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COACHING DONOHUE LIFTS STILL-GRIEVING GAGLIANO
Published by
Jan 23rd 2010, 6:20pm
COACHING DONOHUE LIFTS STILL-GRIEVING GAGLIANO By David Monti (c) 2010 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved - used with permission
NEW
YORK -- When Frank Gagliano gave up his coveted coaching job with
Nike's Oregon Track Club Elite in Eugene one year ago, it wasn't
because he was ready to give up training top middle distance athletes
like Nick Symmonds and Will Leer. His family needed him Back East.
"You
know, I bought a home, a condo, in Eugene and I never thought I'd be
leaving Eugene in January, 2009," Gagliano told the New York Track
Writers gathered at Coogan's Restaurant for dinner last Tuesday. "But
with the illness to Meighan..."
Gagliano's voice cracked. He looked down at the floor and fell silent for a moment.
"I
came back because my daughter-in-law had stage IV cancer, and since
passed away," he continued, haltingly. "I didn't want to stop
coaching. Why would I leave Nick Symmonds?"
Gagliano, a burly
man in his 70's who coached at Georgetown University from 1983 to 1999,
bought a house across the street from his son, Dave, in Rye, N.Y., just
north of New York City, so he could be closer to his family. Coaching,
his life's mission, had to be put on hold, at least for a while.
"I
didn't want to coach at that time because, going down to Sloan
(Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan), back and forth and everything,
there was a lot going on," he recounted.
But the man universally
known in the sport as "Coach Gags" soon found his way back to coaching
after Olympic 1500-meter runner Erin Donohue split with her former
coach, John Cook. Donohue, who grew up and still lives in Haddonfield,
N.J., near Philadelphia, was looking for somebody whom she could work
with closely. Cook had mostly advised her via e-mail and the
telephone, only seeing her for a few weeks a year.
"When I was
thinking of getting a new coach, one thing that I definitely wanted is
a coach who would be there at the track for me, a little more hands
on," Donohue said to reporters. "Word on the street was that Coach
Gags was coming back from Oregon and was going to be back in New York."
She added: "I asked my agent to get in contact with him."
Donohue and Gagliano each took a train to Manhattan and they met at Grand Central Terminal. They instantly saw a fit.
"I
met her in Grand Central Station in the middle of March," Gagliano
said. "She came back from Mexico and took the train up. I took the
train down, and we talked. We had a great conversation."
The
pair have been working together ever since, training together two days
a week in New Jersey and New York. Donohue, who suffered a calf injury
last spring which put her training a little behind schedule, finished
fourth at the 2009 USA Outdoor Championships in the 1500m, missing the
world championships team by one position. Ironically, her race took
place one day after Meighan Coughlin-Gagliano succumbed to cancer.
Gagliano had lost one battle, but another was just beginning: to get
Donohue faster.
"A lot of her lady competitors made the big
jump," Gagliano said of Shannon Rowbury, Christin Wurth-Thomas, and
Anna (Willard) Pierce who all ran under 4:01 for 1500m last year
(Wurth-Thomas and Pierce broke four minutes).
Gagliano will be
training Donohue primarily as an 800-meter runner this year, he said.
Getting her 800m time down was the key for her to run faster at 1500m.
Donohue has run 2:01.12, but Gagliano said she would be getting under
two minutes this year.
"To be honest, you'll see Erin run a tremendous 800 this year," he said. "I really, really mean it."
Donohue
opens her season today (Jan. 23) at the New Balance Games at the Armory
Track & Field Center. She'll be running an invitational mile,
basically as a rust-buster.
"This will really be my first race
of the year where I'm not really concerned with running a time," she
said. "If I run a fast time that's great, but just really looking to
focus on competing, and just getting the win, and starting off the
season that way."
For Gagliano, who will be at the Armory with
Donohue, coaching seems essential to his very existence; retirement
appears to be a long way off.
"I don't have golf clubs," he said. "I have a stopwatch."
ENDS
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