It is far from unusual for athletes to move through the distances as their careers mature and their endurance builds.
For Sweden’s Andreas Almgren, the move to the longer distances has proved hugely successful and the Swede is about to embark on an eagerly awaited marathon debut in the New York Marathon in early November.
However, the idea of running a marathon would have been the stuff of fantasy a decade ago when Almgren - who became the first European to break the 59 minute-barrier in the half marathon last October - was regarded as a rising star in the 800m having run 1:45 as a teenager.
"Nope," stated Almgren on if he had any inkling the longer distances would be his ultimate calling. "I never had any kind of intention to step up in distance. I wanted to run the 800m."
In Almgren’s case, it was a succession of injuries which began with a broken bone in his foot - something he described as "a sudden crack in my right foot" - in early 2016 that halted his ascent through the middle distance ranks and prompted a change in direction.
After a long spell on the sidelines and many major championships missed, a national indoor 3000m record of 7:48.34 at the 2020 Swedish Indoor Championships just before the pandemic was the first clear sign for Almgren that he could possibly reinvent himself as a distance runner.
And six years later, Almgren produced one of the most accomplished and destructive pieces of distance running to win the 10,000m title at the 2026 European Athletics Championships in Birmingham.
Some like it hot
After parts of Great Britain basked in the fifth heatwave of one of the hottest summers on record last week, the temperatures dropped significantly for the last two days of the championships.
By sheer coincidence, most of the endurance events were scheduled for the latter part of the championships. One would have thought this would have been a blessing for all distance runners but not for Almgren who was hoping the temperatures would remain steadfast in the low 30Cs for the 10,000m.
It was only last September when Almgren dealt with the dizzying heat and humidity at the 2025 World Championships in Tokyo, kicking to a bronze medal in the 10,000m - his first major medal as a senior - in a race won by France’s Jimmy Gressier.
"For Tokyo I was preparing for it to be a slow race and I had done a lot of heat training so I wanted it to be as hot as possible. I've done a lot of heat training before this one as well - not for the heat but I didn't really get the logistics working for an altitude camp and you get the blood values from heat training as well.
"When we had the heatwave in the beginning of this championships I was like 'it's going to be nice' but then I saw it was going to cool down for the 10,000m I thought ‘that's bad.'" said Almgren.
"I just took off." A sudden change in tactics
Nor was Almgren counting on the first kilometre of the 10,000m being quite as pedestrian as 3:16.93. This prompted Almgren to rethink his gameplan.
The Swede was preparing to make a concerted effort at some point “to hurt the other guys” but leading almost the entire way in the 10,000m was not the initial plan.
"Yes, that's true. My plan was to go after 5km or something. I was hoping that it was going to be a little bit faster, maybe 14:15 [through 5km] or something at least under 30 minute-pace," said Almgren.
"But when it was 3:17 for the first kilometre I was like 'OK, we can't have it like this. I don't want to have a race like this.’ Mike Foppen was leading the race. He's a big friend of mine. After four laps I went up next to him and he just looked at me and said: 'bro, what the f*** is happening?' And I was like, 'I don't know, I'll just go.' Then I just took off."
And take off he did.
A succession of 63-64 second laps left the 25-man field splintered around the entirety of the track. Only Gressier along with Dominic Lobalu and Yemaneberhan Crippa - the last two European 10,000m champions - remained grimly in contact as the lap counter reduced to single digits but even their resolve was broken as Almgren upped the pain with a brutal three laps of 63.07, 62.18 and 61.22.
Almgren might have slowed in the closing stages which resulted in the unusual spectacle of the Swede acting as a de facto pacemaker for a large group of runners whom he had lapped but the damage had been done and the 31-year-old’s last lap was tantamount to a victory lap.
His winning time of 27:23.44 slashed seven seconds off the oldest championship record on the books which had stood to Martti Vainio at 27:30.99 since 1978 and his winning margin of 19.23 seconds was the biggest in any major championship men’s 10,000m this century.
Running so hard and for so long might not have been the predetermined game plan but Almgren was supremely confident about his form and fitness and his ability to last out the distance from some of his pre-championship workouts.
"Apart from high mileage and threshold, I've basically done three very good specific workouts leading into this and those workouts gave me a lot of confidence. One of the first ones I did was 5x2000m with three minutes rest and I did 5:29, 5:19, 5:13, 5:08 and 5:02 for the last one. Basically I just can run very fast without feeling fatigue," said Almgren on one of his key workouts.
Inspiration from the Ingebrigtsens
Almgren’s victory in the 10,000m was part of a string of successes for Scandinavian distance runners in Birmingham.
It began on the first night of the championships with his Jakob Ingebrigtsen defying an injury-ridden build-up to win his fourth 5000m title and ended with Finland’s Alisa Vainio - who cites Almgren as one of her idols - winning the women’s marathon. In between, Almgren’s friend and roommate Samuel Pihlström also won a surprise silver medal in the 1500m.
Prior to Almgren’s early middle distance success, the Swede was also a highly talented football player. In his youth, Almgren was a promising defender who played at age-group level with and against players who even made the Swedish team at the FIFA World Cup this summer.
But Almgren recalls watching Henrik Ingebrigtsen winning the 1500m title at the 2012 European Athletics Championships in Helsinki as proof that Scandinavians can leave their mark in the middle and long distances and that he could possibly follow suit.
"I guess everyone just inspires each other," said Almgren on the rise and rise of distance running in the region.
"But for me back in 2012 I was in the middle of choosing to try to go as a football player or as a runner. Scandinavians never really succeeded but then Henrik Ingebrigtsen got fifth in the Olympics [in the 1500m] and won the Europeans so you can actually become good as a runner from Scandinavia. Then obviously what Filip and then Jakob did inspired a lot of us and now we can inspire and work well together."
Next up for Almgren is the Finnkampen - the annual Sweden v Finland international match - in late August in Helsinki where Almgren will run the 10,000m. This will be his only remaining track race of the year before he turns his focus back to the roads again.
Almgren is planning to contest the half marathon at the World Athletics Road Running Championships in Copenhagen on 19-20 September before the New York Marathon on 1 November comes into view where another chapter of the Swede’s remarkable career will begin.