By ELLIOTT DENMAN
A Big Apple breeze whispered through the Union Jack flag Andrew Baddeley held at his back.
The 27-year-old holder of a Cambridge University master’s degree in aeronautical engineering had just shown his flying heels to a sizzling field of elite professional runners and hit the Continental Airlines Fifth Avenue Mile finish line in 3:51.8 just past 1 p.m. Saturday, September 26th.
Great Britain’s finest middle distance man handled the usual photo-ops with ease, dealt with the required drug-testing procedures, then proceeded to the award ceremony stand.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I can’t tell you how hard it is to win these titles (as well as a $5000 check from a purse totaling $30,000),” said New York Road Runners CEO Mary Wittenberg, who presided over the 28th annual event.
“Andy, I know you’ve battled back from injuries; this must be the biggest win of your season, and we congratulate you for your performance.
“How does it feel ending your season with a win like that?”
“It’s fantastic winning a race like this, especially against a field as strong as this one,” Baddeley, who owns a track mile best of 3:49.38, told an appreciative audience.
But then he had to answer the harder questions in the press tent.
(1) Given Britain’s amazing history of middle distance glory in past years - the work of such greats as Sebastian Coe, Steve Ovett, Steve Cram, Dave Moorcroft, Peter Elliott and yes, Sir Roger Bannister - but not much of such success the past two decades - was a humongous burden of expectations, heading into the London Olympic Games of 2012, being heaped on his slender shoulders?
“I’m trying to stay away from all that,” he said. “You can't let things like that get to you. One thing I’ve learned from this sport is that you can’t look too far ahead.”
(2) How would he rate the odds on his actually winning the 2012 Olympic 1500-meter title, which would be Britain’s first since Coe’s at Los Angeles in 1984?
“That’s something for the bookmakers to figure out,” he said. “That’s for them, not for me.”
(3) This was Britain’s first Fifth Avenue men’s victory since Matthew Yates’s 3:56.75 triumph in 1991. So is the next Olympic “home team” truly on the way back to its glory days?
“One thing at a time,” he reminded. “Maybe by my winning here it will be part of that. Then again, ‘who really knows?’ “
Once again, the absolutely-free admission event provided=2 0some amazing action for the crowds that lined Fifth Avenue from 81st Street south to 61st Street.
Twenty-two men started the men’s professional race and 15 of them broke four minutes.
Baddeley - pumping his arms in jubilation as he approached the finish line - barely fought off Kenya’s Boaz Lalang, a hugely talented 20-year-old, who was second in 3:52.0; USA Olympians Leonel Manzano and Bernard Lagat (3-4 in 3:52.2 and 3:52.7), and all the rest.
Kyle Heath of Syracuse, N.Y. ran a 4:01.1 and all it got him was 16th place.
Fast-paced as it was, it wasn’t fast enough to threaten the Fifth Avenue record of 3:47.52 by ex-Villanova star Sydney Maree dating back to the very first Fifth Avenue Mile in 1981, or even make the event’s all-time top 10 list (it takes a 3:50.5 to make the cut.)
“Thank you very much, I love you guys, I love coming to New York,” said the Mexico-born Manzano, who then repeated the victory-stand message in Spanish, earning another round of applause.
“At the half, I was feeling really, really great, so that’s where I decided to push a bit,” said Lagat, who’d been beaten out by New Zealander Nick Willis, 3:50.5 to 3:50.6, here in 2008.
“I was pushing, pushing, pushing, all the way from then. The others had just a little more left than I.”
It was much the same in the women’s pro Fifth Avenue Mile - lots of nail-biting, closing-strides decisions, plenty of depth, but no dents in the record book.
A year ago, it was Britain’s Lisa Dobriskey first over the line in 4:18.6, nosing out USA’s Shannon Rowbury, who ran 4:19.2. But this time around, in a much slower race, the positions were reversed, Rowbury’s 4:23.3 edging out Dobriskey’s 4:23.9, with two
members of the much-improved U.S. middle distance corps, Sara Hall and Christin Wurth-Thomas, third and fourth, each clocked in an 4:23.9, too.
Eight of the 12 women elites broke 4:30.
And so it was Rowbury, a 24-year-old Duke University graduate, who got to cavort with the USA flag as what seemed to be the lone Union Jack on the premises was reserved for Baddeley.
At August’s IAAF World Championships 1500-meter final in Berlin, it had been Dobriskey second, Rowbury third, and Wurth-Thomas fifth.
“I’ve been in Europe since the beginning of July, so being back in the U.S., being in New York, of all places, and winning here, is just thrilling,” said Rowbury. “I was hoping to end my season on a high note, and this is definitely that, especially in front of a home crowd.
“My mom was here, my coach was here, my teammates were here. This is just so much fun.
“The World Championships was just crazy. I had bedbugs when I first got there, then I fell in the quarter-fin als,=2 0there was a thunder storm in the semifinals, and then a fall (by runners near her) and a DQ (of first-place finisher Natalia Rodriguez of Spain, for shoving) in the final.
“Those races over there are always so messy. There’s always a lot of elbowing. It’s a learning experience, for sure.”
But as ever, the Fifth Avenue Mile was far more than a pair of competitions for the world-class pros. There was something in the 15-race series of straightaway jaunts for everyone - and a total of 3,793 racers.
Winners of the NYRR’s Metropolitan titles (and $400 checks) were NYC West Side Runners Club/Ethiopian teammates Bado Worku Merdessa (men’s champion in 4:01.8) and Aziza Aliyu (women’s winner in 4:44.8.)
Members of the supporting cast came as youthful as 8 - Alex Wittenberg, son of the NYRR CEO, who took the youngest boys category in a very-very promsing 5:43.
On the men’s side, they were as unyielding as many-time World Masters champion/Seton Hall grad Anselm LeBourne (4:41), Shore AC teammates Tom Cawley (4:43) and Dan Kelly (4:51), and Philadelphian Chuck Shields (4:54), the fifty-somethings who became the oldest men to break five minutes. .
Or as determined as Shore AC stalwart Harold Nolan, who took the 60-69 division of the George Sheehan Mile (named for his late Shore AC teammate) in 5:18, to stretch his winning streak in the event to three and mark his fourth all-time Fifth Avenue victory. Now 62, Nolan still hopes to be able to break five minutes for the mile and set some sexagenarian history.
Runner’s World Magazine executive editor/1968 Boston Marathon king Amby Burfoot ran seventh of the 60's in 6:03.
Or as versatile as Sid Howard, another World Masters champion (most recently this summer in Lahti, Finland), who took the 70-year-old crown in 5:57, as the oldest man to crack six minutes, then went back to his duties on the event’s volunteer team.
Or as daunting as New Yorker William Benson and Vermonter Robert Matteson, who duked it out for 90-year-olds honors. Benson, 90, held on to take it in 11:36; Matteson, 93, holder of an array of single-age shorter-distance records, was a gallant second in 12:32.
“I’m just beginning to learn how to run this mile,” said Matteson, who ran his own management consulting firm, specializing in economic development and public affairs, for many years.
“I’m definitely coming back next year and know I can do a lot better.”
What’s his secret of athletic success?
“Good genes probably help a lot,” he said, smiling widely.
The women, of course, showed just as much resolve.
Eleven-year-old New Yorker Erica Yamazaki led the youth brigade with her
5:56 divisional win.
Two sensational fifty-somethings, many-time National Masters champion Kathryn Martin of Long Island, and New Yorker Inez20McMahon, breezed home in style. Martin, 57, ran the avenue in 5:26; McMahon, 54, ran 5:43.
Ginette Bedard of New York was the senior woman to break eight minutes. At 76, she ran a 7:24
The years were no barrier to New Yorkers Joan Rowland or Pearl Jones, either. In a duel of 83-year-olds, Rowland got to 61st Street in 13:52; Jones in 15:17.
A special finish line celebrity guest was Australian Steve Hooker, the world pole vault champion.
Said Wittenberg, “we’re already working on a (street) pole vault”
Consider it a definite maybe for some future edition of the Fifth Avenue festivities.