When the Heat Is On, U.S. Runners Are Ready

By Amy Shipley
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, April 2, 2008

U.S. Olympic track and field coach Bob Larsen yanked the high-tech cooling vests that had arrived just two days before the 2004 Olympic women's marathon in Athens out of the hotel's ice maker. He was aghast. The vests, designed to lower the body's core temperature before the start of a competition in heavy heat, had not frozen. They were not even cold.

Mindful of the race's start in about 24 hours, Larsen rushed to the athlete's dining hall at the Olympic Village, where he found an American working behind the counter. She surreptitiously stashed the specially designed vests in a walk-in freezer.

The next afternoon, the chilled vests arrived at the start line of the marathon in a cooler. Distance-running star Deena Kastor and her two American teammates strapped them on, then sat alone, shivering, in an air-conditioned locker room as most of their rivals warmed up by jogging in the ferocious, nearly 90-degree heat.

Kastor went on to produce the first of two stunning finishes for Americans, her bronze medal helping to break a decades-long streak of futility for the United States in the event. A week later, American Meb Keflezighi, who wore one of the Nike-designed vests before the men's marathon, won a silver despite having been ranked 39th at the start.

The vests represented the final piece of a multifaceted and intensely focused plan that U.S. officials quietly put into play as the Athens Olympics approached. Its surprising success convinced U.S. officials that they could beat the heat better than any other nation, and that they could surely do it again this summer in Beijing, where temperatures are likely to average and possibly exceed 85 degrees with high humidity and sub-par air quality.

"To sit in that stadium and see those two kids coming in with USA on their jerseys, I think that will probably be my fondest memory of any Olympic Games I've ever been involved with," said Randy Wilber, senior sport physiologist for the U.S. Olympic Committee. "For me, it confirmed the fact that you can beat a lot of people with a lot more ability than you, if you use sports science correctly. Somehow, some way, our kids put all those factors together."

Because of the significant danger to competitors, distance races are almost never run in extreme heat, except at the Summer Olympics and world championships, when they are tied to larger competitions that dictate their scheduling. At the marathons in Athens, 37 runners did not finish.

Given the results -- and the plethora of PhDs once again backing this year's U.S. Olympic team -- some U.S. officials believe their medal hopes might actually increase as conditions worsen.

"We don't want the rest of the world to know what we're going to do, because medals are involved," said David Martin, a professor emeritus at Georgia State who was a central figure in the Athens marathon preparations. But, he said, U.S. officials have been wondering "how do we pull this off again? It's taken me three years to figure that out."

"Everybody's been dissecting" what the United States did in 2004, Martin said. "Thank God it's not going to work, because Beijing is completely different than Athens."

Athens radiated a dry heat; this summer, Beijing could feel like the tropics. In Athens, the marathon began in the late afternoon, providing the most brutal conditions early in the race. In Beijing, the marathons are scheduled in the morning, meaning the heat's full force will be felt at the finish. Athens had a hilly course; Beijing's is flat. Athens's pollution was considered bad; Beijing's is worse, though the IOC has said it would postpone outdoor endurance events in Beijing should the pollution be too excessive.

"Pollution is getting all the publicity . . . but we're sending the message loud and clear that it's important not to get distracted from the real environmental factor likely to detract from performance: the heat and humidity," Wilber said.

To that end, a team of USOC scientists has prepared a 28-page manual on handling Beijing's heat and humidity. Officials declined to allow the publication of specifics from the manual, citing competitive concerns.

Though Nike sent about 200 of the $200 cooling vests to Athens for its clients from all nations, according to Todd Van Horne, the company's global creative director for sport and innovation, they apparently were not widely used, perhaps because of problems with refrigeration or simple unfamiliarity with the product. Keflezighi said he saw no other marathoners wearing them. Kastor said she observed only a couple of women with them.

By the time the U.S. runners got their hands on the vests, they coveted them. They had been briefed on their potential value and couldn't wait to take advantage.

"It was really almost like a movie scene," Kastor said. "It was heat you could actually see. It was visible as it radiated off the pavement."

To devise and disseminate the '04 heat plan, USA Track and Field officials coordinated a then-secret 2 1/2 day marathon summit in May in Chula Vista, Calif. Among the attendees: a nutritionist; sports psychologist; Wilber, an environmental physiologist; and Martin, a cardiopulmonary exercise physiologist. Presentations on handling the expected conditions took place in a classroom setting. Keflezighi said he brought several notebooks and took copious notes.

"We took to heart, basically, what those people were saying," Keflezighi said. "I asked questions. I learned a lot, and I applied it."

Martin said the tone of the meeting regarding the heat was "ominous. It put the fear of death into them."

It was also so successful, a similar marathon summit is scheduled for this May in Colorado Springs.

After the 2004 summit, Kastor began loading up on fruits and vegetables, having been told antioxidants would help her body later withstand pollutants in the air. Both Kastor and Keflezighi worked out in winter clothing at their home base in Mammoth Mountain, Calif., wanting to simulate hot conditions but retain the benefit of high-altitude (8,000 feet) training. They ran a certain hill in Mammoth Mountain seven times at the urging of U.S. coach Joe Vigil, who determined that it mirrored the infamous eight-mile hill on the Athens course.

Kastor and Keflezighi also doubled their usual water intake during the Olympic races and started with great restraint, saving their energy for a strong finish.

The two proved the perfect guinea pigs for the marathon experiment, U.S. scientists say. Both were 10,000-meter specialists who moved up to the marathon, meaning two things: They were new enough to the discipline to respond to suggestions and strategies, and they were fast enough to be able to summon strong finishing kicks, assuming they followed their race plans. Which they did.

Kastor said many deserve credit for the effort. Including, she noted, the cafeteria workers who stuffed the vests in the freezer.

"What happened to them?" she wondered. "Did we give them pins or U.S. caps, or what happened?"