Heartbreak

So many words to describe what I'm feeling. Non of them positive. Disappointed, heartbroken, angry and sad. I promised myself I would NEVER dnf again! Sadly last night at I don't even know what lap I struggled with myself and pulled off the track. It's a horrible feeling to know I just quit. Should I have fought through and run a bad 10k? Maybe but maybe I also did the right thing. The funny thing about running is not everyday can be a good day. Since I ran 32:57 three weeks ago training has been going amazing! I've had some of the best workouts that I have ever had. I was juiced to take 12 seconds off and guarantee my spot in the trials. I had little doubt I couldn't do it until about three laps in last night. So now what do I do? My time will not get me in to the trials. It's going to take the A standard this year which is so great for distance running in the US. For me however it's not good. As soon as I pulled myself off the track I called Levin and just started crying. I knew I didn't have another shot at it and felt like I let so many down. My family, training partners, teammates, friends, coach and probably more than anyone myself. I gave myself some time to just cry than I talked to Scott. I guess there is one more shot at the OR track meet in June. Now the question is, can I put my heart in it for another shot. I have 5 weeks to train hard and try. BUT I could also just hit the roads. I mean I ran a 32:57 that's a pretty solid effort. Maybe it's just best to move back to the roads. Hit the 25k and half champs. Try to make some money and just have fun. I'm in the best shape I have ever been in I need to take advantage of it. I'm just not sure what my heart really wants. I know I have the fitness to hit the standard but that doesn't mean I'll have a good day come time for OR. We are never guaranteed that. It's a tough decision especially when after the disappointment of last night I just want to sit in my bed and say to hell with running! This has been a great string of races in the last year. I have pR'd in everything I tried. I shouldn't be so mad or upset but this one race will be what lingers in my head until I have another good one. I promised myself that no matter the outcome I would realize how blessed I am. That hasn't changed I know the sun still came up. I still have amazing friends and family! But I'm a perfectionist and having failed is hard! I'll take a day to think and decide what is best. If any of you have suggestions or know what you would do I would love to hear it! You know how it is right now I'm not thinking the positive of what could come :-) On a much brighter note, I had a lot of friends run awesome last night! Alisha Williams ran over a minute PR with a low 32 to stamp her ticket. Nicole Aish has made a statement in her "comeback" race on the track last night to get the A for the 5k in under 15:35! Allie Keiffer (who I have never met in person but is now a CO girl ran under 32:30 to get her A and Alvina Begay had an awesome performance getting the A with a 32:34!!! Joseph Chirlee who is also a part of the ADP ran 28:16 just one second off of the A. So many amazing performances and I am so proud of them all!

Blessings!

The last couple of days I have done my best to avoid all talk related to this weekends race. Since I saw the entry list last week I have kindof been freaking out! There are a LOT of impressive scary names on there. It seems every time I get on twitter or Facebook someone is talking about how stacked the 10,000 and 5,000 are this weekend. Athletes are talking about trying for their A standards and press is talking about who they think will and who won't. I freak out before pretty much every race so all of this has only contributed. I want to hit the A standard, I want to get to the trials, I want to learn to compete with these women not just buy a ticket and watch the show! All of these thoughts and social media have made me think a lot this week about my blessings and why I started this sport. First I strapped my babies into this crazy big jogging stroller to lose the pounds I had packed on eating cheetos during pregnancy. I'd go maybe a mile or two or jump on the treadmill at the gym for a bit while I was reading a magazine. Than one day I thought why not jump into the race for the Cure on July 4th? It was a good workout to do before the parade and before I knew it I was joining a weekly running group on Wednesdays. This group urged me to run the Bolder Boulder for the first time and I thought why not it looks fun. THIS is when I decided I wanted to be a runner! I promised to myself I would work as hard as I had to to see if I could ever get in that elite race! Lots of running, workouts, friends and races later here I am. I ran in the Olympic marathon trials and finished 12th and am shooting to make the trials in the 10,000 this summer. It seems pretty sureal! When I get nervous and start to doubt myself I try to remember one thing. I have so many BLESSINGS!!!! As a runner it's so easy for us to get down on life when we have a bad workout, run or race. Than on the flip side its so easy for us to get so amped up when we have a great run, workout or race! It's a funny thing like that! So as a preview to my race I just want to remember how blessed I am. God has really treated me better than I could ever imagine! I have an amazing family! My husband supports me 110% which is sometimes a lot of work. I have these two amazing, perfect children! Yes they drive me crazy on occasion and sometimes all day long, but they are my life! I am able to do what I always wanted to do stay home and be a mom! It's the most rewarding job I could ever have! I have a great extended family who supports me like crazy even if they don't understand running and they think I am slighlty nuts! My in laws will watch my kids every day if I need them to so I can get a run or workout in. My aunt, uncle, dad step mom, cousins, sister, brothers are all here to push me along. I have some amazing sponsers who were here for me when I could barely break 18 for the 5k and are just as happy for me now that I am running Olympics trials times. Boulder Running Company (colorado Springs), Cody Hill and Adidas have made it possible for this girl to keep chasing a dream. Now I also have PowerBar who keeps me (and sometimes my kids) fueled for good performance. I often think about how my mom is up there pulling some strings and helping me out pushing me to keep plugging away. Than of course I have all of my friends who would do anything to help me reach my dreams. Poor Tyler even does some extreme workouts when I know he would prefer to be hanging out and relaxing. There is also my coach, Scott Simmons, who puts a lot of time and effort into my running. So what I want to say and hope everyone remembers when they are having a bad race, bad day or just think life is not going their way. Even if I don't run 32:45 on Sunday I know I am the luckiest girl alive! I really am living the life of my dreams! Running is very important to me but I know that any day I could end up injured or not able to run. IF that were to happen I would still have this amazing life that God has blessed me with! To end this kind of random blog our team is also doing our first fundraiser. I would really appreciate any support!!!!! Check it out! https://charitybets.com/users/148-wendy-thomas Here is to a 32:45 :)

So I qualified?!?!!

So as you know from my previous blog going into this weekend I was not at all sure what to expect. I'm not much for putting my goals out for others to see but I can fess up now. The goal for the race was to hit 33:20. I'm not going to lie I kind of thought there was no way I was going to hit that. All day long poor Ali had to listen to me say how crazy this was, how I really didn't want to run on the track, on and on. My plan (Scott was not informed of this yet) was to run this stupid track thing, hope i hit 33:20 which would give me the Olympic Trials B standard and hope that was good enough to get me in the race. Lucky for me I got to go after my friends. Earlier in the day Janelle Martinez ran a great PR in the 5k 16:58 in her first track 5k for Oklahoma State. Than just before my race Ali got on the track to run a seriously inspiring 5k. She ran a PR of 15:24and finished 4th in a stacked field. Watching as much of her race as I could fit into my warm up and preparation was just what I needed! I got to see a bit of how it works on the track how she tucked into the inside and went along for the ride. I dont get to work out with Ali too mich since we live a couple hours apart but i do get to go down on occasion and hit some hard days with her. Just a week before the race i had the pleasure of doing our 400 workout together. So seeing Ali do so well helped calm me, the workout i did with her went great so i knew i was just as ready as she was. (Lets make it clear though i was ready for my pace no way in hell i can do her pace ;)) But most importantly as I was walking onto the track Ali grabbed me and said "you've got this, you are more prepared than you think." I didn't ask her later but I assume that comment came from the fact that neither one of us thought we were going to be able to go as fast as we wanted. This calmed me down and made me put my game face on!

I had asked Scott on my way to the track if I should aim for a certain pace. His response was just to get in the pack and not to worry about it just run the race. There were a lot of things I was nervous about, my ankle, running in spikes, being in a large group of girls, being able to handle the pace the list is pretty long. But as soon as the gun went off I zoned in. I did my typical get to the front (oops) and ran behind one girl the first couple laps. We ran 75 not exactly what I was expecting. It felt easy but in my head I was thinking oh man this could end up being a long night! Luckily we settled in and started hitting 78-80 for the next 19 laps. The whole time I thought I was at the end just keeping contact but after watching the video i see i was some place in the middle of about 20 girls. My only focus was to not look at the lap counter and keep contact for as long as I could. There was a lot of jostling so I made mistakes of slowing down and speeding up to avoid being involved. Next time I know I need to just hold my position to avoid wasting energy of speeding up and slowing down. I was feeling pretty comfortable the first 19 laps and promised myself I wouldn't count over all laps. I only allowed myself to count to a mile 1, 2, 3 look at watch at 4 to get mile split. First mile 5:14.....yikes, second mile, 5:16, oh man....3rd mile 5:16 5k 16:25 WHAT?!?!? This was a new 5k PR. I had to tell myself it was ok. You feel comfortable so the numbers don't matter! Just keep running.
With 6 laps to go the pack had dwindled down to about 14 (and I know this because the announcer said "the pack is picking it up with 6 to go" Ah thanks?!?!). It was insane to me! People started pushing and moving all around and than they started to pull away. In my head I thought ok you are starting to work now and you are about to lose them try to just focus. I did good holding my original plan pace of 80's for the next four and than a girl caught up to me so I glued to her and ran a 79 for lap 24. This is where 10,000 is fun! I allowed myself to look at the clock as I passed to start lap 25. I tried to do the math and just couldn't get my brain to work. At first I thought I was going to run a 33:10 so I picked it up thinking what? I ran all 5 first miles under 5:20 how In the world. But when I hit 200 I realized what I can get under 33? GO, Go, Go! My legs were tired and my body wanted to just hold pace but I finished with a 76 and a 32:57!!!! At the time I was pumped! I had just run 23 seconds faster than I thought was possible and I got the B standard almost the A!
This only lasted until I realized I was 13th. Place in the race really didn't matter to me what mattered to me was this......the 10k is not like the marathon. Hitting the B standard is only provisional, they allow24 women into the race on June 22nd and sadly 12 women just ran faster than me TONIGHT. There will be faster girls on April 29th on the same track, some women have already run faster than that last year :( So my mind set changed. I will be back for the meet on April 29th I want to run the A! Will it be easy? No way! Sure 12 seconds is only 1/2 a second a lap but honestly I think I gave all I had this weekend. Can two solid weeks of training mean 12 seconds? There are for sure things I can do to be a smarter track runner like not letting up, no surging when it's not necessary, and can I make that move next time? Watching the video I think why didn't you? Part of it was being scared, part of it was that maybe I wasn't ready. But for the first couple laps they only picked it up a bit. So maybe I should have pushed through the pain, but myself in that scary hurt locker and held on maybe a couple more before they started really hammering the pace down. I know for sure I was not ready to make the moves to the end but maybe if I could have held on a couple more laps someone else would have fallen off with me and helped keep me on pace. Don't get me wrong I am so pleased with my race! It was a 1:06 10k PR in my first ever attempt on the track I am only thinking of ways I can improve when I try again. And believe me I will be trying again! It's so funny what one race can do. I went in thinking I had no speed, I wasn't ready and had a bad attitude toward the track. Now I am hungry for those 12 seconds and my auto birth into the trials. Until than I'll train my little ass off and cross my fingers that my current time will be enough.

Before I cut out of this long blog I do have to give huge props to my coach Scott Simmons! I can not say enough for how far he has brought me and my teammates! I still have no idea why he took the chance that I could be good at this but I am so grateful! I don't know why not everyone is knocking down his door to coach them, I don't know that there is any secret ingredient to making a runner good other than really hard work, but I'm pretty sure Scott's play book has to belretry darn close to the best! Just some examples of my improvement since I started with him at the end of June 2011
5k- 16:52 down to 16:25 and that was just on my way to a 10k
10k-34:25 down to 32:57
Half marathon- 1:17:?? Down to 1:13:46
Marathon debut 2:34:25
Numbers don't lie he is doing something right :) and that's just my times. Ali has been getting great PR's Joseph Chirlee got a new 10k PR this weekend and I can not wait to see what Adrian, Shannon and Tommy do at Penn and Mt Sac. I have a feeling we are about to see a lot of new PR's in the American Distance Project!!!!

It's time to learn something about myself

"when you put yourself on the line in a race and expose yourself to the unknown you learn things about yourself that are very exciting"

I just read this as I nervously sit around reading twitter. It scares me and excites me all at the same time. Tonight I will jump on the track in CA for the Stanford Invite and attempt to run 25 laps. I have run a lot of 10k's I have even run a marathon but for some reason THIS race scares me like never before. I'm not sure if it's because it's a lot of laps on a track, the unknown of how to race on a track or the fact that I want to run it fast? Post marathon I haven't had a ton of confidence in my speed. Workouts seem to be getting pretty quick but for some reason I can't wrap my head around going that fast!

This track thing is so different. For one normally my race would already be over! Sitting around all day with nothing but time to think is making me crazy! Should I eat more? Is that going to sit well if I do eat it? Should I nap? Why does my ankle hurt so much? This is the worst scenario for me :) I should not be left alone with my thoughts for this long. I'm trying to focus on the positive. All my workouts on the track are a 10k I complete those as fast or faster than I want to race tonight. The track isn't my thing so if it goes well that's icing on the cake for all the hard work I put in on the track. If not? Well it's not the end of the world! I am so much more comfortable on the roads but running is a lot like life. If we all did only the things we are comfortable with it would be so boring! So tonight I will get on the track, I will try to zone out for four miles, if I'm off pace on one lap I will try not to let it freak me out, I'll try to fall in to the pack and enjoy the magic of Stanford I've heard so much about, I'll think of my boys and know that I'm always making them do things they hate and I'll smile at the pain, I'll try to follow in my friend Janelle Martinez foot steps (she got a kick ass PR today in the 5k), I'll race right after Ali who I know will tear it up!, I'll listen for Scott to try and focus on staying relaxed and most of all I'm going to try to have as much fun as possible! Sure I want that OTQ but either way I was reminded this will result in a track PR no matter what I run!

Back to the beginning.....
This quote is very true. I can learn a lot about myself tonight. It can be good, it can be bad but no matter the outcome it will get me a step closer to what I want to do in the half and marathon this year.