Big call from Buster

[nevetsllim]

He is being a tad arrogant for someone who has come 15th and 17th in recent races but you do need a touch of arrogance to get by in the sport.

Have you ever heard Gebrselassie describe how he won the 10 in Atlanta? "Hissou... Tergat.... I knew they were better than me, I knew there was no way I could beat those great athletes... This is why I went with a sprint from the bell"
Of course a bit of an oxymoron there, seeing as he did find a way to win, and with my fallible memory I'm probably paraphrasing the guy a little bit, PLUS his command of the English language was never great, but despite all this- I believe you can still read how humble the guy is and how much respect he had (and has) for his rivals.

Coming to think abou it now, I guess the arrogant among the long distance bunch are in a minority, really. Besides Buster, I can't think of any others from the current lot (except for perhaps Chepkemei on the women's side).

Is Chepkemei arrogant? She seems lovely in interviews.

[figo]

I read this from Mott's statements.

Mott is having fun with it.

A fun dig into the African style of team tactics which is legal but annoying. Mott is one against many. When they are not in a group he's won on several occasions.
Then again, when there is a group of good runners you're chances are slimmer.

He's also taking advantage of promoting himself a bit. Largely ignored for many years - relative to his achievements - especially in Aus.

Mott probably beat a sub par Bekele, but you look at the race splits and the way they blew away the field you will see that Bek was not so far away from his top form.

Remember Mott was at the end of a very long season too and quite possibly was not at his absolute best too.

I'd say a prime Bek beats a prime Mott by 10m over 5000 championship style race. .
But if Mott improves to say 3:30 over 1500 then the Africans really have something to worry about, if they don't already.

Maybe we'll see Mott go 12:4x soon....

No matter what, Mott is a player.

[tandfman]

Well said.