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How Ser-Od Bat-Ochir got his groove back www.olympics.com/

After disappointing himself at Tokyo 2020 in 2021, the five-time Olympian from Mongolia has found his mojo again, eyeing a historic sixth marathon at Paris 2024.

Ser-Od Bat-Ochir has loved running as long as he can remember - especially the marathon.

He loves the challenge over the last 12 kilometres, the battle within against sheer mental and physical exhaustion.

So you know when someone with that kind of temperament says he can't go anymore, he really can't go.

And that is exactly how Bat-Ochir felt during the Tokyo 2020 marathon in Sapporo.

"I went to train in Chitose (near Sapporo) but I caught a bad cold there," the Mongolian told Olympics.com ahead of the 2022 World Athletics Championships, looking back on a race he failed to finish.

"I had a fever which sapped my strength. I could not run the race I was hoping for at the Tokyo Olympics.

"For around two months or so after the Olympics, it was very difficult for me. It had already been decided that I was going to quit my team after the Olympics so those two months were the toughest.

"It was mental, emotional. I was fine physically."

Ser-Od Bat-Ochir of Mongolia leaves as the last finisher with his team-mate Byambajav Tseveenravdan after the Men's Marathon at the World Athletics Championships Doha 2019 in Doha, Qatar.
Ser-Od Bat-Ochir of Mongolia leaves as the last finisher with his team-mate Byambajav Tseveenravdan after the Men's Marathon at the World Athletics Championships Doha 2019 in Doha, Qatar.
The five-time Olympian hit rock bottom in the months following a Games that should have been a career highlight, a Games held in his adopted home and training base of Japan.

Bat-Ochir thought about calling it quits, even thinking of taking up an ordinary everyday job.

And he actually might have, had it not been for the consoling words of his friends and his wife, Oyuntuya, who also has been coaching him since 2005.

Plus of course, Bat-Ochir's love for running.

"They told me, the Tokyo Olympics is in the past and that it was time to move on. They told me I should set a new goal for myself, the next Olympics and the world championships - and I began to feel that way.

"I thought a lot about what I wanted and I wanted to run the marathon. I love the marathon so I felt that is what I should do.

"Then I began training for my next race".

Paris via Oregon
The World Athletics Championships Oregon22 will be Bat-Ochir's 10th appearance in the marathon at the Track and Field championships which, according to World Athletics, is a runaway record.

With a time difference of 16 hours between his home and Oregon, he has prepared for the meet not in Japan but in Boulder, Colorado, where the cool climate is similar to Mongolia.

Bat-Ochir - whose personal best is 2 hours, 8 minutes and 50 seconds - believes his best race is still ahead of him.

Let us remember that he turns 41 in October. His goal for Oregon is to finish higher than 19th, which he recorded at the 2011 worlds in Daegu, South Korea.

Bat-Ochir believes a marathon runner's peak years are in between the ages of 37 and 45 as double Olympic champion Eliud Kipchoge has proved, when speed and stamina gels perfectly.

By his own account, he has run around 74 marathons (he says 'around 74' because he admits he's not 100 per cent sure) since taking up the 42km race in 2002.

If he makes it to Paris 2024 - and it would be foolish to think he can't - Bat-Ochir will become the first athlete in history to run six Olympic marathons.

He hopes to make that the final race of his career. And clearly, he has found his second wind.

"I want to run at the Paris Olympics," Bat-Ochir says. "I want to run my final marathon at the Paris Olympics and after that I want to go into coaching - but still train for myself, too."

Published Date:2022-07-17

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How Ser-Od Bat-Ochir got his groove back www.olympics.com/

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