Many of his training sessions were over imprecisely measured distances, and even in the stadium he often trained on the grass outside the track, so as not to get in his fellow athletes’ way.

More importantly, his muscles recovered quickly, especially as the years of mileage accumulated.

He was too generous and talkative to keep one.

He studied chemistry as a young man, and from the moment he took up serious running he explored hitherto untried ways of improving his performance. It is also rumoured that Zátopek had a short stint at refuse collection, but was let go as he was unable to complete a round without a horde of citizens insisting on helping him, though no evidence exists of this ever happening . Convinced that the secret of running was to learn to run fast (‘I already know how to run slow’), he developed a rigorous system of fast repetitions with short, ruthlessly limited recovery jogs. You may be able to find more information on their web site. His work in such a field gave rise to the rumour that he had been sent (as many before him were) to the uranium mine concentration camps; however, the camps and the last of the mines had closed many years before. When a person forces himself to do a thing a hundred or a thousand times, then he certainly develops in ways more than physical. His head would often roll, face contorted with effort, while his torso swung from side to side.Zátopek was known for his friendly and gregarious personality and for his ability to speak six languages. Is it raining? When the moment of truth arrives in the stadium – or on the streets of your local half marathon – the resulting toughness stands you in good stead. Rivals loved him for his humour and sportsmanship. Only a decade after his retirement, he fell from the favour of the Communist regime in what was then Czechoslovakia. Most modern Olympians now take a similar approach – it’s rare to find an elite distance runner who isn’t a full-time athlete. His self-developed system of high-volume interval training – first ridiculed, then widely imitated – transformed the way that elite distance runners train.Then there was his personality: witty, charming, kind. Such behaviour is not advisable, but it does suggest that one mark of a champion might be not being put off too easily – and being prepared to take control of your own destiny.Six years later, a hernia operation prevented Zátopek from training properly for the Melbourne Olympics.

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Then Zátopek summons what another writer called ‘the strength of angels’. Like any serious runner, he was a bit of a nutter.Hungarian coach Klement Kerssenbrock first identified Zátopek’s ability to respond to fatigue by accelerating. He resumed training the day after leaving hospital, but never quite regained his form. In short, he was (relatively) normal. But it was also internalised. Undefeated at 10,000m for six years, he dominated and revolutionized his sport.

By the mid-1950s he was doing up to 100 fast 400m laps a day, with 150m jogs in between.When Zátopek first developed his regime of high-volume interval training, his fellow athletes were appalled. Nevertheless, it was because of Zátopek that others after him decided that the only way to reach the sport’s summit was by making training a full-time occupation.Military records suggest that his duties as a soldier were real – and that sometimes he struggled to reconcile them with his training.

The experts can argue as to whether it was genetics or training habits that gave Zátopek the edge.

Zátopek believed that the psychological benefits were as important as the extra miles. At the end of the war he joined the Zátopek was selected for the Czechoslovak national team for the Zátopek attempted to defend his marathon gold medal in 1956; however, he suffered a groin injury while training and was hospitalized for six weeks. His British rival Emil and Dana were the witnesses at the wedding ceremony of Olympic gold medalists A hero in his native country, Zátopek was an influential figure in the He gained employment in one of the few companies not discouraged from employing out-of-favour citizens.

Three years earlier in 1951, he had broken the hour for running 20 km. It was out of myself.’ The modern athlete, by contrast, ‘is not an athlete.

Many of these are central to the ways we run today; others are less fashionable, but we forget them at our peril.The man named by Runner’s World in 2013 as the greatest runner of all time was not the most naturally gifted athlete.

‘But when I first won the European Championship, they said: “Emil, you are a genius!”’‘Before Zátopek,’ wrote Fred Wilt, the US 10,000m runner and training guru, ‘nobody had realised it was humanly possible to train this hard.’ Rivals such as Chataway, the Olympian who helped pace Roger Bannister to the first sub four-minute mile – insisted it wasn’t: ‘For me and many others, it was simply more than we could stand.’Time has proved Zátopek right. To catch up, he tried to train on the flight to Australia. In his 1950s prime he was a global megastar. It’s what drives some to become drug cheats. His pulse rate would return to normal very quickly after a hard race or training session. He rarely used a stopwatch. Marathons are never easy…unless you happen to be Emil Zatopek, arguably the greatest long distance runner of all time. We earn a commission for products purchased through some links in this article. Aged 16, he began working in the A mere four years later, in 1944, Zátopek broke the Czechoslovak records for 2,000, 3,000 and 5,000 metres.

That doesn’t matter.

He kicks, but within 100m has slipped from first to fourth.

Early experiments included holding his breath until he passed out; eating young birch leaves (in imitation of fast-running deer, he explained); eating vast quantities of dandelions and garlic; and drinking a mixture of lemon juice and lane-marking chalk to keep up his vitamin C and calcium levels.Later experiments included running with a load. That’s not something that’s likely to be reversed, at least at elite level. He embodied ideas that go to the heart of what it means to be a runner. Am I tired?