By DAVID LASSEN
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
For months, Deena Drossin Kastor has willingly carried much of the promotional load for the ING New York City Marathon.
The last and most demanding step in that process comes Sunday: Winning the race.
Victory in the 26.2-mile race through the five boroughs of New York would enhance claims she has become the world's foremost woman marathoner, and likely catapult her to a level of celebrity only hinted at by her previous accomplishments.
"We're in a star-driven culture," says Mary Wittenberg, New York's race director. "People respond to personalities that are magnetic and athletes that win, and Deena's both those things."
It's the latter piece of that equation, the winning, that makes the 33-year-old a legitimate favorite in New York, where no American, male or female, has won in 24 years.
Building on her breakthrough at the Athens Olympics - where her intense training regimen paid off with a bronze-medal finish on a brutally hot afternoon - Kastor has won her last two marathons, last fall in Chicago and this spring in London.
The London victory, in an American-record 2 hours, 19 minutes, 36 seconds, vaulted her into the early lead in the new World Marathon Majors, a two-year series linking the races in Chicago, London, New York, Berlin and Boston. Entering Sunday's race, she is tied for second in the series, four points behind Ethiopia's Berhane Adere, who was fourth in London and won last month in Chicago.
Victory in New York would boost Kastor back into the lead. The leader at the end of the 2007 races will receive a $500,000 prize.
Such prize money "certainly was not a focus earlier in any of our careers," says Kastor, "but it's nice that we now have this added goal to work for."
A tireless advocate of her sport, Kastor has done more than her share to help draw attention to the New York race, which drew more than 93,000 applicants and will include about 37,000 runners. She may well be repaid for that effort with encouragement from the huge number of spectators who line the course.
"I really draw energy off the enthusiasm of the crowd, and when I can hear my name being shouted. I appreciate that greatly, which is why I like to be able to speak on my behalf, or the athletes' behalf, or on behalf of a race that's so well put together."
Based on her experiences last year in Chicago, such encouragement is likely. There, too, she was a focal point of pre-race publicity - among other appearances, she threw out the first pitch at a Cubs game and a White Sox game - and was surprised and gratified by the resulting support.
"It was one of the first times I've run a race where the whole entire way, people had banners with my name on it, and people shouting my name," she recalls. "Some people were running wearing T-shirts that said 'Go Deena.' It was very inspiring to hear that and see that."
Kastor responded with her first marathon victory, holding off Romania's Constantina Tomescu-Dita in a grueling duel over the final miles. She followed that with the record-setting win in London, but New York will provide a very different kind of challenge, she says.
Whereas Chicago and London were both about speed, New York - which ends with three very hilly miles, concluding at Tavern on the Green in Central Park - figures to be a more tactical race. She has done her best to prepare accordingly, even making a reconnaissance run of the final 10 miles during a visit in August.
Further complicating the tactical picture is the quality of the field. Seven other women have run 2:25:44 or better, including defending New York champion Jelena Prokopcuka of Latvia, and three celebrated Kenyans: Rita Jeptoo, this year's winner at Boston; Catherine Ndereba, one of just two women to run a sub-2:19 marathon, and Susan Chepkemel, who has been second in New York three times in the last five years.
"It all comes down to an intense desire to win this race," Kastor said. "That's been burning in me for five years.
"That desire to have that finish-line tape breaking across my chest is something I've seen in my dreams and visualized in my training, and I have one moment to make it a reality. So I'd better not waste it on a negative thought."
E-mail David Lassen at dlassen(at)VenturaCountyStar
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