ATHLETICS:Even with an African-American president, America is far from a post-racial society, writes IAN O'RIORDAN

IF THERE’S one thing that gets America talking, it’s the debate about being American. Essentially, this is a debate best avoided, unless you want to risk being accused of stereotyping, racism or, as Kurt Vonnegut once concluded, end up ashamed to be called one. I certainly had no intention of going there either until I read a series of stories in the New York press this week about Meb Keflezighi (pronounced ka-FLEZ-gee), who last Sunday became the first American winner of the New York Marathon in 27 years.

On Monday, he made the front page of the New York Times, under the headline “Keflezighi’s ‘USA’ Breaks the Tape”, a reference to both his victory, and the fact he was wearing the American team uniform (most elite marathon runners wear the uniform of their sponsors).

On Tuesday, he made the front page of the sports section, this time under the headline, “To Some, an American Winner Is Not American Enough” – with the story then asking: “Should Keflezighi’s triumph count as an American victory?” This is where the debate really took off.

Truth is, the debate over Keflezighi, if there is one, is not just about being an American distance runner. It’s about nature versus nurture, and also touches on one of the last taboos of sport: whether a certain race has a genetic advantage over another, and, if so, whether that alone explains their success.

At the risk of being accused of stereotyping, racism or worse, was the Times being entirely unfair with their headline, or indeed question? Keflezighi was 12 years old when he first set foot on American soil. He was born in Eritrea, which at the time was still under the rule of Ethiopia. His father was a member of the Eritrean Liberation Front, a civilian organisation seeking independence, and that put all the Keflezighis at risk of arrest, or worse. To stay safe, the family of seven would frequently hide away from their village, surviving without clean water or electricity.

In July 1981, his father took the difficult decision to flee, walking the 100 miles to the Sudanese border, and eventually securing passage to Italy, which had once also colonised Eritrea. Five years later, in 1986, the rest of the family managed to join him, shortly before the unrest in Eritrea reached its most violent.

After 14 months living in Milan, the Keflezighis were sponsored as refugees to travel to the US, and settled in San Diego. Soon, the family grew in size, to 11, and in self-esteem. Every one of the children attended school, and then college.

Like most American kids, Keflezighi tried out in several sports at San Diego High School, before Ron Tabb, a former top marathoner, recognised his talent. In his final year, he was California state champion in the mile and two-mile, and that helped earn him a scholarship to UCLA. He finished up there with a string of American collegiate titles, and in 1998, the year he was granted American citizenship, settled in the high-altitude town of Mammoth Lakes in eastern California, to train, and start a family of his own.

In 2001, Keflezighi set an American 10,000 metres record of 27:13.98, which still stands, and three years later, at the Athens Olympics, won the silver medal in the marathon.

That was America’s first Olympic medal at the distance since Frank Shorter won silver in 1976, and seemed destined to be the highlight of Keflezighi’s career – at least until last Sunday, when in front of two million spectators and an estimated television audience of 330 million the 34-year-old Keflezighi won the New York Marathon.

As American sporting stories go, winning the New York Marathon is a far bigger deal than winning an Olympic medal, as the subsequent coverage of Keflezighi’s victory clearly proved. On Monday, he was on the Late Show with David Letterman, and by then a lot of Americans were wondering who exactly he was. Tuesday’s New York Times article, in asking whether his triumph should really count as an American victory, then managed to complicate the issue above and beyond what they could have imagined.

Evidently, the last American to win the New York Marathon was Alberto Salazar, back in 1982, except he wasn’t born in America either. Salazar was born in Cuba. But then he spoke like an American: Keflezighi’s name alone sounds less American. In the article, Richard Lapchick, from the University of Central Florida, said the debate about Keflezighi “tells us there are people that still have racial red flags go up when certain things happen”.

In other words, even with an African-American president, America is far from a post-racial society.

Some astonishing evidence of that came from popular CNBC reporter Darren Rovell, who wrote that Keflezighi may be an American citizen thanks to taking a test and living in the country, “but he’s like a ringer who you hire to work a couple hours at your office so that you can win the executive softball league,” before adding: “The positive sign was that some American-born runners did extremely well in the men’s race . . . If any of them stand on the top step of the podium in Central Park one day, that’s when I’ll break out my red, white and blue.”

Needless to say, those comments didn’t go down well, and during the week Rovell tried to cover his tracks, first by saying, “Keflezighi is an American and any suggestion otherwise is wrong”, then adding that “I didn’t account for the fact that virtually all of Keflezighi’s running experience came as a US citizen”.

The bottom line in that particular debate is that “American” is not a race, it is a nationality. And unless someone is of 100 per cent Native American heritage, it’s a nationality with a heterogeneous racial identity.

However, the debate over Keflezighi’s background is still relevant. Is his success in distance running purely the result of his nurturing in America, where he did all his training, or at least partly the result of his natural background in East Africa? This is the question that traverses many sports, yet one which the sports scientists aren’t exactly in a rush to answer.

There is no denying that some countries are far stronger in certain athletics events than others. At the World Championships in Berlin, the Jamaicans once again cleaned up in the sprints, while the Kenyans and Ethiopians did likewise in the distance events. Is that all nature? Or some nurture? The evidence favouring either is slim, but in the case of the East Africans no one has yet identified a unique set of genes to explain their talent.

One recent study, at the University of Glasgow, found that elite African athletes don’t appear to possess a unique genetic make-up; rather, they found a high degree of genetic diversity in East African populations, and even among elite East African athletes.

It seems culture and upbringing are the important factors that allow East Africans to excel, and even if there is a genetic advantage, it’s certainly not their trump card.

In many ways, Meb Keflezighi proved all of this in becoming the first American winner of the New York Marathon in 27 years.