IT IS 15 years since Eamonn Martin became the last British man to win the London Marathon, and while that statistic is likely to worsen this morning, Tomas Abyu may not mind too much.

Abyu is determined to run his way into the British team for this summer’s Olympic Games in Beijing, nine years after escaping his native Ethiopia where his father had been killed in the midst of a civil war. “It would be a big history for myself to represent the country at the Olympics,” he says.

Abyu needs to run 2hr 11min to achieve the qualifying time. He ended last year as Britain’s quickest man after his 2hr 10min 37sec in Dublin, but as that performance was on a course that is not ratified by the International Association of Athletics Federations, he has to do it all again today.

He is unlikely to be fast enough to be among the leaders - Kenya’s Martin Lel is chasing a third title in four years after his victory in 2hr 7min 41sec last year – but Abyu has no fears about dealing with a challenge.

A decade ago, Abyu lived in Arsi, a village in central Ethiopia, and when tragedy struck, he decided he had no option but to leave.

“It was the continuation of 30 years of civil war,” he says. “It was a very bad time. My father was killed. He was a farmer, an innocent person. He was no politician. At the time the government was arresting people, so I just managed to escape the country. There is still no democracy in Ethiopia, but now it is getting a little bit better.”

Abyu, 29, is not even sure how he reached Britain in 1999. “I paid some money and there were agents who brought me here, it was like a mafia,” he says. “When you have the money, they can take you from country to country. They took me by Land Cruiser and after that, I did not know where I was. I was brought here by ship but the port was outside Ethiopia. It may have been in Kenya.”

In April 2000, he was granted full asylum and five years ago, he received British citizenship. He lives in Manchester and runs full-time, finishing fourth in last year’s BUPA Great North Run.

Not that his prowess for endurance events should be too much of a surprise. Abyu and Haile Gebrselassie, Ethiopia’s greatest distance runner, were born just 25 miles apart and last year he returned to his native country to train with him. “Haile is my hero,” he says. Now he has to make that biggest step, of not only joining the ranks of the world-class marathoners, but staying there. If he did, it could have a knock-on effect.

David Bedford, Britain’s former 10,000m world record-holder who is the London Marathon’s international race director, remains disappointed by the overall lack of British men making the grade at the elite level over 26.2 miles.

Bedford said: “I came up in a generation where people worked and even average runners ran fast. Unless these guys are being born as a weaker species, which I doubt, what else can you look at as opposed to the amount of work?

“But we must realise how quickly things can change. Let’s look at women’s marathon running. There is definitely a resurgence in this country. Mara Yamauchi wins an international race [in Osaka in January], so it is not just Paula [Radcliffe]. These are good signs.”

In the absence today of Radcliffe, injured during her preparation for the race, Gete Wami will have more chance of dictating the pace of the race as she bids to win London for the first time. The Ethiopian, who finished second last year, is the world marathon majors series champion, but the women’s event is wide open.

Her fellow Ethiopian, Berhane Adere, is the fastest in the field. Her time of 2hr 20min 42sec is almost a minute quicker than Wami’s, but she has never made the top three in London.

Britain’s Liz Yelling is aiming to book her place in Beijing. Hayley Haining is equally determined to take the domestic honours, with just one Olympic place available alongside Radcliffe and Yamauchi.