Track and Field Blogs - Anthony Famiglietti

I'm not accustomed to writing about my experiences in a personal journal entry let alone an online blog. I did some blogging in the past about 6 years ago, but it was very short lived with just a couple of entries. I don't like to keep a running journal for logging mileage and have only taken the time to log a journal a few times in the recent past when I felt it was important to do so. I like to try to live in the present and be completely present in what I'm doing when it comes to my running. I try to leave the past in the past, but I do internalize and hold onto the lessons and past experiences that I feel are important and help me grow and move forward toward something better. My thoughts and internal dialogue seem to always be evolving in many directions. Perspective is very important to me at this time and I find myself reflecting on my life in this way daily. To be frank my personal perspective on things can often change. The more I learn the more it changes. This is one of the reasons I have reservations about writing journals or blogs. If I'm going to write these blogs I might as well do it in a way that will be most valuable to you. It is hard for me to guess who will be reading this so I will generalize and cater to those of us who are looking to excel in running and enhance our life experience through running and racing. So here we go.

I've been running professionally for over 8 years now and have experienced many ups and downs in my drive for achievement. I've travelled the world with my racing and have been to so many incredible places. Running has also helped me grow in immeasurable ways as a person. It has helped me develop quite a lot of personal character through years of discipline, focus, determination and will. I have achieved things I never fully imaged I could do and now measure my success very differently than I have in the past. In short running has helped me grow in ways nothing else in life could. I'm very thankful for all that running has given me and continues to contribute to my life. This is a major reason why I'd like to continue to find ways to motivate and inspire others to run and challenge themselves as true runners. What I do as a runner is so simple. In the past I used to struggle with the simplicity of running and like many people I felt that it was a meaningless task. At times I struggled with the thought that I was wasting my time running. That is a valid opinion for some to hold, but I've come to see it quite differently.

I'm currently training at altitude in Arizona and make trips almost daily driving thirty minutes to Sedona for runs. There are trails here in Sedona that I think everyone should run at some point in their life. When I run these trails everything just seems right and running becomes more meaningful than anything I could do. I think this is one of the main reasons I've had success training at high altitude here in Arizona. In my opinion, mindset and motivation has much more to do with success in racing than any series of workouts or over refined race buildup. Great high level workouts and mileage cannot develop without this important foundation of running. Many athletes and coaches overlook this crucial aspect of training. I see a lot of athletes ritualize their training turning everything into a cycle or habitual routine. I try not to make this mistake. I try not to give in to mileage counts, interval times or comparison of performance in training. Don't get me wrong I am methodical about what I do and think about my next move daily, but I also move freely with it and try to let decisions come to me organically. I don't force training when unnecessary. I run very hard when the time is right to do so and I run easy when I need. I compare times, performances and training only to what I've done in the past and I get my best results this way. I suppose that is why I enjoy training solo when I'm here and why I enjoy doing most of my runs alone now. I've planned a tough workout for tomorrow and I know it will be done on the track alone most likely with no one else at the track to see it. I can tell you that being there alone will in no way take away from my effort or intensity. In many ways it contributes to it. To be honest I sometimes find it harder now racing with people. Perhaps that is why I run better when I run away from the field and race myself...