The Olympians: Ryan Hall

Frank Shorter, the last American to win a gold medal in the Olympic marathon (at the 1972 Munich Games), recently said that “everyone’s talking about Ryan Hall.” The 26-year-old Californian graduated from “running factory” Stanford University in 2004, and gained attention by moving up to the half-marathon distance and breaking one hour at the U.S. Half Marathon Championships in Houston last year.

In November, Hall followed up that race by setting a course record at the marathon Olympic Trials in Central Park, New York City, a notoriously slow course with a terrain of rolling hills. “For anyone who’s run in Central Park, they know [how hard that is],” Shorter said. More of Hall’s accomplishments can be found on his USA Track & Field biography.

Hall tells the story of his running career on Christian video site GodTube, chronicling his journey from a novice runner to an up-and-coming college runner to a disillusioned college athlete who eventually learned, after injuries and other setbacks, that discipline and work were more important than medals.

In February 2008, Running Advice and News, a blog run by distance running coach Joe English, interviewed Ryan Hall and Dathan Ritzenhein, teammates in this year’s Olympic marathon. Hall admits that he’s “aspiring to win a medal” in Beijing and asserts that the high pollution in the city, a much-discussed aspect of this year’s race, isn’t affecting his race mentality. “[W]e’re all going to be out there going through the same thing and it’s really outside of our control, so I don’t find any point in worrying about it.”

Terrence Mahon, coach to both Ryan Hall and Deena Kastor (American record holder in the women’s marathon), talked to New York Road Runners in June 2008 about his coaching style and his hopes for Ryan. Hall was so new to the marathon prior to 2008 that Mahon styled his training very differently than he did Kastor’s, who has been running long distances for years. Ryan’s training was “based on what would make him feel comfortable competing in the event, and that was a huge factor to his success.” Mahon also talks about the “power of visualization” in setting goals.

Watch Hall in the marathon on August 24, the final day of the Olympics. The event will be broadcast on NBC. Tune in to NBCOlympics.com for multimedia and related stories.