I’m going to tell you about my most memorable race.

Part 1:

July 4th, 2008: The Olympic Trials final of the 5000 meters.

Its the time of day right before dark, where each moment is marked by less and less color, and the lush green of Eugene summers fades into varying shades of grey.

“This is it,” I tell myself, as I sit in the warmup area, slightly removed from everyone else to catch a few moments by myself before beginning my warmup.  I’m wearing warmups, even though its flippin hot….one of those weird things you tolerate because ever since high school, you were told you are supposed to wear sweats before a race.  You shakeout in the morning, you eat 4 hours before the event, you drink blue powerade even though you don’t like it, and you wear warmups.  You just do it.

With my hands wraped around my knees, I rock in place a few times, noticing that the damp grass has soaked through my pants.  Awesome.  Looking across the way, I see some of my teammates laying down relaxing.  A trainer is stretching out a sprinter who looks off into the distance.  Someone skips past me in deep concentration, doing drills before her race; as she passes by, I notice her butt is wet too and it makes me smile to myself.  The air is thick with anticipation, focus and potential energy.  Years worth of preparation can be felt all around me, and within me.  For a second I see that we are all united in that same feeling…we are all looking off at some far away horizon, lost within ourselves.

If I hadn’t been here at the Olympic Trials twice before, that type of energy in the air could completely unwind me like a ball of yarn into an absolute mess, and for a moment, I have a brief memory of my first Olympic Trials when I was 18: a true unraveling after the longest freshman year of college in history.  I got the pity clap that day as I barely finished my round of the 5k.  That was 8 years ago, and I’ve come a long way since then.  Injured in 2004, I watched that Olympic Trials 5k final from the sidelines and visualized myself winning four years later.  In 2008 I would be in my prime at 26 years old, and I would be unstoppable.  I knew it deep in my soul as an absolute truth.

Now the day is here, and I shake my head thinking about how sure I once was.  Even 4 weeks ago I didn’t think I would make the Olympics, I knew it.  That was the day I became the 8th American woman in history to break 15:00 for 5k, as I sprinted to victory in New York City and the crowd stood on their feet.  Was that only last month that I was bursting with elation?  I feel as if I’ve aged three years since then.  That was one day before a sharp pain in my foot kept me from running, and completely changed my Trials preparation.  I had made a decision then to heal my foot rather than train to win the Olympic Trials, knowing that it was the only way I could have a healthy, 14:50 5k body for the Olympic Games.  This was a huge risk because it would mean I would be running the Olympic Trials rusty and at 80%, but with only 4 women time-qualfied to fight for 3 Olympic spots, my chances were still good.  Worst case scenario I would finish fourth among those women with the Olympic time qualifier, and then all I would need is for one of those women to decide to run the 10k in the Olympic Games instead of the 5k, opening up a spot for me.  By the time Beijing rolled around six weeks later, I would be back to 100%.  Of course that’s not how I ever imagined myself trying to make this team…I was supposed to be peaked, confident, deserving, fighting for the win, unstoppable…

“Don’t think about that now,” I remind myself as I try to slow my heartrate back down. “All I have is now.  Do what you can with now.”

Zipping up my backpack and leaning it against a fence for safe keeping, I shuffle past all the out-of-town athletes, (who are warming up in circles on the grass field,) toward a fence leading to the outside world.  I head out to do the same warmup loop I have done a hundred times before, the loop Eugene locals do.  Jogging through neighborhoods, I tune out the feedback my body is giving me about how its feeling today.  It doesn’t matter.  Today, with this body, I race.

Past familiar houses, cars, dogs behind fences…I get lighter on my feet, smoother in my stride, quicker through the breeze.  I pass the turn-off for Pre’s Rock and make the turn back toward the track when suddenly I have tears in my eyes.  I can not breathe.  The tiny crack in my heart threatens to burst open.  Sitting on the nearest curb, the sadness turns to anger and my sinewy body balls itself up for a fight…a fight against what?  Fate?  The situation I am in looks nothing like what I had dreamed this day would be like for the past 8 years.  This is my home track.  I moved my life here for this.  The Olympic Trials.  My moment.  My moment.

To be continued…