Eritrean-born Meb Keflezighi, who won the New York City Marathon yesterday, is the first American man to win the race in 27 years. Meb came to the US as a 12 year old boy in 1987 as a refugee from his war-torn country and became a US citizen in 1998. He has emerged as one of America's leading long-distance runners since graduating from UCLA. He won a silver medal for America in the 2004 Olympics in Athens, but an injury knocked him out of contention last year. The Athens medal was the first for an American male marathon runner since Frank Shorter won a silver medal in 1976.
Meb's time of 2 hours, 9 minutes and 15 seconds was his best finish time ever.
A lot of people were not born here, including myself, and we all became American citizens. Some Americans were born here but their parents were born in another country. That is what makes America one big melting pot. I consider him And myself American!!!
Posted by: Amy | November 03, 2009 at 12:39 PM
And Stephen Colbert makes fun of the people who think he is not American enough...
Posted by: JoeF | November 02, 2009 at 08:39 PM
To Some, an American Winner Is Not American Enough
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/03/sports/03runner.html?hpw
to some he is not good enough...
Posted by: LFWF | November 02, 2009 at 08:04 PM