219. Insights from the Coach of the Kenyans, Claudio Berardelli

[00:00:00] You're listening to episode 219 of the Marathon Running Podcast. In this episode, we're going to hear from Claudio Berardelli, who is the coach of a Kenyan Olympic Marathon Runner. This is the Marathon Running Podcast by Letty and Ryan from WE GOT THE RUNS. Join us in

[00:00:22] our running community for weekly content that is motivational, educational and inspirational and let the Marathon Running Podcast take you from the starting line to the finish line and beyond. Hey runners, and welcome to episode 219. My name is Letty. My name is Ryan.

[00:00:43] And welcome to everyone that is new and welcome back if you have been a long-term listener listening to our weekly podcast on all things training, coaching, nutrition, inspiration, etc. So with the Olympic Marathon coming up, what a better person to talk to than one of the

[00:00:58] trainers of the Olympic athletes. Yes, that's right. So I was super excited about this interview. What a great thing to interview a coach of that caliber. I mean, elite coach of the Kenyans. And as you

[00:01:08] know, I've been following the Kenyan elite runners for years and looked into even camps in Kenya because I'm so intrigued by that whole world that I've never had a glimpse of. And so by attending these marathons and press conferences, I was very

[00:01:23] lucky to meet some people that connected me with this trainer. So tell me more about him. Yes. So Claudio Berrelli is the coach of Benson Kupruto. He is originally from Italy, but he's been living in Kenya for a really long time now and coaching these elite athletes.

[00:01:40] He is Benson Kupruto's coach who if you don't know has been winning and, you know, getting podium at a lot of the major marathons within the last few years. So he is up and coming. I think his PR is a two or two. He won the Tokyo Marathon

[00:01:56] recently. He's won Boston before he's won Chicago before. But yeah, so super interesting. And he agreed to come on the podcast and speak with me. What did you guys talk about? Yes. So we hopped into what it's like to live in Kenya, the culture of Kenya,

[00:02:11] how elite athletes in Kenya live, how they think, how the training camp works, you know, the challenges that they're facing. And then we also talked a little bit about the Paris Marathon and strategy. Of course, I know that was something that you were going to ask about.

[00:02:26] I thought it'd be cool to get some insight into the strategy as you watch the race. It would be kind of fun to see what happens. Of course. And obviously he's not going to reveal all his secrets, right?

[00:02:37] But you know, I was more asking what are some things that you have to think about being so far in the front? Because most of us, we run in the middle in the back. We're not planning on winning a race. But for the people

[00:02:49] up front, they always have to think about, you know, what do we do? When do we push it? If somebody starts picking up and going a faster pace, do we go with them? Things like that? Yeah. I think that stuff's interesting.

[00:03:00] And also the course, of course, in Paris, we've heard about it. It's not the best course. It's in the middle of August, it's going to be hot and hilly and all that stuff. So, you know, just things of that nature.

[00:03:09] Hopefully just having some of this insight will make watching the race even more fun. Absolutely. And maybe next week we can talk about the Olympic marathon a little bit more and about who to look out for and maybe talk about some of the key players.

[00:03:24] Yeah. I think that'd be fun. Yeah. So you want to get into it? Yeah. So without any further ado, we're now going to speak with Claudio Berardelli. All right. So I'm on here with Claudio Berardelli, head coach of Two Running Club.

[00:03:40] Thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you, Leti, and thank you for having me. No, absolutely. I am super grateful given that as we're going to get into you coach some of the highest achieving marathoners in the world and the Olympics are right around the corner.

[00:03:58] So I'm super appreciative of your time. But perhaps we can start with your background. Maybe you can tell us a little bit about yourself, how you ended up in Kenya and how you ended up coaching all the elites. Yeah, it's quite a long story.

[00:04:13] Anyway, I'm from Italy as you might have heard from my Italian accent. And everything started probably back in the early 2000 when I got my degree in sports science. So I started at the University of Milan. And actually during my time at the university

[00:04:37] is when I got in touch with some very interesting people. They played an important role in what I did and what I'm still doing. And so some of my university mates basically involved me in a lot of discussions in regards of endurance in general,

[00:04:57] via two marks, threshold and whatever. And that's why I got really passionate about again endurance in general. And then it happened during that time that one of my friends got involved. He actually got employed by one of the leading management

[00:05:12] in the world when it comes to East African, so Rosa Management. That one was 2002. And a few months after he got employed, he asked me if basically I was interested in helping him as a sort of assistant coach.

[00:05:29] I was still at the university, but I was able maybe early in the morning with those athletes spending time in Italy because in those years there were a lot of road races in Europe. So we had quite a number of Kenyans spending a lot of months in Italy.

[00:05:45] So then in the morning I was on the bike, carrying the water, doing the busy things, taking time and you know. But definitely my background as a sport boy was not running. So I had no clue about things like three minutes per kilometer, 68 per lap.

[00:06:04] Those things for me were totally unknown. I've been a cyclist myself up to a junior level. But for me was super exciting to have such an experience. And then in 2004 I got a chance to have my first trip to Kenya. It was supposed to be a 10 day trip.

[00:06:25] Just to have a better look on how things were in Kenya. And then once I got here, I thought, OK maybe I can stay a little bit longer because I wanted to learn more. I wanted to explore more.

[00:06:40] So basically what initially was a 10 day trip became a 20 year trip. I'm still here. I'm still exploring. I'm still here learning a lot. Eventually in these 20 years so many things happened. Good things, bad things unfortunately as well. I got married to Claudia. She's from Kenya.

[00:06:59] We got two kids and yeah, 2015 I left Rosa Management and I started somehow my independent group, training group to running club. Then at that time I needed an agent to take care of my guys because myself I just wanted to be a coach.

[00:07:18] So I got in touch with another agent, another one of the top agents in the world for East African, Gianni de Madonna. And then from 2016 up to today, we have been having a very nice collaboration. His team, Rick Lilo, Monica Poncha for all the team.

[00:07:39] And we had honestly, we had also quite good success. That is an amazing story. So much to unpack still, right? Because now you're living in Kenya and you see the Kenyan lifestyle and everything. And I'm going to try to put that into the questions

[00:07:56] that I'm going to ask you. But first let's talk about a few of your success stories. Which athletes that are worldly known do you currently coach? What allowed me to say that I was fortunate enough since to afford to work with some incredible athletes.

[00:08:14] If I go back at the very beginning of my story here in Kenya, when I was still 23 years old and I was kind of pretending to be a coach. But I always say that someone like Martin Lel, won during those years, won London Marathon three times,

[00:08:33] New York City Marathon two times. And he's one of the first athletes I started working with. But I always say he was actually the one coach in me to become a coach. Because I was not in a position to really coach him at the time.

[00:08:51] But I was doing everything in my possibilities to help him. And it has been an amazing experience together with Martin Lel, Robert Chariot, who won Boston four times, Chicago. And then I had also the privilege to work with some very good middle distance athletes.

[00:09:10] Janet Gepkoz-Gay, who won a title in 2007 in the 800. And then Alpha Q Aiego, he also won the 800 meters World Championship in 2007. Eunice Soom, she won the title of the World Championship in 2013 in Moscow. Up to the recent years, currently I'm having again the privilege to coach Amos Kipruto,

[00:09:35] who won London Marathon in 2022. Evans Jebet, two times Boston Marathon champion, New York City Marathon champion. Benson Kipruto, who will actually represent Kenya this year at the Olympic Games. And he won Tokyo Marathon this year. Sebastian Sauer is the current half marathon world champion.

[00:09:56] Margaret Celiimo, she got silver medal at the half marathon world championship. And also she got bronze medal at the cross country world championship. She will represent Kenya in the 10,000. And also again, I've always been involved in middle distance and marathon, which is not easy

[00:10:12] to shift from the very short distance to the very long one. But currently I'm also coaching Emmanuel Luagnoni, who last year got silver medal in Budapest, in the 800 and the ZRM 141.7. So I have around 30, 35 athletes, of course. I couldn't do this without assistant coaches from Kenya.

[00:10:33] I have three assistant coaches. I have a team of physiotherapists. So it's a teamwork and I'm very thankful to my team. That's amazing. Some amazing names for those of us that follow the marathon distance and middle distance as well.

[00:10:49] So let's hop into the way that it works, right? Cause you have a training camp and how does that work? Do they live on this campus that you have and how often do they train? What does this camp entail?

[00:11:03] Yeah, the training camp concept is very common in Kenya. You have several training camps well established from the main management. And I think the training camp is a little war by its own in a sense that once you are inside there,

[00:11:24] there is a way of staying, there is a way of living and mostly it's probably the idea of keeping all the noise away, all the distractions that you can have from a bit, let me say a dynamic society here in Kenya as many people are aware.

[00:11:43] When a Kenyan athlete manages to succeed then to be also financially stable, of course many people expect help which we do understand and actually many athletes tends to help the large families but it can be a little bit stressful at time.

[00:12:03] So this idea to have a place away from home maybe not particularly far away, it can only be sometimes a few kilometers away from home but it's like a place which actually protects the athletes and well in my case because I believe if other camps

[00:12:23] they might have their own way of doing things in my case, in my group. I found the two running club in 2016 and we decided together with my guys to call it actually two because we believe it's basically a concept which can express togetherness.

[00:12:45] So the individual for the group and the group for the individuals. And so running it's an individual sport but there is a lot when it comes to staying a group. They really help each other beyond even running. So you have the more experienced athletes

[00:13:06] guiding the young ones in many ways not just on how to run faster and being stronger but maybe also how to do their first investments and how to take the best out of this opportunity which for them is life changing actually. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:13:26] I can't imagine and that kind of goes back to Kenya, right? Because in Kenya running is the main sport. Maybe you can tell us a little bit about how that works compared to other countries. You grew up in Italy obviously soccer is the number one sport.

[00:13:42] Is running the same for Kenyans? Yeah, absolutely running is the sport in Kenya no doubt although it's a bit different. Because you have these elite athletes maybe walking in a Doret town, Tapsabet town, in Ten Town and you might not even notice them.

[00:14:07] And maybe they are I don't know Olympic champions or champions you know. So there is really a level of humbleness which is different actually. I feel like they are more recognized when they go abroad and sometimes some of them they don't even know how to handle this

[00:14:23] because they are not used to it. But this is very nice because keeps them very connected to their normal life. Because actually it goes back a little bit towards drives them to run the best they can. People they might say that making money

[00:14:43] might not be an intrinsic motivation that can last but for them making money is not just make money to become rich but is to make money to get really a better life and to help their families who have a better life.

[00:15:03] And that is also something which motivates me a lot because I feel part of their responsibility really to help them to have such an impact in the society because each of them will have a huge impact for generations to come. There will be probably some young people

[00:15:27] that in five, 10 years will be able to go to the university for example to have a better education and they might not know that everything has changed because someone like for example Benzon Kipruto has been able to provide an opportunity to their brothers and sisters

[00:15:46] and the brothers and sisters have been able to give an opportunity to their children and then the children of their children and you understand it's something which will continue for years to come. And that's something very nice to me and I'm very privileged to be part of it.

[00:16:02] Yeah, that's awesome and that's beautiful. We hear those stories also, a career right? Wesley career coming back, building schools in Kenya things of that nature. Absolutely, yeah. Alright, so now from our sponsor, Tifosi Optics. Tifosi the brand name is the Italian word for superfan

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[00:18:12] and use code R-U-N-U-R underscore MRP20 for 20% off. So talk to me maybe a little bit about the challenges that you face coaching clients or athletes. I'm sorry, that are not from the Western world when you first got there.

[00:18:33] How is the thinking maybe different when it comes to running and motivation, et cetera? Yeah, of course. Despite having been here for 20 years, sometimes I still struggle because my Italian attitude actually is not that easy to remove it. But what sometimes for me is obvious,

[00:18:56] is not that obvious for them because they have different backgrounds. They have grown up in a different culture. So my role as a coach, it has definitely a technical aspect, no doubt. And I think that as a coach, I'm always trying to evolve technically.

[00:19:17] I'm trying to keep myself updated as much as I can. But then every day, I have to sit down in my office and I have to listen to some of their problems, which maybe are not technical problems. Problems related to their families,

[00:19:38] problems related to how things are going in their lives. And of course, if I want to help them, I have to always understand the context in which I'm operating. And I have really to try my best to detach, not that I'm always able to do that,

[00:19:57] but I have really to try to detach myself from my Italian way of seeing things. So what for us might be normal, it is not normal yet. And again, despite 20 years, sometimes I struggle a bit, but my wife helps me. So I've learned a bit. I'm still learning.

[00:20:18] That's why I'm saying that even if I've been doing the same things for 20 years, but it's never the same because you encounter different human beings in your journey. And each of them is different and with his or her own individual story and background.

[00:20:38] So of course there is probably a common pattern which is related to the society here. But then, you know, people, they say, oh, another Kenyan winning. For me is not another Kenyan. For me, they are the Amos Kipruto, Benson Kipruto, Sebastian Sauer, and Yukip Chogye.

[00:20:56] So they're not just Kenyans. They are individuals with their own stories, amazing stories because some of them they really come from very difficult background and the way they can succeed is amazing for me. Yeah, no, I love that. But you know,

[00:21:11] for somebody who's not familiar with Kenya, right? We hear, okay, there's the Kenyans and then there's the Ethiopians. And just in general, there are a much faster nation than even the United States, right? The United States Olympic Trial Qualifiers are right around 208.

[00:21:24] What is it about Kenyans in general that makes them so fast? You know, there have been already quite a number of studies trying to identify why probably East Africans, let's say Kenyans in this case, because I mean Kenya, are so fast. And it's pretty interesting because

[00:21:45] this dominance comes from a very small region. We can't even say Kenya. They're not strong athletes from Mombasa. They're not strong athletes from all the regions in Kenya, but specifically from some few regions, the one where I'm based and we know mostly from one tribe,

[00:22:06] which is the Kalinjin tribe, but even there there are sub-tribes. We have the Nandi, we have the Maraqwet. So it's really a small area producing such a high number of athletes. Now, if you ask me what is the reason, physiologically speaking, there are maybe some studies

[00:22:26] trying to show that maybe the Kenyans are able to sustain for longer a higher percentage of their VATU marks. But I would say if I have tried, although I've stopped a long time ago to try to understand why, it's more for me now to leave the experience.

[00:22:45] But anyway, if I can try to say my opinion is that probably it's a perfect combination of many factors. Some of them are so-called intrinsic factors, more physiological factors. Some are more extrinsic factors related to the fact that most of the people here are running in school.

[00:23:10] And probably when they start moving, running from such an early age, they develop some physiological adaptations that in long term can then make them very good athletes. But then also I think it's more a social aspect. Probably I've never been in Brazil

[00:23:29] but you can imagine that all the kids, they're playing a ball in every corner, it's a street or it's a football pitch, wherever it is and then they develop incredible skills. So somehow it's the same here when it comes to running.

[00:23:45] Kids in school, yes, they practice some other few sports but more or less it's just about running. Yeah. That's a good answer. And you know I've heard before about the Kenyans or the fastest ones coming from certain tribes and that you can identify the names

[00:24:03] if they start with Kip for male and Cheb for female. Am I getting that right? Yeah, in the Kalenjin tribe there is a, how do you call it prefix, Kip, which actually is common for the Kalenjin and the Kip is for the man

[00:24:24] and Cheb or Jeb is for the women. Yeah, it's true. So the moment you hear that sound, you can be sure he or she is a good runner and no doubt about it. Yeah, I like that. Okay. All right, so let me get some useful information

[00:24:43] since I have one of the best coaches in the world with me for our runners, which is average runners. My question would be do you implement the 80-20 rule where 80% of running is easy and then 20 fast because how do you view all this when it comes to coaching?

[00:25:00] Of course, it depends which distance we are talking about but for example in Marathon, I can't say that we fully use the polarized system although because we do also quite a lot of stuff at threshold intensity. But I would say the 80-20 is an interesting concept

[00:25:22] where we have definitely picked some useful insights. I think Steven Saylor has actually published a lot and guided us a lot on the 80-20 and for example, this idea that even for very above athletes like for example the one I'm coaching running slow

[00:25:45] and for long still can generate adaptations in terms of high-tech control, biogenesis, those type of things. So yeah, we don't really use the 80-20 but Kenyans are pretty famous for running slow and they do their easy runs which is true

[00:26:04] and they run quite a large amount of kilometers per week. So in that side, yes, we do also high intensity but there is also a bit of stuff in between. Okay, so just to kind of make it visual for runners

[00:26:24] what is the average pace that Benson Kiprutu runs for a mile for Marathon? Okay, no, I think it's faster per kilometer. Benson ran at 2.16 in February in Tokyo. That one makes him to be the fifth fastest man in the world.

[00:26:47] So I think it's around 2.54, the average pace which is pretty fast. So yeah, I mean, it's something that maybe people they don't realize. I always tell people, okay, listen, do this, try to mark on the road not even one kilometer

[00:27:08] maybe just 500 meters and try to run as fast as you can and you might realize how incredible are these guys that they run for two hours at such an incredible pace. So even watching them in television probably doesn't give a real feeling on how fast they are.

[00:27:31] I think some people, they might even struggle actually riding a bike for two hours at such pace if they're not fit enough. Right, right. So to give it to our listeners because a lot of them are from the United States so you said around 250 per kilometer?

[00:27:46] Well, no, I would say more 254 per kilometer. All right, so that's 4.5, 440 per mile. So how slow does he run his easy miles? Oh, that's interesting now. Really easy. You might wonder that you can actually have an easy run with him and you might be pretty much surprised sometimes

[00:28:11] like, hey, you see really an elite athlete because they can run as easy as a six minutes per kilometer do the conversion for me but you'll see it's quite easy. So if you run six minutes per kilometer that's a nine minute and 40 second mile.

[00:28:30] Again, for example, this is one of the things that, okay, they can run from six down to five when they go easy. Still five minutes per case pretty easy. I might say that maybe running too slow sometimes can be even a bit dangerous

[00:28:46] because biomechanical is not probably the best but okay there are also some things, some ways of doing things but I've decided just to accept and not to change too much. For example, most of the Kenyan athletes they have to run in the morning when it's still dark.

[00:29:06] For them if they don't start running when it's still dark is like they're not optimizing their time. They have this idea that they have to run basically when the sun is rising and sometimes I have athletes that they come back to me and say, oh, I got,

[00:29:23] I twisted my ankle a little bit in the morning and I'm like, of course, if you go when it's still dark you don't see where you step. But again, you always have to respect and consider a little bit the context and so compromising is,

[00:29:38] I think it is important in coaching in general because again when you deal with human beings in general is important but even more when you do it in a culture which is different from the one where you come from. Yeah, no, it's very interesting

[00:29:53] that you have such an insight on having both cultures to compare to. But I guess, yeah, my last question is in regards to the Paris Marathon Olympics what are your thoughts on this course? Well, everyone knows it's an interesting one with Benson we had a trip

[00:30:15] more than a month ago. We went to have a look because we thought it was a good thing and I think many athletes actually did that because from roughly 14K up to 32K let's say it's an interesting one whoever came up with this idea decided to

[00:30:35] put up a show. And considering that we are expecting also quite a challenging weather in August I read an article a few days ago that they are expecting one of the hottest Olympics in the recent years. So I think most of the athletes are working for it

[00:30:58] so I would say probably the course might not be I mean, yeah, it will be the key aspect but no one, there are no athletes who don't know how the course is because either they have gone to parties or there are a lot of videos around

[00:31:21] so it's more the combination of everything this course in such weather conditions that will be an interesting race because if you do a wrong move maybe too early you might then pay I still believe that the last 10K will probably play a key role.

[00:31:43] So with Benson we are trying to work towards specifically for parties we knew since the moment we started training for this marathon that we had really to forget for example what we did for Tokyo in February still it's a marathon but approach has to be completely different.

[00:32:03] Yeah and to hop into that and I'm not going to have you reveal your training secrets on how the strategy should be but what are some things that coaches have to consider when it comes to running a marathon of that significance?

[00:32:19] Oh well, I think tactical is difficult to say I would say that probably in my case I think with Benson we will try not to have a plan I mean because probably if you stick too much with one plan you might find yourself

[00:32:39] probably a bit lost in case something unexpected will happen so probably the plan is not to have a plan and to be ready to interpret and to read the race really step by step moment by moment and in this case I think the experience of Benson

[00:33:03] who has been in his last six marathons he has been on the podium and all major marathons winning Boston, Chicago, Tokyo so I think Benson comes into these Olympics at the right time probably in East Korea because he is a very experienced athlete but also

[00:33:27] physically and mentally still very fresh so of course I think there is also a psychological demand for a race like this one because the capacity to maybe very difficult conditions is something that you have to prepare for and you cannot just show up on that day unprepared

[00:33:51] and just hoping that because you are a good marathon runner like Benson who ran 2-0-2-16 he can't just say oh because I was the fastest in the world this year I will be able to perform in Paris absolutely no. Again he has to be ready

[00:34:06] for this specific event that's why I expect probably that we might have without disrespecting anyone but I think we might have somehow unknown athletes being protagonists in Paris that's what I'm expecting Yeah that's so true and not to take away from the grandiose

[00:34:30] event that this is going to be but even for us to dumb it down the Boston Marathon in 2018 we had people winning it that were not expected to win it on the ladies side because nobody else stuck with it

[00:34:42] and persevered through it so that's a really good point but yeah thank you so much for talking with me and I wish the best of luck to you and your athlete. Thanks a lot once again thanks for having me

[00:34:58] Thank you so much Claudia for coming on to our podcast we appreciate you taking the time to do that and of course good luck with this marathon that's coming up and hopefully we'll speak with you soon Yeah what a cool contact to have especially

[00:35:16] given it we're going to be watching this marathon in the Olympics pretty soon I know absolutely I wish I were still in Europe well I am in Europe right now but I wish I would stay until August 12th and truly just be in the streets of Paris

[00:35:31] and cheer everyone on but can't do it all Stay tuned for next week where we talk about something new and we haven't decided what yet We're working on it so until then Have a good week of running Thanks for tuning in for more information and marathon running news

[00:35:54] please head to www.marathonrunningpodcast.com and we'll be back next week To discover the perfect blend of comfort and style visit www.runswag.com Runswag there's something for every runner