Report for Senior races
Giorgio Reineri reports
from Turin
Men's race
 Paul Tergat (KEN) has won
his third world cross country champion title.
Never before in the century-long history of this
event, and in the 25 years that the cross country
has been run using this formula has there ever
been such a terrific battle between two great
athletes: Tergat and the Moroccan Salah Hissou.
" I can only congratulate Paul - said Hissou
after the race - because today he was the
best". Nobody would question that: certainly
none of the fifteen thousand spectators watching
the race in the Parco del Valentino, nor those
following the magnificent shots from the event on
television. Paul Tergat, silver medallist in the
10 000 metres in the Olympic Games in Atlanta,
ahead of the same Hissou, ran with cold
determination, with intelligence and his
magnificent fluid style. Salah Hissou sought to
counter Tergat’s path to glory without
success: Tergat broke away and crossed the finish
with his arms held high and a huge smile.
 The race was frenetic, led
with the rhythm of a "bullet-train" by
Thomas Nyariki (KEN). Nyariki is an ex-sprinter
who has changed to distance running with a
certain success: today, he also acted as pace
maker. For nearly nine kilometres he kept the
lead with a spectacular flight 50 metres in front
of the group and the heavy task of following him
fell to Hissou, whilst the other Kenyans -
Tergat, Paul Koech, Bernard Barmasai (who was
looking for victory in the IAAF Cross Challenge
more than anything else) -didn’t try to
force the pace, playing their usual team game.
"I had to try
to keep up and once I had taken Nyariki there was
only one tactic possible: try to stick with
Tergat, because one Kenyan is easier to beat than
four" commented Salah Hissou. This, and
nothing more, describes the race: first
Nyariki’s show, which carried the race at a
rhythm of 2:45 per kilometre (with an
intermediate of 13:52 at the 5th
kilometre); then the pursuit of Hissou and the
other Kenyans, then the Moroccan’s attack in
the last two kilometres of the race. Hissou
appeared to have gained a few metres on the
Kenyan at one stage, but Tergat had wings on his
feet. These wings carried him forward on a wind
of triumph. In the end, he finished with a full
two seconds ahead of Salah Hissou.
Kenya once again
took the team title, ahead of Morocco and
Ethiopia.
Women's race
 Derarta Tulu of Ethiopia,
former 10 000m Olympic Champion in Barcelona 1982
won the World Cross Country Championship title
after a terrible battle with Paula Radcliffe of
Great Britain. It was a beautiful race and
possibly one of the closest finishes of recent
years: the European women countered the African
women for every metre of the course, but the
Ethiopians’ team tactics and Tulu’s
great talent (she was the first black African
woman to win Olympic gold) finally won the race.
At the beginning of the last circuit, two
kilometres from the finish, Paula Radcliffe and
Julia Vaquero of Spain tried, just at the start
of the 250 metre grade - the most difficult part
of the course - to separate the Ethiopians Wami
and Tulu and the Kenyan Sally Barsosio. It was a
wonderful fight to watch: the extraordinary speed
of the race - 3’ for the first kilometre,
6:09 the 2nd, 9:23 the 3rd,
12:36 the 4th, with 15:45 at the end
of the fifth circuit - while Gete Wami, last
year’s winner in Cape Town tried to make the
break. In the wake of Wami: Paula Radcliffe in a
duel to the last breath between the two women.
 But the last breath was
that of Gete Wami as, 300 metres from the finish,
Paula Radcliffe found herself in the lead, only
to see her dream of victory fade to nothing with
the incredible reprise of Derartu Tulu. Coming
strongly from behind and using her compatriot as
a point of reference she launched her attack in
the long straight leading to the finish: to win
with a five metre lead and take the world
champion's title. Ethiopia took the title once
again, respecting a long tradition, but Europe -
thanks to Radcliffe, Vaquero and Catherine
McKiernan of Ireland - showed that some of the
old grit remained. Proof came in Ireland’s
third place in the team classification after
Ethiopia and Kenya.
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