Alex Yee: “I need to discover out the place my limits are”

Olympic triathlon champion explains why his marathon debut in London might be about a lot greater than protecting 26.2 miles

Alex Yee vividly remembers the races he would run at his house observe within the Ladywell Area in Lewisham to qualify for the Mini London Marathon and signify his native borough. Again then, the aspiring children had been combating it out for the precise to compete over the closing three miles of the complete marathon route, from Previous Billingsgate Market to The Mall, and between 2010 and 2015 he achieved the feat 4 occasions, twice ending third in his age group.

A decade and sooner or later on from his last Mini Marathon look, the now 27-year-old will full the circle by lining up on the beginning line of the principle occasion for the primary time. The truth that the venue he first set foot in throughout his early days with Kent AC has been renamed because the Alex Yee Ladywell Area maybe finest illustrates simply how a lot life has modified for him within the intervening years.

“He’d be amazed,” says Yee, when requested what that teenager would make of his older self’s achievements to this point. It’s a powerful listing.

Yee was as soon as mooted as a possible inheritor to Mo Farah on the observe, a British 10,000m champion in 2018 in addition to European Cross Nation medallist. Nonetheless, it was solely via triathlon that he first found his love of working and it’s in that multi-sport self-discipline the place his star has shone brightest. He’s essentially the most profitable Olympic triathlete ever, having gained particular person gold within the males’s occasion and Combined Relay bronze in Paris final summer season so as to add to his Combined Relay gold and particular person silver from Tokyo 2020. He was topped world champion in 2024, too – solely the second man to win that title and Olympic gold in the identical 12 months – whereas he’s additionally a two-time Commonwealth gold medallist.

“From 2010 to 2015 my solely purpose of going to London was to run as quick as I may and have the most effective time I may with the individuals round me,” he says, casting his thoughts again. “To begin off a sport only for the love of it, and nonetheless to be doing that for a similar cause, I believe is extremely particular.”

These preliminary encounters with racing on the streets of London had been central to Yee’s early training as an athlete, although he admits that wasn’t essentially his precedence at first.

“I believe in 2010 and 2011 most of my pleasure most likely got here from going to Chinatown to have Dim sum after the race and it motivating me to get to the end line!” he laughs. “To do this final three miles, I believe I most likely took it without any consideration for the primary few years.

“However, as I bought older and began to remain on a bit of bit [for the main race] afterwards, I started to understand that this was greater than only a race. After 2012 there was extra of an appreciation of sport, of the Olympics, the marathon and what it meant. It was throughout these years once I began to attempt to get in that entrance row to look at the elite guys come previous.

“Having finished among the coaching, now I’m much more in awe of them due to how extremely exhausting it’s. It’s fairly cool to assume that I used to be as soon as a kind of individuals leaning over the boundaries, cheering on everybody and hopefully I could be in that place [of being cheered on] as effectively.”

Yee’s profile, to not point out his working means, implies that his marathon debut is a very intriguing storyline at this 12 months’s occasion. Simply as with the Mini Marathon, the thought of studying extra about his capabilities is a central theme.

Anybody who witnessed his brilliantly timed late surge to seize Olympic gold forward of New Zealand’s Hayden Wilde again in August would possibly disagree, however Yee insists he has work to do in terms of his working. With the following Video games in Los Angeles not rolling round till 2028, he determined to grab the possibility to shake issues up a bit.

“To search out the place my limits are,” he says, when requested what he’s trying to get out of the expertise. “Submit-Olympics, I wished to do one thing that challenged me and hopefully allowed me to develop as an athlete. I haven’t been capable of work on my working for 5 years, and this felt like the precise time to work on that once more, however then I even have a deep love for the London Marathon and it’s one in all my solely bucket listing races.”

As somebody who competes within the Olympic or “normal” distance triathlon, it’s normally a 10km task which Yee has to deal with – instantly after having swum 1.5km and cycled 40km. His marathon mission means he has to run over 4 occasions additional than regular, however the occasion wherein he has made his title is rarely removed from his ideas.

“I do know that if I do the identical factor as I did earlier than, I don’t assume I’ll get the identical end result as a result of, basically, I’m a unique individual than I used to be three years in the past,” he says of this new Olympic coaching cycle.

“I have to do issues barely in a different way. Finally the purpose is to go to LA and to be as aggressive as I can there in triathlon however I believe doing it in a approach the place I work on completely different bits, change into a greater individual and a greater athlete, is one thing that’s thrilling me in the meanwhile.

“I’ve been very fortunate in triathlon that I’ve been capable of be aggressive on the again finish of a run on a couple of events, however I’ve additionally been left weak on the odd event, and I might like to be able the place I simply check my limits and see what I can obtain. Is persistently working below 29 minutes or [around] 28:30 off the bike for 10km attainable? What’s the restrict of my physique that I can obtain and what can I discover? That’s one thing which retains me up at night time, retains me excited and retains me pushing the envelope.”

On the afternoon when Yee sits down to speak with AW, he admits to feeling a bit of weary – maybe not stunning on condition that the interview takes place not too lengthy after the completion of a working session that included a steady 30km effort and concerned a couple of tempo variations.

“I’m attempting to get the most effective really feel for what the marathon will really feel like,” he says. “There’s a bit of little bit of the unknown about it for me, however the extra we are able to make it much less of an intimidating distance, the extra understanding we’ve of my physiology and what I can do then hopefully it gained’t be a scary distance and as an alternative be one thing which I’ll actually look ahead to. Then the day generally is a bit extra of a celebration than a little bit of a scary fact-finding mission.”

Yee’s is under no circumstances a standard marathon coaching plan. Sure, he’s inserting a bit extra emphasis on his working however he isn’t simply ignoring the opposite two triathlon disciplines, both.

“I’m doing about 5 hours of swimming in the meanwhile, eight to 9 hours on the bike after which my working quantity might be between 9 and 10 hours, so between 80-90 miles,” he says of a typical coaching week at his Loughborough base.

“I’m doing a variety of my working as longer single runs, as an alternative of doing a couple of smaller double runs, after which I complement the second cardio stimulus of the day with a trip or swim. It helps to maintain a really feel for the swim and the bike, but in addition supplies that further stimulus that the fellows are getting once they’re working 120-130 miles per week.

“It’s a low quantity programme compared to guys working loopy distances and it’s been fascinating to study and to be a bit distinctive and a bit completely different in my preparation. Hopefully I can both pave the best way or present individuals what to not do in preparation for a marathon!”

Yee is a giant admirer of a person who has proved himself adept at main by instance within the marathon nevertheless it was Eliud Kipchoge who publicly acknowledged his need to satisfy with the champion triathlete. The 2 are on account of spend a bit of time collectively in London, the place little doubt the Kenyan will impart a few of his trademark phrases of knowledge. There are echoes of Kipchoge’s philosophical nature in Yee’s phrases, although, when he comes again to the pondering behind his marathon debut.

“I believe the place we do our most development is after we don’t know stuff about ourselves and we’re studying,” he says. “Studying is a vital a part of being an elite athlete, and when you’re not doing it, then I don’t assume that you simply’re capable of progress and develop.

“It’s been nice for me to have the ability to study myself, but in addition put myself in an atmosphere which I don’t know a lot about. I assume I am going into the London Marathon a bit like tens of 1000’s of different individuals do, being a novice and experiencing it for the primary time, and that’s actually thrilling.

“It’s a spot the place I really feel like I’ll do my most development and my most studying and hopefully we’ll be capable of take that again to triathlon, to working 10,000m on the observe, to no matter it could be in a couple of months’ time. Hopefully I’ll be capable of be a greater athlete from it.”

The place Yee differs from so many first-time marathon runners, after all, is not only in his athletic pedigree but in addition his goal time, albeit he isn’t about to make any outlandish claims.

“If I’m being trustworthy, the goalposts hold shifting week on week,” he says about what he could be able to. “However I might like to be in that 2:08 to 2:09 bracket. I hope that there’ll be a variety of British guys round there within the area. I’m positive there might be a couple of who will try to go faster, however hopefully that places me in that aggressive home area, and I’d like to be part of that.

“If I can do this then who is aware of? Possibly I can come again and do one other marathon in some unspecified time in the future however we’ll must see. I believe my potential hopefully sits a bit of bit increased than what I can obtain in London so hopefully I can present that in some unspecified time in the future sooner or later.

“Pre LA, my thoughts is absolutely centered on the triathlon, however I believe over this 12 months there could also be one other alternative to do a marathon. It’s an extended season and there are many alternatives throughout the first 12 months of an Olympic cycle. I don’t have the whole solutions but. I’ll most likely have a couple of extra solutions as soon as I cross that end line and I both have a starvation for extra or a need to get again to the swim and bike after experiencing that degree of ache. I’m actually excited to do it and hopefully I can put down an excellent marker.”

That marker ought to make him the quickest marathon runner in his household by fairly a long way. Yee’s dad and mom have each run London and that he’s about to get his personal style of the occasion which begins so near the place he grew up – a showpiece that has been a part of the material of his sporting life – is a very attractive prospect.

“Experiencing what I’ve heard so many different individuals speak about experiencing, from the ambiance, to the bands, to the noise,” he says of what he’s most trying ahead to. “I need to soak that up as a lot as attainable, in addition to attempting to run the most effective race I can.”

This time, protecting these last three miles of the marathon route goes to be a reasonably completely different expertise to 10 years in the past.

“I’m wondering what that final 5km will really feel like?” says Yee. “[I won’t find that out until] I’m in that final 5km. I’m trying ahead to that, in a approach. I believe that’s one of the best ways I can do it – trying ahead to that problem reasonably than fearing it.”

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