Twin Ambitions - My Autobiography (35 page)

I returned to London for the Anniversary Games, held on 27 July, to celebrate a year since the city had hosted the Olympics. I was running a shorter distance than the previous year, but won the 3000 metres to continue my winning streak at the Olympic Stadium, and the crowd did their bit to recreate the wonderful atmosphere. Being there brought back some great memories of the Olympics. And on a personal level, it was the first time my twin girls had come to watch Daddy race at a meet. Seeing my family after the race was a bittersweet moment. Amani started crying because she didn’t recognize me. That upset me, obviously. You want your kids to be smiling when they see you, especially after you’ve been away for a long time, as I had been in Kenya and then Park City and St Moritz. At times like these I have to remind myself that I’m working hard not just for myself, but for my family too – I want them to have a good start in life. Don’t get me wrong – I love what I do, and the rewards my success has brought. But at the same time I’m looking forward to life after running, in terms of spending more time with my family. I want to see my kids grow up, take them to the park, play with them – do the stuff normal parents do.

Two weeks later, I competed at the World Championships in Moscow. Revenge was on my mind. Before competing in the 10,000 metres, I sat down and watched the video of my defeat to Jeilan. It served as a powerful motivation – a reminder of what I had come here to achieve. I watched that video several times, kept playing it back. Watching as I went too early. Watching Jeilan streak past me to win the race and leave me in the silver medal position. Two years. That’s how long I had been carrying that defeat inside me. Now I had the chance to put things right. I had my Olympic golds, but the 10,000 metres world title was missing. More than anything else, I wanted to win that race.

If you watch a recording of that 10,000 metres final, the set-up looks so similar to Daegu it’s almost scary. The same blue track. The same faces on the start line: Imane Merga, Paul Tanui of Kenya, my training partner, Galen. And, of course, the guy who had beaten me last time out: Jeilan. There were some new faces in the mix, top runners like Abera Kuma of Ethiopia and Bedan Karoki of Kenya. Dejen Gebremeskel was there too, and Dathan Ritzenhein, another of Alberto’s runners from the Oregon Project. The race played out very similarly to 2011 as well. In the first half the pace was quite slow: I started at the back with Galen and worked my way through. I took the lead with 400 metres to go. Then the pace became much faster. It was almost like a replay of Daegu. Going into the final 150 metres, Jeilan and me were neck and neck, exactly as we had been in 2011. Back then, Jeilan had surged past me to win the race. This time, as we sprinted towards the finish line, I was thinking, ‘Oh God, not again. Please not again.’ I didn’t want it to be a case of déjà vu. I was determined not to get beaten, so I dug deep and told myself: ‘No way. Not this time. I’m not gonna let it happen again.’ I’d trained for this. Prepared for it. I knew what was coming. What I had to do. In Daegu I’d kicked on too early and left myself with no more gears to shift up into when Jeilan had ghosted past me. This time, I had something left in the tank. Jeilan didn’t. Right at the end I moved up into another gear. I had that little bit of extra speed to hold him. Everything about that 10,000 metres was the same. Only the ending was different. This time, I won.

I was the first British man to win a 10,000 metres World Championship title. I’d created another piece of history. When I crossed that line it was a special feeling for me. I’d waited two years for that moment – that chance to avenge Daegu. Now I had a few days to rest and recover for the 5000 metres, and my opportunity to make history as only the second man after Kenenisa Bekele to do the ‘double-double’ – to win both Olympic and World gold at the two distance events. I felt good about my chances of joining Bekele in the history books. In the twelve months since the London Olympics I had put even more effort into training. I remember feeling tired going into the 5000 metres heats in 2012, having to somehow just get through it. Now my body was responding much better. I was ready for this. I wanted to win.

I came through fifth in the second heat, trying to conserve as much energy as possible for the final. Three days later, on 16 August, I walked out onto the track, determined to make history.

The pace was slow at the start of the race. There had been a lot of talk beforehand about some of the African guys using team tactics against me, but, as usual, this talk didn’t translate into action. Having done the 10,000 metres, I thought that maybe the guys with fresh legs on the start line of the 5000 metres – guys like Edwin Soi and Bernard Lagat – would have pushed the pace harder early on to try and burn me out. But it didn’t work out like that. To my surprise, the guys sat back. Nobody wanted to make a break for it. Hagos Gebrhiwet sat on my shoulder near the back of the pack. Galen and me had talked beforehand and agreed on our plan: sit back rather than go hard, don’t take any risks, do our thing of working our way through the pack, then put the foot to the pedal at the end. With 1 kilometre left, my rivals finally made their move. First to take the lead was Isiah Koech, the Kenyan 5000 metres specialist, who had won gold as a junior at the World Youth Championships in 2009. The pace quickened to 62 seconds a lap. Then Yenew Alamirew moved out in front. The pace got ridiculously fast. That last kilometre was 2:26. In any major championship, if you run close to 2:26, you’re going to win the race. At that speed we were going faster than at the Olympics. With just over 600 metres to go, I went out in front, moving past Alamirew. Koech tried attacking me on the last lap, but I just pushed and pushed and pushed. With 40 metres to go, I pulled away from Koech. And that was enough. I came home in first place with a time of 13:26.98. Gebrhiwet finished less than three-hundredths of a second behind me and one-thousandth of a second ahead of Koech. That’s how close we all were.

It was my fifth global outdoor title, making me the most decorated athlete in British history. At the end of it all – at the end of a crazy, crazy twelve months – I was overwhelmed with this feeling of indescribable joy. To have gone into a major competition a year after the Olympics and done it all over again, winning gold at both distances, now decisively proved that London wasn’t just a one-off. For my family, for the people who had supported me and stuck by me through the years, good times and bad, to add the World Championship golds to the Olympic medals meant a lot. I could rightfully claim my place on the list of all-time greats. I couldn’t have done it without my family. My friends. My support team. And the public. To have the entire country behind you at home and in the stadium is such a fantastic feeling. In my career, I never thought I would achieve everything that I have. It just goes to show that anything is possible.

Surprisingly, there were a few critical voices in the media after my double. Some observers claimed that I couldn’t consider myself one of the greatest athletes ever until I had broken world records. Everyone’s entitled to their opinion, but you can’t have it both ways. My target has always been to win as many medals as I can, both on a personal level and for my country. Records are different. They don’t last. They’re there to be broken. Let’s say you train hard and throw all your effort into breaking a world record. What’s going to happen to it? Your record might stand for one year, or maybe even ten, but sooner or later, someone else is going to come along and beat it. Then you’re a footnote. But no one can ever take an Olympic medal or a world title away from you.

Some people fail to understand that training to win medals involves a different strategy from training to run a faster time. In a championship race you have to combine speed and endurance, you have to work out your tactics and what your rivals are going to do. You have to have every angle covered because you don’t know what others are capable of. When it comes to posting a fast time, though, you can simply say, ‘I’m going to go for it,’ and you don’t have to worry about tactics or rivals or anything else. You can focus purely on teaching your body to run at a particular pace.

Now the 2013 World Championships are out of the way, there are no major track championships for me until 2015. For the next year I’ll be able to focus on running faster times. Then let’s see how fast I can push it. But if it comes down to a choice, I’ll always choose medals over records. I want titles. I want to be up there on the podium, gold medal hanging around my neck, draped in a Union Jack, the national anthem playing, doing my country proud. As long as I can do that, I’ll be happy.

Looking ahead, my target is the marathon. The plan with Alberto has always been for me to step up to the 26.2 mile distance in 2014, working my way up by running half-marathons. The type of person I am, I don’t like standing still. I like to try different things. The marathon is something new, and I want to know what it feels like to run it. It’ll be a different type of pain. I’ve tasted the pain of running at 5000 and 10,000 metres on the track – now I want to taste the pain of running a marathon. Running it is all about testing my limits, pushing myself while I still have the chance. The motivation to do that doesn’t come in the form of a cheque. It doesn’t come from your agent or your coach or your sponsors. It comes from you and you alone. I want to be able to do things that I feel good about. All the miles I do, all the training and recovery, pushing my body week in, week out: it all comes down to me. I’m the one who has to make that effort, that sacrifice.

The London Marathon is the biggest challenge for me in 2014. I’m looking forward to running through the streets of London, soaking up the love of the crowd. Dave Bedford, together with Hugh Brasher, his successor as Race Director, and the rest of the team at London Marathon always put on a great show. Best of all, I know it’s going to be really tough. I won’t be running against a few easy guys. The race is going to be loaded. The pressure is on for me to get my training right. To tell you the truth, I can’t wait.

And beyond that – who knows? I try not to think that far ahead. Sure, there are things I’m looking forward to when the time comes for me to finally call it a day. I’ll catch up with friends I haven’t seen for too long. I’ll chill out. Maybe do some travelling. I’ve been to loads of countries, but all I’ve seen of most of them is a running track and a hotel. I get on a plane. Fly some place. Get off. Check in at the hotel. Sleep. Rest. Eat. Run. Recover. Back to the hotel. Sleep. Get on another plane. Different countries for me just mean different hotel rooms. They all start to seem kind of the same, apart from the language of the sitcoms on the TV. If you ask me what China is like, I couldn’t tell you. I haven’t seen the Great Wall or the Forbidden City. At least I’ve got my laptop, so I can Skype my family while I’m away from home. Otherwise I’d be lost.

There’s one other thing I’m looking forward to doing once I retire: playing football. I love the game, yet I haven’t been able to play for years. I wouldn’t change anything for what I’ve achieved as an athlete, but at the same time, I have missed kicking a ball around a pitch, putting tackles in, running down the flanks. When I’m done, I’ll put on a bit of weight and just enjoy life. I like the idea of getting back into Sunday League.

One thing I won’t do when I retire is run. When that day comes, I’m done. I’ve run so many thousands of miles. That’s it. No more running. Just the football, and maybe the odd bit of boxing. Having said that, retirement is a
looooooong
way away for me. I try not to think that far ahead. There’s still so much I want to do in my career. There are more championships to compete in, more races to run, more medals to be won for my country. There’s the World Championships in Beijing in 2015; the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro in 2016; the marathon. I just want to keep pushing it and do well because, as an athlete, you know this moment isn’t going to last for ever.

My faith helps to keep me grounded. Take Ramadan, for example. I’m not about to adopt the attitude of, ‘I’m an Olympic champion, I’m not doing that now.’ I have never looked at myself as better than other people. I expect to be judged just the same as anyone else. Islam teaches you to be thankful for the things you have, to be charitable and kind, not to be resentful over the things you don’t have. Whether something good or bad happens, you still thank Allah for everything he has given you. At the same time, I would never wish to impose my religion on someone else. In my view, religion is a private, personal thing. What you believe is what you believe. It’s not for me to decide what someone else should believe in and, as much as possible, I keep my beliefs to myself. I hate the idea of imposing my views on someone else. It’s important to respect everyone’s beliefs, even if you don’t agree with them.

A lot of it comes down to education. At school I was in a minority and marked out for treatment by some of the other kids. Because I was known as the athlete, I escaped the worst of it. I imagine it was worse for some of the other kids. Thankfully, things have improved dramatically since those days, although it’d be a lie to say that racism has completely disappeared. I’m regularly stopped and interrogated by customs in the US, and as a general rule of thumb, I need two hours when catching a flight connection because that’s how long it takes me to get through immigration. As soon as the name ‘Farah’ flashes up on the screen, everyone’s on alert. Tania gets stopped even when she’s travelling without me, purely because she now has a Somali-sounding surname.

Changing perceptions takes time. Parents can do their bit by encouraging their kids to make friends with people from other cultures and backgrounds. That way they’re less likely to be prejudiced. For me, speaking as a kid who moved from one culture to another, when I’m walking down the street, I don’t see myself as black, I’m just Mo. I don’t judge people by the colour of their skin. I just see people. At the end of the day, everyone bleeds the same.

I’m trying to do my bit to change perceptions. In the past few years there’s been a lot of negative coverage of Somalia and Somali people: the gangs, the civil war. That’s started to change thanks to the success stories of people from Somali backgrounds, such as the writer and journalist Rageh Omaar and the singer K’Naan. I’d like to think that my achievements have played a part too. The country has a transitional government now and is starting to rebuild, but that will take time. In early 2013 the new Somali president, Hassan Sheikh Mohamoud, called me to ask me to move back there as part of a drive to get Somali people living elsewhere to return home and help rebuild the country after decades of war and devastation. For now, my life is in Britain and the US. My family is here. My friends, my career. And whenever I run, I’m doing both Britain and Somalia proud. Even though I represent another country, Somali people still take great joy in seeing me win. The country has never had someone achieve what I’ve achieved in my lifetime. I hope that, in my own small way, I can help create a more positive image of the country of my birth.