Jeff See KWIK-E

January 2, 2009

Jeff See is a senior at Ohio State, a sub-four minute miler, and a multi All-American. Follow Jeff as he makes his bid for a National Championship this indoor season.

Did you get a run in on Christmas Day?

Yeah. I took an easy day that day. It wasn't too bad. My oldest brother has kids, so we do a Christmas with them. I do a run in the morning.

Overall, how would you say your 2008 year went?

It was a B+ or an A-. There were definitely some highlights, but it was closer to a B+. The whole focus was to get to the Olympic Trials Final. I missed that by a spot. But, I definitely want to do better at NCAAs. I was gearing toward top-three. I wasn't there on both of those goals. I hit 3:40 and my goal was 3:38. There were still some encouraging moments. I think it sets up well for this year.

What did you learn and where do you go with what you've learned?

Basically I learned a lot about training and really trusting it. I think the type of training that I've been doing here, it's only been getting better every year. It's getting to the point where I can see that everything I'm doing every day I can see the purpose. That really helps to try to keep your focus on what you're trying to do in the long term and the short term. I think that's probably the big thing that's going to have helped. When I look back on this year, I didn't have to keep racing. It was more of a “hey, I need to get a mark to get into NCAAs indoors” or “I need to get a mark to get into the Trials for outdoors.” I was able to go and do it. I didn't have to race all season until I popped one. I would train and train and train and once I raced I was ready to go. I think I got a little bit better as far as that goes.

Can you go into your training a little bit? What's a typical training week like for you?

Right now I do about three workouts a week. They tend to be a little bit more moderate. There aren't really high peaks and low lows. Everything is pretty stable. This week I'm doing Ks on the track and hills. Those are two staple workouts. I'll do Ks on Tuesday and hills on Friday. Then on Sunday, I'll do a long threshold run. Those are basically the three things we focus on. The other days, there are two days of easy mileage and two other days, well three different days of kind of workouts. I'll do core twice a week and run obviously and then one light little speed routine to keep my legs awake and keep my body geared towards track...where I hope to run a little bit faster. We're on a coverall basis right now. Then as the season goes on, I'll start doing quarters late in the indoor season and then go back 1000s. Those are really my staple right now.

What does that usually work out to mileage wise?

I usually run around 75. That's why this year's been so good for me. Last year I felt I was able to run pretty well off of 65 miles. This year I feel—starting in the fall—I've been able to do the same quality, with just a little more quantity. I've been right around 75 all fall and so far indoors.

What are you trying to do this indoor season?

I definitely have some pretty big goals this indoor season, it's just that everything is sort of geared towards the outdoor season. I really don't see any reason why I shouldn't expect to win NCAAs. I mean, I know there's always going to be guys, that's the way it should be, but I don't see any reason to count myself out for it. Run 3:50 high or mid, 3:56, 3:57 would be absolutely great. Again, I'm not really focused on time, just getting in there and with 600 meters to go...being in the hunt for the win. Other than that, I really want to get my coach, Coach Gary's 3K record. It's 7:52, so that's fast. My PR is 7:56. I definitely would like to get that. Those would be the two that I'm looking at from this point. Obviously winning Big Tens comes with that. That's always hard with the Big Ten being so competitive...especially in the mile.

Do you have any sort of schedule set so far?

I have it kind of planned out. We always have a dual meet with Michigan, indoors and outdoors. I always do that. That's always an early one. We can go with no real goals there, just go in there and compete. Then I'll just do a mile and 3K. Probably the Mayo Mile at Notre Dame and maybe a 3K the week after. Then I'll do Big Tens and Nationals. Not too much racing indoors, but a lot of training. It will be hard to get that 3K record. I won't have too many opportunities. It would definitely be pretty special if I could do that.

What are you studying at Ohio State?

I'm in the business school. I'm a marketing major and if I stay in college for five years, because I have eligibility, I'll get an economics degree as well. It's not too many more classes.

Have you started to look at what you want to do after you graduate?

I want to keep running as long as I can. I don't expect to be making a lot of money off of it, but I want to keep going for the next Olympics and give myself a shot. I would stay here in Columbus. Coach Gary has got it together and we work well together. I think I will just train here. Brian Olinger and Rob Myers train here, so that's always nice to have some older guys. I train with them.

Do you catch a lot of Ohio State football games?

This year I redshirted XC, so I got to go to all the home games. We've been sold out for what I want to say is the last 20 years. It's a pretty special thing here. Even when the team's not going doing so well, football season is still pretty crazy. That's an experience that everybody should get to be a part of. Any of the big schools like, Penn State or Michigan, that have a big stadium...it's pretty unbelievable.

Where will you be January 5? Will you be watching the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl?

I'll definitely be watching that. I've got a couple of friends around here and we're excited to see how good the seniors can play. It should be a lot of fun. I'm not feeling too confident, I know that Texas is a pretty solid team. We'll see. It will be fun.

What's the hardest workout you've ever done? Anything with Rob Myers and Brian Olinger?

Anytime I get thrown in with Rob or Brian it tends to be that type of red lining, not from the start necessarily, but it's nice to get over your head sometimes. This year was a little bit better, I wasn't so much over my head with those guys. I remember my sophomore year, I'd get on the track and do 300s. I'd do four sets of four times 300. You'd get a 100 meter jog between each of the four 300s and three minutes rest between sets. Those were always, always the hardest workouts. I'll probably start doing those again this Spring. That's got to be the hardest one. It's a matter of having 100 meters jog to rest then you're sprinting again. That or anytime we train for XC, I'm not in my element and they tend to be pretty hard. We do a workout called “three by three”. It's three sets of three miles on the golf course. That's kind of our staple XC workout. That's always pretty tough.

What kind of times do you run for those sets?

This year we were right around 15:15 for the first one, then we'd cut it down for the last one and it would be right under 15. And we'd have three minutes rest, so that's a pretty good quality workout. It's just the amount of volume when you're in the grass and stuff.

Can you give me a crazy running story?

I was out at Arizona State for Spring Break about a year and a half ago. I don't know if you're too familiar with Arizona State, but they have these mountains I think they call “The South Mountains” or something. They're in Phoenix, in that area there. I went for a run and I was supposed to run about 70 minutes. So I go and there's this little trail, you climb for a half mile then you're up on the top of these mountains and you can see everything, you can see all of Phoenix from there. I kind of ran for about 35 minutes and was going to do an “out and back.” I don't really know what I did wrong, but I basically got lost and was by myself. I was dehydrated and ended up running for about 2 hours, 15 minutes, I think. It was just completely miserable. There was a mirage and anything you can think of with people out in the desert. It was probably the craziest physical thing I've ever been through. I could not find my way back, I saw the city and thought that I would get down there and find my way back to the mountains and the car. I eventually got back and was worried because once I turned around, I peeled off the other people I was running with. They were on a little bit of a longer run. I got back about an hour past my time to run and thought they must have gone to look for me. It was getting pretty dark. I get back to the car and I'm really worried because these guys had gone out to look for me and there's not way to get a hold of them. Low and behold I see somebody's head peaking over the mountain as the sun was setting and I thought, “they're back, they must have been looking for a while” and I was feeling bad only to find out that they had been going throw the same thing that I was going through. They got lost as well in the same trail. They were dehydrated way worse than I was. All four of us were just completely out of it, just dead. We just sat there, laying over the hood of the car, everyone was white and there was sweat everywhere. Just crusty and out of it. It was crazy and miserable. Probably the craziest run I've ever been on.

That's pretty scary. Did anyone have to go to the hospital?

It was pretty scary! One of my teammates, Dan Heely, he runs the steeplechase, he was out there and was probably the worst. We regrouped after about 20 minutes and we're talking and stuff and Dan wasn't really saying much. He was really bad, so we were kind of worried for a little while and we stopped at the gas station and he had a Powerbar and in about 10 minutes, he was OK. Once of those situations that could have been a lot worse.

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#6	Anonymous Coward January 4 at 8:23pm the 300's workout that jeff talks about is the hardest workout i've ever done, its def. a milers workout, & I'm glad to hear that he too thinks its tough. reply
#5	Sal W. Delle Palme January 3 at 7:49pm insane story, reminds me a little of the movie "Gerry" reply
#4	Anonymous Coward January 2 at 10:58pm great read GO JEFF!!! reply
#3	Anonymous Coward January 2 at 9:42pm The Arizona story with mirage and all had me slipping into panic mode just thinking about all that could have happened. You and your friends were fortunate to have found each other when you did. That dehydration gig is almost 'otherworldly'....definitely nothing to fool around with. reply
#2	Danny George January 2 at 10:03am Good story! reply
#1	Anonymous Coward January 2 at 4:24am Great article once again! Even a road trip can't slow you down! reply