You've got to want it to win it

Felt awful today.  Puked about 20 times last night and this morning.  Needless to say, took the day off.

30 minutes of biking today.  I feel better than yesterday, but not up to running just yet.  Still working on rehydrating and resting up.

I went running today!  I went to Jordan River trail, then found out the bridges on the trail were closed at 4700s, and because I didn't quite know the way around to start on the west side of the river and eventually cross over, I just ran north.  Pretty sketchy, I know, but it was in the morning and there were a few other people on the trail too.  That part of the trail also smells gross.  Anyway, I went out 2.5 and back.  My calves were sore.  Flew to Cincinnati and drove into Louisville at night.

This morning we had a brief workout to keep us sharp for nationals.  We started at the Tom Sawyer park and ran out on the road and across the street to an old golf course.  We did our usual warmup length and then strides and drills on part of the course, around the 1k to go area (we had permission, because of heavy rain earlier in the week the course was closed but this part wasn't bad).  Our workout was three sets of 300, 200 with equal recovery jogs.  The 300s were supposed to be about race pace, and the 200s just a little bit faster.  The distances weren't actually measured, Kep just counted steps and used a coffee cup for the start, a snow scraper for the 200, and a water bottle for the 300 meter mark.  My times were 56, 36, 56, 37, 56, 38.  It felt nice to get in and do this short workout especially following a few sick days.  Cooled down in the old golf course again just short of 2 miles to finish with 6 total.  It is so neat to think about how 6 weeks ago when we were here for prenationals we talked about how cool it would be if we could come back in 6 weeks for nationals, and here we are :)  We went to the banquet tonight at Churchill Downs, that was a really fun experience :)    

Ran my last cross country premeet ever this morning!  Like ever. !!! Andrea and I were happy about that :)  We ran the course once, at least the parts of it that weren't closed while they still are trying to dry it up.  Then we did drills, spiked up for strides, Hannah and Shay and I went to the finishing area for a couple, and then changed back to trainers and did cooldown drills.  Had to take a couple of pictures afterwards. :) But I don't remember how to post pictures.

This morning was full of a lot of last evers since this was my last college cross country race, ever.  About an hour before race time, we started our warmup as a team.  We ran about the last half of the course to refresh our minds and get a feel for any parts that had to be filled in last moment due to any of the rain from earlier in the week that hadn't cleared up.  We did our usual strides and drills, and then put on our spikes and headed over to the line.  We were in box 31, which was good because it put us towards the right half of the field.  After a few more strides, it was time to go.  The plan was to go out with Shaylen, but to get up to Jess, Andrea, and Sarah (who had been sick all week) before 2k.  Going out I felt like I had lost some of my warmup, so it was a struggle to get that back.  But I was able to stick with Shaylen pretty well.  Because the field was smaller than at pre-nats, it was a lot easier to get out together and not get lost.  But I was also very aware that I was at the back of the pack, because the field was really thin about where I was.  Shay and I kept moving up, towards Jocelyn to help her out, and then towards our other teammates.  I came through the mile in about 5:35, so a lot better then at pre-nats.  It was between the mile and 2k that I think Shay and I got separated, so I focused on getting towards Andrea, Jess, and Sarah.  When I caught up to them, Sarah and Jess stuck with me for a little bit.  Jess fell off, but Sarah was with me for pretty much the rest of the race.  There were times when one of us was a little ahead of the other, and times that we were running side by side.  Still, having each other within sight was extremely helpful.  And seeing pictures of the race afterwards, Andrea and Jocelyn weren't far behind either.  Around the 4k mark I heard Coach Mack tell me I was about 180th place.  I knew I would have to be able to move up a lot to get close to where the coaches said we could be last night in the team meeting.  Because I had gone out faster than at pre-nats, and this was a more talented field, I knew my chances of catching as many people in the last 2k were slim.  I just stuck with Sarah and we worked up together to keep passing people and gain any ground we could.  Around 1k to go we saw Mack again and she told us to catch 10 people.  I don't know if we did, but I just thought about picking people off one at a time.  But it was really difficult because everyone was giving it their all now, so a lot of my efforts went towards not getting passed.  I tried just kicking with Sarah and to make moves when she moved.  There were so many people down the finishing stretch it was crazy.  And so many people posting times so close to one another.  I finished in 168th place, 2 places and 1 second behind Sarah.  I scored 131.  Being able to be here as part of a team made the experience so much more meaningful.  Not like I would know from individually qualifying, but whenever I saw people there on their own I really appreciated my teammates and getting to share this experience with them.  It was working together in every workout and every race this season that made it possible.  As a team we finished 26th.  As our coach said to us afterwards, he could sense a little disappointment from us, but it was a good thing because it meant that we had gone into the race with goals.  From the team meeting last night, he had told us about the point range we would need to get below 20th as a team.  Given the illness that hit our team this week, and the novelty of the experience at nationals, we still performed well.  We cooled down 2 miles and then took a large group picture with all of our family members who traveled out to Louisville to support us.  While I wish the end results could have been a little better, I hope that this experience will serve as a chance for the coaches and returning team members to take as much as they can from it and be ready to do better next year.  Results from the race can be found here 

http://www.ncaa.com/ncaa-cross-country-championship-live-timing