How are you feeling heading into the Carlsbad 5k?

I love this race. It was my first professional race in 1995, but I was still in college and came to Carlsbad to race here just to get an international race then a professional race and see how I could stack up against runners that were making a profession out of running, and then I came back year after year because it was always after the World Cross Country Championships. It was always the following weekend, so I'd compete at the World Cross Country Championships and be in great cross country fitness. World cross country is always like, nasty conditions and swampy and muddy and cold and then the week flying out for Carlsbad was always, it felt like a running vacation, really. Being able to unleash on the roads in Carlsbad is so much fun and really just a celebration of all of us runners. On Carlsbad 5k weekend it just becomes electric with races, junior Carlsbad on Saturday and then the different waves of racers that hop in from morning until the professional race goes off at noon. So just a fun weekend of running and racing in a beautiful part of the country. 

 

It definitely seems like a special race!

I know, it's so awesome here at this time, it really is. It really is fun and I think earlier in the season I had a little higher goal but if motherhood has taught me anything in the past four years it's to be flexible. Because my travel schedule the past three weeks has been so extensive, the past three weekends, I've shifted my goals a little bit to just run aggressively as opposed to wanting to run 15:30 or under. Soa little adjusting but I'll still give it my best out there despite traveling the past few weeks.

 

The last time you ran Carlsbad was in 2002 when you broke the American 5k road record.

Yeah, I think it was broken the year after or two years later, but that's the caliber of racing that Carlsbad is known for, just top athletes around the world. I think since my first record in 2002 it's been broken like four or five times. So it's always extraordinary racing on the professional side of things. I feel like it's exciting for anyone to get into the race and run and just enjoy the comraderie of running in a beautiful setting, but it's also thrilling to be able to watch the professional athletes just blow by. It really gives you a perspective of how fast they run. I remember standing there watching Sammy, I think it was Sammy Kipketer that set the world record and he went by so fast you could barely even recognize him. He was really like a blur and I think that's something that's really profound in this race is that the fans can line the course and really get a sense of how fast the professionals are racing.

 

That must be a really cool feeling to be apart of and watch.

And now the race has even bigger significance to me just having a daughter who enjoys running, although she doesn't run often she's so excited for this race. She's going to run the junior Carlsbad race, I think it's a quarter mile long, so she'll run some on Saturday and then I'll race on Sunday. So just fun that this weekend we can be in this together.

 

Is she excited?

So excited. She already has her outfit picked out and which ASICS gear she's going to wear, which luckily for me I don't have to fight with her, and match what she is wearing. If they didn't match I might have had to have an intervention.

 

Do you guys do runs together? Or do you give running advice?

She kept saying that she was going to win the race, and I'm like well Piper, if you want to win races you have to practice. So I said, do you want to go for a little run after school today? And she said, yes, I want to go to the track. So we went to the track and in lane eight she ran an entire lap, a little more than a quarter mile so at least I know she can run a quarter mile. That was a relief to know that, and she ran it like, swiftly. I was impressed that she was running that fast. And then Andrew showed up towards the end of her lap and then they ended up sprinting 100 meters together. So she clocked, he of course being a coach had a watch on her and she clocked a 33-second 100, which was also impressive. To me, that she accomplished it is fun but that she had so much fun doing it is even better.

 

That’s so cool! It’s also really amazing that you keep smashing all of these Masters records. How have you maintained such great health all of these years?

I love the pursuit of what I'm doing in sports but I also value my other roles as a wife and a mom and a mentor to my younger teammates. It takes the pressure off of me and at any given day, if Andrew is out of town and my daughter's sick and home from school, instead of regretting the fact that I'm missing training, I'm like, ok it's time for me and Piper to spend quality time together and we'll sit around and play and do crafts. But I think always focusing on the positive things and not freaking out that I miss workouts or panicking that my weeksaren't perfect, helps me make the best of every day and not obsess. I try not to fixate on the little details that I may be missing that weren't missing when I was at the height of my career, when I controlled my day a little bit more and now I feel like I have less control over my day – maybe not less control, but I have so many more things that take my energy that I'm not training as much. 

 

I don't train twice a day anymore, I only train once a day, sometimes only five days a week. So I think that being able to maintain my health is because, I just make the best of the days that I can get out there. Last year when I broke the two records in Dallas [half marathon], I couldn't believe how close I was to breaking the American record in the half marathon and that kind of sparked my excitement for the rest of the year. It was just kind of one race that I was doing where I felt like I was well prepared but not focused on and I think because I ran so well, it made me excited to see what I could do in better conditions on a faster course when I was more prepared. So exactly a year ago is what got me excited and really mapped out the entire year. I was kind of going on this pursuit to running faster.

 

What are you planning on tackling next?

I'm thinking of doing a full marathon, so I'll probably focus on getting some more miles in over the summer, which I haven't been able to do in a while and get in some longer weeks to build that strength and then focus on a half and a full and then come back and possibly do the Olympic Trials in the spring. So I have to balance that. I won't be racing too much because I know I want to be ready in the spring if I want to race the Olympic Trials too. I am racing the same weekend in Boston so I'll be in Boston and in New York City that weekend. In New York there's the More/Fitness/Shape Half Marathon and it's an all women’s half marathon so I'll be there taking part in that event. This will be my third year running that and I love the comraderie on that weekend, so I'll be there for that. And then get back to Boston on the train that Sunday afternoon in time to watch the Boston Marathon on Sunday.