I do it for love...

Many of my non-runner friends often ask me why I do what I do. I'm sure to a lot of them it seems nonsensical that I chose to go spend 6 weeks in Arizona with people I'd never met, giving up "fun" Friday nights in favor of sleep, and going for runs of up to 15 miles on Sunday mornings before they're even out of bed. But the reason I do this is pretty simple. Sure, I have the big goal of qualifying for the Olympic Trials in the steeplechase, but the main reason I do this is love. I love running! I actually got in a bit of trouble after last Tuesday's workout because I got so excited about running with my teammates that I pushed the pace on some of our 400s and ran considerably faster than we were supposed to be running. I was just so happy to be sharing my favorite activity with some of my favorite people that I couldn't contain myself!

Even with my own personal goals, I don't actually run for myself. I am so blessed to be healthy and able to run and I know there are countless people out there who are not so fortunate. I run for love of them. In high school, I had a habit of dedicating each race to a person who had made an impact in my life. In college I changed this practice slightly, offering the sufferings and successes of each season to a particular individual. When my former high school teammate Megan was in a coma following a car accident, that track season became her track season - I knew that nothing I was going through could possibly be as difficult as her rehab was as she was relearning to walk and eventually to run again.  Last fall one of my old theatre friends Emily was killed in a car accident a few days after beginning her junior year of high school. I ran my entire junior year for her and her twin sister Erica, inspired by the remarkable strength Erica was showing during an unimaginably difficult time.

So, what about this season? Who am I running for? As I'm aiming at becoming an All-American, am I running for myself this time? My team has a chance at a National Championship... Am I running for them? Maybe a little. But I could never keep it all together this season without my friend Savanna and her mother, Trish. At the beginning of this year, Trish was diagnosed with cancer. For several months, her doctors seemed hopeful that the treatments were working and that Trish would recover, but not long ago they delivered the tough news that there was nothing more they could do. She and Savanna are now just trying to spend as much time together as they can. I'm astounded by the courage, strength and incredible grace they have both displayed and Trish has even maintained a fantastic sense of humor through all of it. But above all I have been impressed by her unwavering trust in God. It can be easy when life gets hard to get angry and turn away from God but all of her journal entries show a remarkable trust and faith that God would take care of everything. Watching her battle against cancer has made all my struggles seem so insignificant. I'm feeling tired or stressed out or the race is getting hard? So what? I'm so blessed to have my health and be able to run. What do I really have to complain about?

"Therefore I say to you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?"

Matthew 6: 25-26

Inspired by these remarkable women and out of love for them, I will continue to run. I know it won't always be easy, but I welcome the challenge because through them I have learned lessons of courage, strength and trusting in God. Trish and Sav, know that you are ever in my thoughts and prayers and I love you both very much.

My teammates are FAST!!!

Congratulations to my lovely teammate, Colette Whitney on being named NESCAC performer of the week last week for her race at Albany!

http://www.middlebury.edu/athletics/sports/crosscountry/archive/2010-2011/news/node/267583

Pictures from Open New Englands, Courtesy of Steve Stewart

"Seeing the forest through the trees"

Looking at the big picture -- that's something with which I often struggle. It's been something I've been working on lately because of this achilles injury. I tend to always want to go full speed ahead, attacking every workout and every race. I set goals for every race, using them as stepping stones to larger goals for the end of the season, but I tend to place an unnecessary amount of importance on these smaller goals. I forget sometimes that these other races aren't really important as the Big Dance - Nationals. Because of my achilles, I was unable to run in the Albany Invitational yesterday. I wasn't in a lot of pain, so I really wanted to run. I couldn't see any reason not to run. I wanted to take advantage of my last chance at a sub-18:00 collegiate 5k. I couldn't see the big picture. My coaches had to make the smart choice for me. Maybe I could've muscled through the pain and run a good time, but at what cost? I had to give up the dream I had for that race for the sake of my dream for November 20th in Iowa. I have a running date with a speedy lady from Wisonsin and I'm not going to let anything make me have to stand her up. It's not easy to give up on any of your goals, even the little ones, but you have to move past them and see the future through the trees to realize your ultimate dreams.

Up next: NESCAC Championship (our conference meet) - 6k at Hamilton on 10/30

Anyone for champagne? - Open New England Championships Recap

"Amanda, imagine yourself as a bottle of champagne. We're just going to shake you up and then when the gun goes off, we can pop the cork and watch you go." - Terry Aldrich

I'd have to say that's probably the most entertaining and possibly most helpful thing Terry has said to me as a coach. He said this after the workout on Thursday after I expressed some frustration about feeling like I wasn't working hard enough. This image struck me as very odd, but it made sense and I thought a lot about it in the time leading up to the race. I also really took a lot of care with my achilles. I didn't want to do anything to make it flare up before the race. After my disaster with having to drop out of the Purple Valley Classic 2 weeks ago (which I still believe was the right decision in that case) and then sitting out of the Vermont State Meet last weekend, I was pretty nervous about racing again. It got me really excited and also calmed my nerves a bit to get a pep-talk from my fantastic friend Stephanie Rothstein (Runner for Adidas McMillan Elite and 2010 USA 20k Championship Runner-Up... lived in Alicia's house with me toward the end of the summer) who is in Boston for the USA 10k Championships tomorrow. I've been feeling homesick for Flag lately, so it was wonderful to see her smiling face and get a hug, even if she didn't get to stick around for my race.

So, anyway... the meet! Our JV women started the day off on a great note for us with a set of pretty incredible performances, led by Chelsea in 11th with a time of 19:03. Our talented ladies finished 2nd out of 31 teams, only being beaten by Boston College! Seeing our girls run so strong and look so great doing it really got us ready to run. We had starting box #1, waaaaaaaay out on the side, which initially worried me but turned out to be a blessing. Even though we had to cut over to the side at the start, our position on the outside prevented us from getting horribly boxed in (there were 322 women in the race.... 47 teams!) As you can imagine, the atmosphere was electrifying and we got a little caught up in the excitement. Madie, Colette and I went through the first mile in about 5:35... Oops! But  we stayed calm and kept things under control. There were a few moments when I thought "wouldn't it be easier to just slow down?" but I committed to sticking to my teammates and they helped me out more than they can understand. With about 800 meters to go, I realized that I felt good, so I decided to try to open things up a bit. I encouraged my girls to come with me and then I just went for it. I really wasn't aware of people around me at that point, but I do know I was able to pass the first Yale girl in the last 150 or so. As I crossed the line I stopped my watch and then started walking through the chute. I knew I'd had a good race, but I didn't know that I'd placed very well until a man at the end of the chute handed me a t-shirt. I'm not sure how many runners got shirts, but as I turned around and saw my teammates receiving them as well, it hit me what a great race we'd all had.

I soon found out just how great it was... I finished 24th in 18:17 - a new 5k personal best and my best time ever on this course by a minute and ten seconds. And my teammates weren't far behind:
Colette - 26th in 18:19
Madie - 30th in 18:25
Addie - 38th in 18:36
Claire - 45th in 18:45

I know what matters is how we run in November, but I think it's very encouraging that our top 5 average was 18:28 and we finished 3rd out of all the women's cross country teams in New England, behind only Division 1 teams Boston College and U Conn.

Click HERE for Nicole's blog post about the meet

I love these girls and I know that my race wouldn't have been possible without them by my side. (I have to give some credit to my dad as well, as I believe having him there definitely took seconds off my time!) I can't wait to see where the next 6 weeks take us!

Up next: U Albany Invitational 5k on Saturday, October 16th

Human

Sometimes when the running is going great and life is busy, you tend to forget that you're human. Let me explain what I mean. Every run feels effortless, you're turning in the best race results of your life, school work might be filling up your schedule, but you're coasting through. Most runners face injuries at some point, but when things are going well, you don't think about that. You think nothing of staying up late to get that reading done for class every night. Then you get a wake-up call that reminds you of your humanity all too forcefully. My reminder came in the form of achilles tendonitis shortly after my race at Panther Invite (within a few hours). I tried to ignore the problem and kept going through my week as I normally would, although I did substitute a flat, easy run instead of the hill workout because I knew a hill workout was a terrible idea for my achilles. I even ran a 5k tempo (a new PR of 18:28) on it but it became apparent immediately after that this pain was bad news. I even tried to race on it at the Purple Valley Classic at Williams (I knew I shouldn't race, but I wanted one of those shirts so badly! I know that's a terrible reason to race with an injury...) and even took the lead at one point because I wasn't satisfied with the pace. But shortly before the 2 mile, the pain became unbearable and I had to record only my 2nd ever DNF. That was really tough for me. I was just now getting to the point since my first DNF (a panic attack during a steeple race in March 2009) where I no longer have a voice pop into my head during races telling me "I know it hurts... You could just stop..." So I'm a little worried that voice is going to be back, but I think I'm much stronger mentally than I used to be. I feel like I've grown a lot as a runner over the past year.

Anyway... I spent a week in the pool while I let my achilles recover and I just started back to running last Friday. My first workout on land was on Tuesday and it was a rough one, but Nicole told me afterward that it was to be expected since my legs forgot what a hard run felt like after being in the pool. (It would've been nice for a little warning to expect to feel that bad in the workout, eh?) But I get another workout today and hopefully it will be better. Through my injury, I've had a chance to step back and look at the whole picture of my health and I'm working at doing a better job of eating and getting sleep because I know the little things will make a big difference towards accomplishing my goal in 43 days in Iowa.

I just have to remember that I am, in fact, human and take good care of myself.

Race Recap - Panther Invitational 9/18

You can tell the semester is getting intense by how long it took me to get this race recap up. I'm really going to try to be better at updating my blog, but it's hard with classes and running and life getting in the way.

On September 18, I ran in my last Panther Invite. The great thing about home meets is all the support we get from friends and classmates who walk down to watch us race or wander over from the soccer game to figure out why a bunch of girls are "running around in their underwear." Although, at Middlebury, many meets end up feeling a lot like home meets - many of my teammates are from New England, so their parents make it out to races pretty often and I have to say we usually have the most impressive tailgate spread of any team at a meet thanks to the parents of our fellow Panthers. I cannot even express how great it has been to have a training and racing partner like my teammate Colette. Going into the race, we agreed that we wanted to work together as much as possible and we had a pretty good plan for pacing. We took the first mile out in a comfortable 6:00 but the hills on Mile 2 slowed us down more than I had anticipated they would and our 2nd mile was about 6:20. Yet it still felt comfortable and we were working really well together... until some spectator got confused and said "Go Emily!" and Colette thought that meant there was someone from another team coming up behind us and she just took off! After a tough week, I just didn't have the legs to go with her and for a while I was a little upset to not get the win but now it's actually just funny. I ended up 2nd in my final race on our home course with a 36-second course pr of 18:56 and both the men's and women's teams won with perfect scores of 15. It was a great day to be a Panther, as Terry would say!