David Rudisha winning the 800 meters

David Rudisha winning the 800 meters at a 2011 meet in London.

Runners training

Runners training on Iten’s dusty roadways.

David Rudisha, a six-foot-three Kenyan Masai with dark skin and haughty cheekbones, will start hard. Rudisha, 23, is the world champion, the world-record holder (1:41.01), and the clear favorite for Olympic gold. He knows only one way to race, hitting the front early and destroying his competition with raw speed.

Naturally, Rudisha鈥檚 opponents will attempt to stifle this tactic. His main rival, an affable, gap-toothed Sudanese named Abukaker Kaki, told me recently that if he is to win gold, he needs to take control at 200 meters and box Rudisha in. The Kenyan had beaten him too many times the same way, and the Olympic final would be Kaki鈥檚 best opportunity to try something different. 鈥淚f you keep getting punched in the face, eventually it鈥檚 your fault, not his,鈥� said Kaki鈥檚 coach, Ibrahim Aden, clarifying the point.

In truth, there isn鈥檛 much Kaki or any other contender can do to avoid a knockout. Like Usain Bolt in the 100, Rudisha towers over his fellow athletes. He possesses a gorgeous, loping gait鈥攖he stride of a fearless child running downhill. If he is in peak form, the only place he will see his opponents during the race will be on the JumboTron.

Meanwhile, should Rudisha win, his longtime coach, the man largely responsible for the Kenyan鈥檚 powerful, front-running style, doesn鈥檛 even plan to be in the crowd to congratulate him. Indeed, his coach, a 63-year-old Irish priest named Brother Colm O鈥機onnell, probably won鈥檛 even be on the same continent. He鈥檒l be 4,000 miles away, sitting on a barstool at the Kerio View Hotel in Iten, Kenya鈥攁 village perched on the western escarpment of the Great Rift Valley鈥攚atching events unfold on television. 鈥淚鈥檓 not so attached that I have to go and see them winning races,鈥� said O鈥機onnell of Rudisha and the other athletes he coaches, including Olympic middle-distance hopefuls Augustine Choge and Isaac Songok.

It was March, and we were sitting in the hotel where O鈥機onnell told me he鈥檒l watch the Games. A ravishing scene lay behind him: cloud shadows dotting the valley floor. O鈥機onnell was describing his coaching style鈥攁 free-form, instinctive approach that鈥檚 as unusual in modern professional sports as it is successful. O鈥機onnell, who receives no money for his coaching work, loathes the cult of analysis鈥攁ll the metrics like VO2聽max and stride length鈥攖hat dictates the regimens of most of today鈥檚 elite athletes. 鈥淚f it works, it works,鈥� he told me. 鈥淲hy must we analyze everything?鈥�

O鈥機onnell prefers to train his athletes by feel, not by numbers鈥攁nd it鈥檚 hard to argue with the results. Since he began working in Kenya in 1976, 25 world champions and four Olympic gold medalists have come through Colm鈥檚 programs, making him, by almost any measure, the most successful running coach in history. It鈥檚 a record that doesn鈥檛 seem to square with the person sitting across from me: a short, potbellied man wearing a blue diamond-patterned sweater stained with a tiny reminder of breakfast. How did this Irish priest become the guru of Kenyan running? He will excuse me if I attempt some analysis.

O’CONNELL’S UNLIKELY RISE began 36 years ago, when, he says, he experienced a sort of epiphany. Born in 1949, in rural Cork, Ireland, he joined the priesthood in his early twenties and began work as a geography teacher and part-time coach at the Newbridge School, in County Kildare. In 1976, while standing on the sideline at a Gaelic football match on a miserable, rainy Irish afternoon, he was asked by an older teacher whether he would volunteer to teach abroad, in Kenya. O鈥機onnell took a look at the weather and said yes.

Less than four months later, O鈥機onnell arrived at St. Patrick鈥檚, Iten, a notably successful Patrician Brothers school with a strong reputation for athletics.聽The next day, he was dragged to a track competition in the nearby town of Eldoret. He鈥檇 never seen a track meet before. The man who accompanied him was Peter Foster, a 21-year-old from Newcastle, England, working for Voluntary Service Overseas. Foster was temporarily in charge of track and cross-country at St. Patrick鈥檚, and he鈥檇 been looking for someone to coach the team when his stint in Kenya ended. He fixed on the new man.

鈥淗e was a very happy-go-lucky kind of lad,鈥� remembers Foster. 鈥淗e certainly wasn鈥檛 a fitness fanatic. He knew literally nothing about athletics.鈥�

In the Brother Colm legend, it鈥檚 often reported that his intuitive approach was born of this initial ignorance. He said as much to me. 鈥淭he athletes were the only source of information,鈥� he said. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 the way I was introduced to the sport.鈥澛�

Still, Foster suggests there was slightly more to O鈥機onnell鈥檚 education than pure trial and error. In the six months between O鈥機onnell鈥檚 arrival in Kenya and Foster鈥檚 departure, the Englishman had time to show the Irishman the ropes. Foster鈥檚 brother, Brendan, won bronze in the 10,000 meters at the Montreal Olympics in 1976, and they鈥檇 trained together as boys.

鈥淪tan Long, my brother鈥檚 coach, basically taught us fartlek鈥濃€攊nterval training鈥斺€渉ill work, long runs on a Sunday, that sort of thing,鈥� said Foster. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 all I did with the Kenyans. It was a bit of a revolution, because before that they would just try and run as hard as they possibly could for the same distance every time they went out. Variety was the greatest thing I gave them. Colm just picked it up from there. He started as a willing pupil and then became an expert.鈥�

O鈥機onnell immediately threw himself into track and field at St. Patrick鈥檚. Under his supervision the school became a power-house, dominating Kenyan track events throughout the 1980s and attracting some of the country鈥檚 best young athletes. One wall of the St. Patrick鈥檚 dining room is now crammed with photographs of gold-medal-winning alumni, including Wilson Kipketer, the three-time world champion in the 800 meters, whom O鈥機onnell describes as the most graceful athlete he ever coached. In 1986, Athletics Kenya鈥攖he national track federation鈥攁sked O鈥機onnell to select the Kenyan team for the 1986 World Junior Championships. Not knowing any better, he chose nine St. Patrick鈥檚 students. All nine came back with medals. Three years later, O鈥機onnell had built enough of a following to spread his net, beginning twice-yearly month-long track camps at St. Patrick鈥檚 for talented kids from around the country.

In those early years, Iten, which is 200 miles from Nairobi and nearly 8,000 feet above sea level, was still a relatively unknown backwater鈥斺€渁 dot on the map,鈥� says O鈥機onnell. Today, largely owing to the success of the athletes at St. Patrick鈥檚, Iten has become an internationally known magnet for elite distance runners. There are now dozens of coaches, running camps, and training groups in the area. Thousands of young men and women from poor families come to pound Iten鈥檚 dusty pathways, hoping they can sweat their way to a better life.

O鈥機onnell remains one of the town鈥檚 biggest draws. In 1996, three years after he finally gave up his post as headmaster at St. Patrick鈥檚, he began working with Kenya鈥檚 professional athletes for the first time. His initial batch included Japheth Kimutai and Sally Barsosio, who had both earned medals at the World Juniors. (Barsosio went on to win gold in the 10,000 at the 1997 world championships in Athens; Kimutai won the African games but failed to make the final of the 800 at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.) Though his coaching philosophy remained unchanged, the shift forced him to sharpen his focus.

鈥淚 polished it a bit,鈥� O鈥機onnell told me. 鈥淭alked a bit more to senior coaches who were coaching elite athletes.鈥� He was suddenly aware of the seriousness of his role. 鈥淲hen you鈥檙e a kid in school, you have options,鈥� he said. 鈥淵ou can do other things if you don鈥檛 make it. But if someone comes to you and says, 鈥業 want to be an athlete and that鈥檚 it,鈥� all other options are put aside.鈥�

After the switch, O鈥機onnell established a set of rules that still govern his approach. He will never coach a school-age pupil who isn鈥檛 in school full time. (鈥淵ou drop out of school,鈥� he told me, 鈥測ou drop out of my program.鈥�) He won鈥檛 coach more than four or five professionals at a time, and he鈥檒l only coach would-be pros who came through his junior program. And he鈥攏ot Athletics Kenya nor the dozens of European and American managers who have flooded into the Rift Valley looking to sign talent and make money on lucrative races鈥攚ill decide his athletes鈥� event schedules.聽When I asked if this stance had ever caused any friction between him and his runners鈥� managers, O鈥機onnell smiled and shook his head. 鈥淚 make it very clear from day one,鈥� he said. 鈥淎ny manager who wants to work with me knows me. A young athlete has to make a choice if there鈥檚 a clash of interests. I have no problem with an athlete moving on.鈥� Few ever do.

O’CONNELL DETESTS poring over data, and he doesn鈥檛 put much emphasis on technique, either鈥攁lthough his juniors learn core strength, the rudiments of Pilates, and the importance of a rhythmic gait.聽So what, exactly, does he offer? After all, thanks to a peculiar blend of genetics, good diet, and a cultural affinity with the sport, the Rift Valley is teeming with gifted runners.

What separates all these hopefuls from the superstars, O鈥機onnell told me, is not talent but mental strength.聽And this, perhaps, is O鈥機onnell鈥檚 gift: his ability to spot the few athletes who have the right raw material and then help them hone it. He describes this as working on the man rather than the athlete鈥攄eveloping the confidence and personality of the individual runner rather than the sum of his mechanical parts.

As an example, O鈥機onnell told me about discovering David Rudisha. The first time he saw the Kenyan run was in 2004 at Kamariny Stadium in Iten, a dirt track measuring an eccentric 408 meters, with a dilapidated grandstand on one side and a dusty soccer pitch in the middle. Rudisha was 14 or 15, and O鈥機onnell didn鈥檛 take much notice. 鈥淗e was one among many,鈥� he recalled. 鈥淭he only reason you would have picked him out was that he was tall, elegant.鈥�

The next time O鈥機onnell clapped eyes on the boy was at a school meet the following year. Rudisha was competing in the decathlon, and he had traveled some 120 miles from his hometown in the Trans Mara District to do so. O鈥機onnell made some discreet inquiries and discovered that there was no track team at Rudisha鈥檚 school. Not only had this teenager effectively taught himself to pole-vault, high-jump, throw the discus, and so forth, but he had shown considerable determination by traveling so far to compete.

O鈥機onnell invited Rudisha to join his holiday track camp. Rudisha thrived in that environment, and his new coach found him a place at St. Francis, a school in Iten that, like St. Patrick鈥檚, had a good track-and-field program. Rudisha didn鈥檛 balk at moving so far from home, nor did he protest when his new coach persuaded him that鈥攁lthough he preferred the 400 meters鈥攈is future was in the 800. Many coaches may have missed this opportunity, immediately pegging Rudisha as a 400-meter runner because of his size and build. (They wouldn鈥檛 necessarily have been wrong, either: Rudisha has run 45.50 in the 400, a time that would have earned him a spot in the semifinals at the 2008 Olympics.) In April 2006, however, O鈥機onnell asked Rudisha to run an 800-meter time trial at Kamariny. On that day, he saw signs of the power-running style that would eventually destroy all comers.

Three months after his first serious 800, Rudisha won gold at the World Junior Championships. He was still a 16-year-old student at St. Francis, and O鈥機onnell wasn鈥檛 eager to see him progress too quickly. 鈥淚 wasn鈥檛 going to pressure him suddenly to become a superstar,鈥� he said. 鈥淗e just took his time and went through some difficulties.鈥� An Achilles injury kept Rudisha out of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, but 2010 was a breakout season. During one extraordinary week鈥攊n Berlin and then Rieti, Italy鈥擱udisha broke Kipketer鈥檚 800-meter world record twice. At the end of the season, the 21-year-old Rudisha was named the IAAF World Athlete of the Year, the youngest ever to receive that distinction. The reward from O鈥機onnell? A few days later, back in Iten, Brother Colm put his new superstar in a training group with teenagers. The message was clear: no special treatment, big man.

That response reflects O鈥機onnell鈥檚 recognition of a particular truth about Kenyan runners: the greatest hurdles they overcome are not on the training ground. 鈥淢ostly, athletes come from rural peasant backgrounds,鈥� he said. 鈥淎nd once money enters the equation, it can become an issue.鈥� Sammy Wanjiru, for instance, was a Kenyan prodigy who won the marathon at the Beijing Olympics and by his early twenties had made several million dollars. In May 2011, after a night of drinking鈥攐ne of many, according to those who knew him鈥攁nd an argument with his wife, he fell to his death from the balcony of his house. Wanjiru was 24 when he died, and his story is not uncommon. The principal advantage of what O鈥機onnell calls his 鈥渉olistic鈥� system is that he can spot danger signs before trouble sets in.

Despite Brother Colm鈥檚 beatific status in Kenya, he鈥檚 not without detractors. Renato Canova, an Iten-based Italian who trains many of the world鈥檚 best marathoners (and who鈥檚 a friend of O鈥機onnell鈥檚), gently suggests that, while the Irishman鈥檚 results in middle distances are unimpeachable, he hasn鈥檛 achieved as much at longer distances.

During a car ride to the Ngong Hills outside Nairobi, Canova told me that O鈥機onnell 鈥渄oesn鈥檛 have the long-distance mentality鈥� and that he sometimes sends athletes to championships with too little speed endurance. He mentioned the case of Augustine Choge, one of O鈥機onnell鈥檚 current crop, who won a handful of world junior and youth events but hasn鈥檛, according to Canova, had the impact he should have had at the senior level. He won silver in the 3,000 meters at the World Indoors this spring, but, Canova says flatly, 鈥淐hoge should be world champion.鈥�

Still, most coaches and observers I talked with admired O鈥機onnell鈥檚 work. Patrick Sang was a Kenyan silver medalist in the steeplechase at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics. Now a 48-year-old with gray flecks in his hair and a dusty laugh, he coaches middle- and long-distance runners, making him, in theory, a rival of Brother Colm鈥檚. As he held the stopwatch for his athletes at the Chepkoilel track, near Iten, Sang pointed out that O鈥機onnell鈥檚 lack of sophisticated methods is a good thing: a rigid approach might work the magic out of some Kenyan athletes. 鈥淚f Rudisha was trained by a system to be a perfect athlete, it might destroy him,鈥� he said. 鈥淚f you get a supercoach, they only look at a blueprint鈥攁 product. Brother Colm goes to the roots. He understands people, where they come from.鈥�

His former athletes agree. Peter Rono, an Olympic gold medalist in the 1,500 meters at the 1988 Games in Seoul and now the manager of a New Balance franchise in New Jersey, said it was O鈥機onnell鈥檚 spirit that made the difference to him. Rono, a promising teenage athlete whose family was too poor to afford the fees at St. Patrick鈥檚, said O鈥機onnell personally raised funds from overseas donors so he could continue his studies. Dozens of other athletes, he said, could tell the same story.

鈥淚 don鈥檛 think I would have finished high school if not for him,鈥� said Rono. 鈥淗e gave me an opportunity to explore my talent. He told us that you can鈥檛 win by strength alone鈥攜ou have to win with your head and the heart, spiritually. It鈥檚 more than training technique. That鈥檚 why he has produced so many great runners.鈥�

O鈥機onnell rarely talks about his own faith and spirituality. The closest he came was when I asked him to explain why he considered Rudisha a 鈥渙nce-in-a-lifetime athlete.鈥� Instead of describing the runner in a string of superlatives, he told me a story about the athlete鈥檚 second world-record-breaking run, in Rieti. O鈥機onnell was trackside for that race, and his description of it had a mystical edge. 鈥淓ven though I鈥檇 coached him, I could still be mesmerized by the absolute leg-turning speed he had in that last 200 meters,鈥� he said. 鈥淵ou cannot imagine a human being鈥斺€�

He paused and scratched for the right words. 鈥淒avid has a presence in a race, not just because of his size but because of his personality. He has a hypnotic presence. Do you feel that?鈥澛犅�

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