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Beijing Olympic silver medalist Nick Willis stepped into relatively unfamiliar territory to capture his second 5000m title at the NZ Track& Field Championships at Waitakere. Running his final race before returning to the United States this week, the 1500m specialist turned out over the longer distance, partly to break up his heavy training load and partly to test the waters for a possible double at the London Olympics later this year. On both counts, he deemed the exercise a success, powering away from American training partner Will Leer in 13m 54.29s. While the time was still 27 seconds slower than both his personal best and the Olympic qualifying standard, Willis was obviously in great early-season fitness. The reason Im able to talk about this is because my training has gone so well, he said. Youve got to do 140km a week to give the 5km a good crack and Ive been able to do that over the last three weeks in New Zealand. Im just thankful to be standing here healthy and with a huge, huge base for my campaign. Willis has only run a handful of 5000m races during his career and recorded his fastest time (13m 27.54s) at the 2005 US collegiate championships. Hes keen to double up at London and has already targeted a couple more opportunities to qualify over the coming months. But if my training is not going 100% or Ive got the slightest pain in my shins, we wont worry about it. The 1500m is what matters and Im not going to take any unnecessary risks. It would be nice, though. Its after the 1500m and youre at the Olympics, you may as well do every race you can. I did say Id do the 800m at Beijing, but after I won the medal, the last thing you feel like doing is getting up early and doing another race. If I won a medal in the 1500, I doubt youd see me on the 5000 start line. Willis and Leer broke away with Kenyan Edwin Kaitany and triathlete Martin van Barneveld early, but dropped their rivals midway through the journey. Leer began to drift with three laps remaining, leaving Willis to cruise home a popular winner. In the scramble for minor medals, van Barneveld was passed late by fellow mutisporter Ryan Sissons and track exponent Stephen Lett.
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