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Maryam Yusuf Jamal capped a brilliant season on Saturday by winning the 1,500m gold at the season-ending World Athletics Final – and her success reminds me of another great athlete – Kelly Holmes of
It was her sixth major victory of 2007, her ninth triumph overall from 12 major events (including one in the 5,000m at the IAAF Hengelo Grand Prix and two in cross country events).
Maryam ended the season exactly the way she had begun – with another convincing and compelling victory.
The 23-year-old Bahrain champion started the year as No 1 in the event, the fans’ favourite, and ended as the undisputed champion, undefeated in a majority of major events, with more than 100 points. Her main Russian rivals Olga Yegorova and Yelena Soboleva were a distant second and third respectively.
I watched the Stuttgart race with a growing sense of pride having followed Maryam’s career closely since she became a Bahraini citizen in 2004. There was an air of inevitability as the pretty and lithesome runner made it a one-horse
race – leading from start to finish. Maryam was a lonely but imperious figure on the home stretch as she dominated the TV screen like never before.
Her characteristic and contended smile at the finish line said it all. She was weary, no doubt, at the end of a tiring and testing season, but clearly at the top of the world. If ever there was a Smiling Assassin in athletics it has to be Maryam.
“It has been a very long season, but thoroughly satisfying. I’m happy with my achievements, it was a fitting finale” said Maryam after the Stuttgart event talking to our sister publication the Gulf Daily News.
“We want to take a break now before thinking of another race and another season,” added Maryam’s husband and coach Tareq Sept.
Well, who deserves a break better than Maryam. Yet, the question ‘What next Maryam?’ does not sound untimely.
Maryam was certainly one of the best women athletes this year, but, most importantly, not THE best. She is well off the 1,500m World (3:50.46 by Yunxia Qu of China) and Olympic (3:53.96, Paula Ivan of Romania) records, and the year’s best was set by her arch-rival Soboleva (3:57.30). Maryam’s best of the year was 3:58.75 during her golden run at the World Athletics Championship, her crowning moment, in Osaka, Japan.
Pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva and 400m champion Sanya Richards, at the other end, were the leaders in the championship race, and eventually shared the $1-million jackpot.
In this context, Maryam has still some running to do literally, quite some distance to cover, and a lot of micro-seconds to conquer.
But many athletes have done it in the past from similar situations, and one name that springs to mind immediately is that of Kelly Holmes of Great Britain. The double middle distance Olympic Champion (800m, 1:56.38; 1,500m, 3:57.90; at the Athens Olympics in 2004) overcame depression early in her career, long-term injuries, and persistent self doubts to become one of the greatest runners of her time.
Holmes achieved a feat which even the great 80s middle distance trio of Sebastian Coe, Steve Ovett or Steve Cram could not. I still remember Holmes saying that she achieved her goals after “20 years of dreaming” soon after the Athens Olympics. It’s still not too late for Maryam to start dreaming great dreams.
Holmes should be Maryam’s inspiration and guiding force for the new season. Born Zenebech Tola in Arsi, a tiny village in Ethiopia, Maryam has a lot to look forward to. And so have we.
