Haile Gebrselassie
Haile Gebrselassie (born April 18, 1973) is a long distance track and road running athlete born as one of ten children in Assela, Arsi, Ethiopia. He is considered by many one of the best distance runners of all time which may have been helped by his home village being 3,000 feet above sea level.
He gained international recognition in 1992 when he won the 5,000-meter and 10,000-meter races at the World Junior Championships. In 1994 he set his first world record by running a 12:56.96 in the 5,000-meters. Since then, Gebrselassie has gone on to set 14 more World Records and World Bests.
He was the first man to break both the 13 minute mark for the 5000 meter run and the 27 minute mark for the 10000 meter run, although not the first to break each of those marks separately.
On August 30 2003 Haile topped the polls when elected as a member of the IAAF Athletes Commission.
In 1999 Gebrselassie starred as himself in the movie "Endurance." The film chronicled his quest to win Olympic gold in the 10,000-meters.
Honors
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|align="center"| As five miles: Henry Hawtrey | Emil Voigt
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|align="center"| As 10,000 metres: Hannes Kolehmainen | Paavo Nurmi (twice) | Ville Ritola | Janusz Kusociński | Ilmari Salminen | Emil Zátopek (twice) | Vladimir Kuts | Pyotr Bolotnikov | Billy Mills | Naftali Temu | Lasse Virén (twice) | Muruse Yefter | Alberto Cova | Brahim Boutayeb | Khalid Skah | Haile Gebrselassie (twice) | Kenenisa Bekele
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