KIMbia Athletics

Beijing, here I come. I can’t believe that the time to leave for the Games is already here!! This season is different than most in that the travel has been broken up into short chunks. I really like it, and it almost feels like the season is just now getting under way. That is good, because now I will be gone for close to six weeks. That includes the Games and racing over in Europe after.

The time here in Madison has been well served since Stockholm. The weather here in Madison has cooperated (hot and humid), although not as bad as past years. I have a lot of snap in the legs and training has been going awesome. After Stockholm some might have thought that I was questioning my fitness, but I knew that Jerry had the plan for sharpening work once I got back to Madison; I was right! I wish I could go into specifics, but I can say Jerry summed up the last week of workouts as “the best I have ever had here in Madison.”

Hopefully that will translate into a big time performance in a couple of weeks. That’s the crazy thing about leaving so early for the competition–I feel like I should be racing in a couple of days, but really I have a couple of weeks to round into final form. I am very confident now and really looking forward to this opportunity.

I have some crazy travel coming up, so hopefully I will be able to get off another entry before opening ceremonies; if not, definitely after. Good luck to all the high school kids starting up their seasons, and keep the comments coming.

Teg

P.S. I was not at the Brewers game.

Q&A

What do you get to eat before regular training runs or track workouts? How long before do you eat and how much?

I have a pretty weak stomach so I eat pretty light on the day of a workout. Usually it is either Eggo waffles, oatmeal or eggs about four hours out. After that if I need anything else I just graze on crackers or pretzels until two hours out, and then I don’t eat anything. Training runs vary a little bit and usually I can eat 90 minutes to two hours before and be fine. I can pretty much eat anything before a training run.

If you are having problems you need to keep a log of what you are eating, and if you are hurting that day, mark it down. If your diet varies from day to day, you might be able to pinpoint what is causing it. It is good to treat your workout days like races, though, so you can figure out what food will work for you. That way you don’t have to worry about it on race day.

Could you explain the phases of training you have in a season leading up to this event? For example, you talk about base phase and sharpening work. How many weeks will this take place before, and what kind of stuff will it consist of?

Very general: Base phase started back in November and got serious in the middle of January. I kept the mileage up in the 100/week range until the first week of April. (Remember, these are Badger miles.) From that point on, mileage was up and down because of racing, but I tried to keep it around 80 until the middle of May. That allowed me to keep my aerobic system working, but still allowed recovery for the introduction of hard workouts.

From the middle of May until now I have been between 60 and 70 with heavy racing and workouts. Workouts from May to middle of July (Stockholm) were still trying to improve fitness and focus primarily on strength with little hits of speed. Over the last couple of weeks up until the Games will be the serious speed sessions. As you can see, it does not take very long to develop when you are fit. After the Games until the end of the season will be short maintenance workouts. Hope that gives you an idea and makes some sense.

Hey everyone, thought I would give an update of the Monaco 3,000m on Tuesday.

I left this race and went home to the States the next day, and on the way back I was trying to figure out just what to take from this first half of the summer season and some of the spring. The only title of my first half of the track season is……..”The Frustratingly Mediocre Season.”

To call what I’ve been through this half a terrible season would be false; to say it was good or great would also be false. I think after last summer, with everything going so well, left me set up to try to do the same this summer, and that is a tough and incorrect way to approach racing. It rarely, if ever, goes as planned, and I was just fortunate to get out of last summer having everything go perfect.

This year I have faced many disappointments. I won’t go into all of them because I have previously discussed them, but Tuesday’s race in Monaco continued that trend. I came into this race once again having no expectations in terms of a time or place, but as always I just wanted to be competitive and have fun. I am happy that I did those, as I wasn’t feeling the greatest going into this race–in the days prior I was just kind of tired and almost zapped, but I was able to enjoy the experience and while still feeling not great stay in the race up until the last lap.

This is where the frustration comes in for me. I was there with a lap to go and got rolled, again! Somewhere just before the bell I got boxed in and missed the initial move and was never able to get back on the main lead pack once they started kicking, and thus kind of lost the real hunger to dig down and really go after the last lap. This is what I’m mad at myself about for–noteven with a gap not really going after it–because who knows if I could have caught some of them, because I just ran in hard versus really digging.

I ran 60 seconds for my last lap and ran 7:41.9 for my second fastest time ever, but I finished 11th…not competitive. The one thing that is positive to take out of this summer is that I’m learning way more from this summer than last, because last summer was so perfect. I’m facing adversity this year and I’m learning a lot, so if anything I will be so much smarter from this year and be that much better from it.

I am now back in the States and going to train for a month before heading back over for the meets that I had mentioned previously. I am no longer doing the Falmouth Mile, mostly because I need to get more training in at this point rather than just racing. I really enjoyed that race last year and am sad I have to miss it, but I feel that this is the best move for me to address a few things before stepping to the line again.

I would also like to say thank you to everyone for their support this entire year. I cannot express enough how appreciative I am of it. It is something that helps me to keep pushing, so again THANKS!!

I am looking forward to watching the Olympic Games in a few days and seeing what our team can do. I think there will be some exciting performances–we are sending quite the team! I am actually even looking forward to watching the 5K. (At first wasn’t planning on watching it, but now I may tape it for motivation.) I am excited to see what my training partner and the rest of the guys can do against the world. Good luck guys!

Well that’s it from me until I head back over in a month, but if anyone has questions I would love to try to answer them, so just leave them in my comments! Thanks again for the support and happy training/racing!!