Interview: Benjamin Maiyo

By Scott Douglas

Benjamin Maiyo is a top contender for the win at the Boston Marathon on April 17. He set his personal best of 2:07:09 while placing second at last Fall’s LaSalle Bank Chicago Marathon. Last year, he was also second at the Los Angeles Marathon. There, he took the lead with three miles to go, but as Maiyo recounts below, began celebrating his would-be victory too early and was caught off guard by a resurgent Mark Saina just before the finish.

Boston will be Maiyo’s fourth marathon. He brings world-class track speed to the event. His PRs on the track include 7:32 for 3000 meters, 13:02 for 5000 meters, and 27:07 for 10,000 meters.

Maiyo spends much of his year in Iten, Kenya, training with his teammates from the Kimbia squad of runners. Fellow Kimbia aces Timothy Cherigat, who won Boston in 2004, and John Korir, a highly successful road racer making his marathon debut at Boston, traveled with Maiyo last month to Boulder, Colorado, for their final Boston preparations.

MensRacing.com: Your last marathon, in Chicago, was on a very flat course. The Boston course is hilly. How has your training been different?
Benjamin Maiyo: The training is going well. It is the same training as last year, but in our training we are going downhill often because of the Boston course.

MR: What’s an example of an important workout that you did before Chicago and before your upcoming marathon?
BM: Thirty kilometers going fast, in 1:35.

MR: Who have you been training with?
BM: John Korir and Timothy Cherigat. [Former Chicago and London Marathon winner] Evans Rutto is running the London Marathon, so his training is different. He has been training with others [from the Kimbia group].

MR: You spend a good part of the year at the Kimbia camp in Iten. Now you’re in Boulder. What are some of the differences in an average day when you’re in Iten versus when you’re in Boulder?
BM: The biggest difference is the altitude. Iten is more altitude. [Iten is at 8,000 feet of elevation, while Boulder is at just more than 5,000 feet of elevation.] Also different is the weather. We come here so that we can get used to the weather for Boston. It can be hot there.

MR: Does the difference in altitude allow you to do different training?
BM: Yes, we also come here to finish the training. Here we can go faster.

MR: Such as?
BM: Fifteen kilometers fast, in 45:00

MR: What other differences are there between training in Iten and Boulder?
BM: In Iten, our food comes fresh from the market. Here we have to get it from the supermarket. When we are not training, in Iten, we might go to Eldoret [a city of more than 100,000 people, half an hour from Iten, which has 3,000 or so residents]. Here, between training, we stay home. We just relax and indulge in living and resting.

MR: Tell me about what happened when you ran the Los Angeles Marathon
BM: It was my first time trying to win a marathon. I thought that I was going to win, and when I saw [Mark Saina] suddenly very close to me, I could not react well because I was very tired. In the last kilometer, I started to celebrate that I would be winning. I did not know he was so close to me, because he was hiding behind a motorbike. If I would have seen him a kilometer before, I could have increased my pace maybe.

MR: Your first marathon was a 2:13. Then you ran 2:09, and then 2:07 just a year after running 2:13. Why do you think you were able to improve so much in such a short time?
BM: Because of good training. The coach is making sure I am not getting injured. Also I should tell you that when I ran 2:13, I was pacing in that marathon. I was not there to try to win. I was pacing the second group. I was to pace them to 25 kilometers, and then if I was still strong, to 30 kilometers. When I got to 30 kilometers, I thought, “There is only 10 kilometers to go. I will finish.” We were running fast—15 kilometers in 45:00, 30 kilometers in 1:32. The last five kilometers were very hard for me.

MR: How did you get started running?
BM: I started in college, and then I joined the Kenyan police force. I began training in the mornings, and then I started competing. I won the race that selected the team for the Kenyan national meet. At that meet, I was fourth in the 10,000 meters. There I met the late Kim McDonald. In May 1998, I finished college, and I joined the club of Kim McDonald and Moses Kiptanui. They arranged for me to train with their group in Nyahururu.

MR: You have an uncle who was a world-class runner.
BM: Yes, Joseph Cheshire, who ran the 1500 meters, is my uncle. [Cheshire was fourth in the 1984 Olympic 1500 meters.] I remember going to his home in 1996 when I was still in high school. He was training there with a group. He said, “Do you like running?” I told him I do. He gave me a pair of shoes and a track suit. While I was visiting him there, I would go to training with his group, but I was not able to run with them. They were too fast for me!

MR: Did he give you any advice?
BM: When I ran in the national meet, he came and told me after I took fourth position, “I knew you could run.” He was working with Kim McDonald and helped me when I got to Nyahururu. He told me to run the 5000 meters and get more speed before I return to running longer distances.

MR: At that time, did you think that you would eventually become a marathoner?
BM: No, not at that time. In 2001, I met Evans Rutto, and started coming to the United States for road races. In 2004, I ran my first marathon. Evans Rutto told me I would be good at the marathon, so I told him I would train for the marathon. And then I was able to join this club [the Kimbia group].

MR: Before you became a marathoner, you raced much more often. Now you don’t race much, and everything is built around a marathon in the spring and a marathon in the fall. Which do you like better?
BM: Marathons are good, but the training is not easy. When I was running every week in the Golden League [track meets in Europe], it was nice, but it was all the time, and you need to have your coach close to you all the time, and you move around a lot. So I think I like the marathon more—we can be in Kenya training for most of the year.

Editor's Update: Maiyo finished the Boston Marathon in second place behind Robert Cheruiyot, with a time of 2:08:20.

Interview conducted April 3, 2006, and posted April 11, 2006.