Runner finds that less can be more
Levins broke Canadian record for 10,000 metres after reducing his training runs
EDMONTON— At the London Olympics, Cameron Levins had Canadians on the edge of their seats for 24 of 25 laps.
He was running comfortably in the lead pack in the 10,000 metre event, and people started to wonder whether he could actually pull this off. He was running the race of his life, right there with the medal-winning elites, until the last 400 metres when the finishing kick that helped him dominate in his final year of U.S. collegiate competition deserted him.
Flash forward three years to the Canadian track and field championships where he secured his ticket to the Beijing worlds in the 5,000 to go along with the 10,000 qualification he already had, and he looks about the same as he did in London.
Levins can still pass for a younger, faster Malcolm Gladwell but, aside from his trademark hair, he’s a far different runner than he was in 2012.
For one, he’s finally given up on his belief that he could reach world-class speed through sheer miles.
Now, he only runs 170 to 190 km a week in training, the equivalent of just over four marathons. The word “only” fits, simply because he used to run six or more each week. He’s found that less can be more. In May, he broke the Canadian 10,000-metre record by 16 seconds when he ran 27.07.51 at the Prefontaine Classic in Oregon.
While he’s covering less distance, he’s ramped up his weight training and the intensity of his runs.
“I was training myself too hard, too much . . . it’s a fine balance and I was well beyond it,” he said in an interview Thursday night just after win-
“I was training myself too hard, too much . . . it’s a fine balance and I was well beyond it.” CAMERON LEVINS
ning the 5,000 metre Canadian title. “I changed to something new and it’s really coming around for me.”
But those changes are part of the new training program he started in 2013 with coach Alberto Salazar at the Nike Oregon Project and that has, recently, put him under an unwelcome spotlight.
In a June story by ProPublica and BBC, a former assistant accused Salazar of violating anti-doping rules with Olympic silver medallist Galen Rupp.
Salazar has denied any wrongdoing, and issued a 12,000-word rebuttal.
And that, as far as Levins is concerned, is the end of it.
“Alberto came out with a statement himself and I believe he’s put forth a far larger amount of evidence than was ever put in the initial allegations. I’m just trusting in that,” he said.
But Levins knows that in a world left jaded by numerous past doping scandals in sport, any talk of performance enhancing drugs tends to taint by association, whether athletes are guilty or innocent.
Levins is sure people look at him a little differently because of the allegations made against his coach and training partner.
“It sucks, simply put,” said Levins, a 26-year-old from Black Creek, B.C.
“But I know I’m a clean athlete and I would never even venture towards performance enhancing drugs. The only thing performance enhancing I’m doing is going out the door and training my butt off every day,” he said.
“Even if I’m being honest it doesn’t mean anyone is going to believe me,” he said. “There is nothing I can do about it.”
So he tries not to think about it and focuses on what he can do something about.
He broke the Canadian record, something he’s been chasing in his mind since 2012, but he still wants more.
Levins wants to cross the 10,000metre finish line before the clock hits 27 minutes. He feels physically ready to run that fast, he said, he just needs to be in the right headspace at the right time in a fast race.
But before that’s likely to happen, he wouldn’t mind picking up a few medals.
At the Toronto Pan Am Games, he will run just the 5,000-metre race. But in August in Beijing at the world championships, he plans to run both the 5,000 and 10,000.
Championships races are often more strategic than simply being allout fast.
“Beijing is about winning, Pan Ams is about winning,” Levins said. “There’s not much room for anything else.”