Dad time keeps Willis fresh
COUNTRIES COMPETING: Tuesday, 4.25am.
(1500m) Heats: Wednesday, 6.35pm. Semifinals: Saturday, August 17, 3.05am. Final: Monday August 19, 1.25am.
(Javelin) Qualifications: Thursday 5.30pm. Final: Sunday August 18, 2.35am.
(Marathon) Saturday 10pm.
(10,000m) Sunday 2.55am, (5000m) heats Thursday 6.20pm.
(5000m) Heats, Thursday 6.20pm. (50m walk) Wednesday 4.30pm. (800m) Heats, Thursday 5.35pm. (pictured right) Only seven athletes have achieved the feat New Zealand’s Valerie Adams is striving to match in Moscow — four or more titles in the same event.
ATHLETICS
NEW ZEALAND track and field fans will soon see if Nick Willis’ new ‘‘lowkey’’ approach can deliver him his finest moment on the big stage since his silver medal at the Beijing Olympics.
The 30-year-old middle distance star deliberately chose to scale back his participation in grand prix events this year – in part because he has just become a first-time father.
His wife, Sierra, gave birth to son Lachlan early last month, and Willis tweeted last week that the new-born has already helped him develop a new pre-race routine – ‘‘hanging out with my son asleep on my chest all afternoon’’.
He left Lachlan long enough to run a snappy 3min 56.57sec mile to win a feature race in his hometown of Ann Arbor, Michigan last weekend – his first outing in three months since recovering from a calf injury.
Willis suffered the strain when he hyper-extended his knee in a fall after clipping another runner in a Diamond League race in Shanghai in May. be his last major meets before Moscow.
He said he had ‘‘blown up’’ in his two big races in the last two seasons – the 2012 Olympic Games final where he was a disappointing ninth – and the 2011 world championships in Daegu, South Korea, where he was last in the final.
The Lower Hutt native had his best European season in 2011 and, last year, achieved a personal best of 3min 30.35sec in Monaco, just a few weeks before the Olympics.
‘‘A lot of that had to do with the fact I had my best race in the grand prix race before the championship.’’
So he decided to ‘‘take a low-key approach’’ this year and use the 1500m heats and semifinals to ‘‘fine-tune’’ for the final rather than compete in the latter rounds of the Diamond League circuit.
Hence Willis is only 36th on the list of fastest 1500m runners in the world for 2013, with his best effort of 3:34.68 stretching back to Sydney in March where he qualified for Moscow after a little push from Australian pacemaker Ryan Gregson.
Yet the IAAF deceiving.
‘‘top
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Only three athletes in the world have run a faster 1500m in 2013 than Willis’ PB and the Kiwi champion won’t have to worry about two of them in Moscow.
Mo Farah, Great Britain’s 5000m and 10,000m world champion, stunned the track and field world with a searing 3:28.81 effort in a Diamond League meet at Monaco last month to break former great Steve Cram’s 28-year-old British record.
It was the sixth fastest 1500m in history and the second briskest this year, behind 2008 Olympic champion Asbel Kiprop from Kenya.
But Farah won’t be racing the 1500m in Moscow. He is committed to contesting his two specialist longer distance events and the schedule is too tight even for a superhuman.
Kiprop, who ran 3:27.72 to shade Farah in Monaco, will be in Moscow and will be widely tipped to defend his world title.
The 24-year-old, who won the only three Diamond League races he contested this year, has the fourth-fastest 1500m of all time and, like Willis, will be out to atone for a disappointing effort in London last year.