Not Too Shabby

            It has been a week since the Olympic Trials Marathon in Houston, and I am still pretty excited about how things turned out. I am not an Olympian and I did not run a personal best, but I am very happy with my result. My two main goals going into the race were to run the fastest race I possibly could, and to get myself into the top 3, booking my ticket to London. I did not accomplish either of those goals, but there is little I could have done last weekend to change the result.

            I was not in 2:09 marathon shape, I ran the first 20 miles of the race perfectly for a 2:09 marathon, but I didn’t have it the last 10k. I didn’t necessarily hit a wall, my legs just started losing energy and I faded to a 5:12 average for the last bit of the race. I was lucky enough to have such a large and fast group of guys in the chase pack to help each other out, take turns leading and keeping the race honest. We all gave ourselves the best shots we could to make the team. The Olympians up front were just on a different level than we were. I truly believe that if any of us in the chase pack had tried going out in 1:03:25 for the first half, none of us would have run as fast as we did.

            Looking through the results excites me, seeing so many Americans running as fast as we did, taking the US marathon to a new level of competitiveness is amazing. I am a huge fan of the sport and I am thrilled to be a part of this resurgence of American distance running. So many former teammates, competitors, and many guys who I had never met ran personal bests, or within a minute of their best. It is great to see so many of these guys running well.

The next four years it is going to be very exciting to see how many of these guys can continue to improve and make it to the next level. Who is going to be an Olympian in 2016? There are hundreds of guys who still have not tried out the marathon, since they are still competitive on the track or still in college. There is no telling what the next 4 years will bring. Maybe next time we will have 15-20 guys under 2:12. Maybe it will take a 2:08 marathon to be an Olympian. Whatever it may be I am looking forward to continuing to improve myself as much as I can. I am still going to pursue the dream of one day being an Olympian.