Posted: January 11, 2005

Athletics: Ritzenhein's Career Takes Turn For The Better

From David Monti

(c) 2004 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved RaceResultsWeekly.com

When Dathan Ritzenhein circled the track 25 times at the Stanford Invitational last April in Palo Alto, Calif., he looked smooth and effortless setting the U.S. collegiate record for 10,000m: 27:38.50. His time gave him an Olympic Games "A" qualifier, and knowing that he had a great shot at an Olympic Team berth, he began to ready himself for the U.S. Olympic Trials in July.

But the University of Colorado junior could never have anticipated how his collegiate career would soon come to an end. Hobbling on a broken foot, he was barely able to finish his race at those Trials in Sacramento, crossing the line last amongst the 22 finishers. He completed the race because the Olympic team would be chosen from only those who had both achieved the qualifying time and finished the Trials race.

Because veteran Bob Kennedy wasn't able to finish at the Trials, and winner Meb Keflezighi chose to compete only in the marathon, Ritzenhein was selected for the Olympic team, the last man with the "A" standard behind Abdi Abdirahman and Dan Browne. Just 12 days later, despite his injury, he announced that he had decided to forgo his last year of collegiate eligilbility and sign a professional contract. Was that a smart move for an athlete who could hardly walk?

"I'm confident in this decision," Ritzenhein said at the time. "I feel like this is the best move to make to make me the best runner that I can be."

One month later, he stepped out on the track in Athens to contest the 10,000m final. The foot injury raged, and although he bravely started the race, it was impossible to finish.

"It was like all your dreams for the year were crushed," Ritzenhein said today on a conference call with the New York Track Writers. But the 24 year-old kept his head, and tried to look forward: "I never got to the point that I was so despaired that I couldn't keep going on."

Injury prone while a collegian, Ritzenhein knew he needed to modify his training in order to get to the next level. His coach at Colorado, Mark Wetmore, is an Arthur Lydiard disciple, and piled on the mileage to build Ritzenhein's vast aerobic base. But the athlete felt he needed to get stronger.

"I just needed to do a few things differently," he said adding, "My body wasn't strong enough to hold up to the miles." He said that his skeleton and tendons were taking the brunt of the work instead of his muscles.

He turned to Brad Hudson for coaching, and began to add different drills and hill repeats to add strength. The foot healed, and on December 31, 2004 --one day after his 22nd birthday-- Ritzenhein made his professional racing debut at an invitational road race in in the Alto Adige region of Italy, the Boclassic. There, on a twisting 10 km course which included generous sections of cobblestones, he placed third, beaten only by five-time European Cross Country champion, Sergey Lebed, and Olympic Marathon gold medalist, Stefano Baldini.

Then, last Saturday in Belfast, Northern Ireland, Ritzenhein dominated an international cross country meeting there, romping to victory over four strong Kenyans, including 2004 World Cross Country junior bronze medalist, Ernest Meli Kimeli, and veteran track ace Luke Kipkosgei. Ritzenhein led the race from gun to tape.

"It was really relatively easy," said Ritzenhein of that effort. He built his lead to over 20 seconds and was able to relax in the final kilometers. "I shut it down and cruised in," he said. He won the 9.8 km race over muddy turf by eight seconds.

Why did he choose to open his professional racing thousands of miles from home? "For me it was important to get out there and test myself." He later added, "I thought I was in pretty good shape, but you never know until you try it."

Ritzenhein is confident in his gift, and now he's got the testing to prove it. Alberto Salazar set him up with extensive physical evaluations at Nike's Beaverton, Ore., headquarters and "Ritz" liked what he saw. "I have just as good a talent as the best guys in the world," he said.

Ritzenhein's next competition will be the Reebok Boston Indoor Games on 29-Jan where he will run a 3000m race against a stacked field, including Olympic 10,000m champion and world record holder, Kenenisa Bekele. From there, he plans to contest the U.S. Winter National Cross Country Championships in Vancouver, Wash., where the U.S. team for the IAAF World Cross Country Championships will be chosen.

"I'll definitely be there," he said.

After a likely trip to St. Galmier, France for those championships (he won an individual junior bronze medal there in 2001), Ritzenhein will prepare himself for a track season which he hopes will culminate in a career performance at the IAAF World Championships in Athletics in Helsinki in August. He's also looking forward to posting some fast times before that.

"I think I can get down near the American record," he said of Meb Keflezighi's 27:13.98 set in Palo Alto in 2001.