Opportunity

My college coach often told us before a race - "Be excited about the opportunity" (or Have Freaking Fun).  To be honest, I never really got all the excited when he said that.  I always took it as just one of another in a long line of coaching platitudes uttered in premeet strategy sessions for years on end.  I was always nervous and obsessing about how the race would go.  Now, as I sit in my hotel room in Duluth, Minnesota preparing to race in a national championship race tomorrow, I am finally starting to understand his message.

As this is a national championship race, there was a press conference for the top runners in the field.  I sat in on the press conference to glean whatever small insight I could into how highly successful athletes like Meb and Abdi prepare for a race.  As I sat there, I couldn't help but think of Coach Piazza speaking about opportunity.  This race really is a huge opportunity for me to gain valuable experience racing at the national level, and on a more personal level, it is just a chance for me to travel across the country to a beautiful city I otherwise never would have visited all to do something I love.  Then the press conference began, and one word peppered the sentences of the elites - opportunity.  To them, races are an opportunity to do their job and get paid to compete, but even though they are competing for a living and I am competing for enjoyment, the message is all the same.

Races really are opportunities for us as runners and I am glad that I am finally starting to understand that.  They are opportunities for us to measure out progress after months of training and set tangible goals moving forward.  When you see a race as an opportunity to test yourself and prove to yourself that you are capable of great things rather than an chance to fail, it gives you a sense of confidence and anticipation.  I have trained hard for months and there is nothing I can do about my fitness at this point.  I know what I am capable of, and I can't wait for the opportunity tomorrow morning to let it all hang out for 13.1 miles!

Here we go!

Meb is excited about the opportunity to race for $12,000.