Olympic post mortem: Moh Ahmed
Moh Ahmed had hoped to return to St. Catharines triumphant after a strong showing at the Paris Summer Olympic Games.
But things didn’t go as planned for the 33-year-old former St. Catharines resident. He missed the podium in the 10,000 metres by 0.33 seconds and then fell in his 5,000-metre heat and failed to advance to the final.
“The intention is you win medals and you bring them home. When you don’t have that, you wonder if you should even go back home. In many ways, I almost skipped coming here,” the Niagara Olympic Club member said. “It is a bit embarrassing to come back empty-handed and honestly I almost booked a flight to the West Coast and let myself figure things out in silence a little bit.”
After some reflection, the 2021 Olympic silver medalist in the 5,000 metres, returned to Niagara last Thursday and plans to stay until the middle of next week.
“I chose to come back because I know the people here love me regardless whether I have medals or I don’t. Of course I am a competitive person and I think highly of myself and I want to obtain some really high, lofty goals but this is where it started.”
St. Catharines will always be home for the St. Catharines Collegiate alumnus.
“This is where the journey began and it is always a nice thing for me to come back here after every season to run the same trails I ran,” the former All-American at Wisconsin said. “Having a different stimulus and exposing yourself to a different environment is important in that it helps you grow but coming home helps you rediscover your older self. Sometimes that is how you get regrowth and I love it here.”
His biggest takeaway from Paris was feeling he did enough and was good enough to stand on the podium but it just didn’t happen.
“This year was about getting back on that podium and telling myself that I had done it once and I could do it again,” he said. “You have to have confidence to go for something like that. I wasn’t lacking that but it was more the way I worked and my processes. You have to evidence throughout the whole year and when I got there I had that.”
He believes he is still a contender on the world stage.
“When you are 32 or 33, you start to wonder how many years you still have and for me, the way I performed in Paris definitely tells me that I have more years whether it is the track or I go on the road. I competed really well. It was disappointing in some ways, especially the five (5k) in that I couldn’t really show my work. The ten (10k) was one of the greatest races ever at that distance. I was frustrated and disappointed in the finish but I wasn’t disappointed the way I executed the race.”
In the 10,000 metres, he crossed the finish line fourth in a pack of five, less than a second behind eventual winner and world record holder, Joshua Cheptegei of Uganda.
“The 10,000 metres was electric and the atmosphere was crazy. I’ve been in special types of races before like London in 2012 when Mo Farah, the hometown hero, was racing. That was deafening. There have been some great races since then but nothing came close to that. Paris was the closest.”
Ahmad described the Paris 10,000 metres as historic.
“Thirteen men broke 27 minutes and 13 men ran faster than the previous Olympic record. That is unbelievable.”
His time in the 10,000 metres was the second fastest of his career.
“I can definitely be proud of it and when I am grey and older, I will look back on that race and say that I don’t have any regrets. The finishing position was a bitter pill to swallow but I executed my race and you just have to tip your hat to the people who beat me. I did everything I could and it just wasn’t enough.”
In the 5,000 metres, Ahmad got tangled up with a group of runners and fell 50 metres before the start of the final lap.
“The 5,000 was just unfortunate. I felt really, really good and I recovered (from the 10k). I did a good job of sleeping, eating and getting treatment and when I was on the line I felt good,” he said. “It wasn’t my fault that I fell nor was it the fault of the person ahead of me that I made contact with. It felt like I deserved a chance to be in that final but you can’t blame anyone but yourself. You look back and you say ‘What decisions could I have made before the incident occurred for that not to happen?’ ”
Ahmad is now taking a few weeks off to decompress, let his muscles recover and put some weight back on.
“Then I have to figure out the game plan for the (2025) world championships. People tuned in for the Olympics but that is not all we do. We don’t just train every four years for one event. There are other things along the way.”
The 2025 worlds are in Tokyo.
“For me, that is a special place. It is where I got my Olympic medal. My intention is to be there and compete again for a medal.”
He knows he is not getting any younger.
“Sometimes you go on your own terms and for me that is what I want to do. In many ways, I still feel young aside but now I can grow a beard. There’s a few grey hairs popping up but from an energy perspective, I feel young. It is figuring out what excites me next. Is that going to be the track and sticking around or do I do road and play around with different stuff? I am a bit conflicted and I am still ruminating on my next move.”
His intentions are to regroup and use everything that happened in Paris as motivation and fuel to get back on the podium.
“There is no other feeling like standing on the podium and for me, I would love to stand on top of that podium and sing the national anthem. I have stood on the podium several times but I have had to hear other people’s national anthems.”
