything but it has kept me ticking
over.
After that one race I went to a local club and a lovely old lady came
over and told me to wear brighter kit in the night and was asking how fast I was
while I could hear two guys behind saying "I'm not running with him".... "Well it's your turn to take the slow ones" said another. Anyway I said I was just jogging but they wanted to know what times I
had run to get me in a group, I said I had run 3.51 for the mile and have
actually been to two Olympic games, she didn't believe me at first and then was
having a heart attack trying to find a faster group for
me!
I then thought I had a free weekend when the indoors were in Sheffield
and thought id just give it a crack. I ran 1.52 but I was blowing a bit, but off
no speed work for a long time I didn't think it was too bad. After the race
James Thie was saying "It's the muscle memory Anthony!"
I am really fancy trying to break the 4minute barrier as a veteran and
that's it, I have no intention of going to champs any more. The 4minute mile
barrier is a big thing in athletics and I have found a bit of fire again so why
not see what happens but my training won't be like before. I can't think of
anything worse than doing 8x1k on my own...so I won't. If there is no group that
night I will just do 3 or 4 reps where in the past I would do the whole 8 reps
alone. I can still knock out 23seconds for 200m which makes me think I still
have something in the tank and off no training.
Have you got any races planned then?
I will be doing the relays. I want to do Milton Keynes to get a gage
for the Nationals in April. I really enjoy 2nd leg when I was running
before so will hopefully do that leg again, I have to be in the mix! If I go
last leg and find my self on my own I will be looking at the trees or something.
I hope there will be guys to hang on too and then on to the
national.
Then it will be the National relays in Sutton Park. I love the way
they have never messed with the course and the team spirit at the race. I first
did the south relays with only 3 runners so moved to Shaftesbury to race with a
full team. I would always do the relays as my final endurance work before going
into the track season, I ran sub 14minutes on a short leg but don't think I will
be doing that this year!
Current 1500m in the UK
Standards have fallen since when I was running. Michael East came
along just as I was finishing and was another top athlete and missed my time by
around 100thof a second I think but apart from that the others
haven't quite done it yet. In general now races are won in slower times
throughout Europe not just in the UK. El Guerrouj ran 3.26 but would win most
races in around 3.30 and now it's about 3.34 to win big
races.
When I was running I never looked at the UK rankings, it was always
the Euro and world rankings to compare myself. You have to compare yourself to
the best out there.
It is very surprising to see I am still the 5th fastest on
the UK list, you would think by now guys would be braking through the times my
generation ran.
Do you think you got the credit you deserved when you were
racing?
I don't deserve the credit maybe because I didn't perform at
championships so that's fair enough. For one reason or another I was never quite
on my game at major games through injuries and illness. I was happy with what I
achieved and have no regrets, I really enjoyed the grand prix races and maybe
that's also a reason why I performed better in them.