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Season/Year wrap-up/reflection

April 29, 2013 (Morning)

Exercise Type: Run

Comments:
Well what a year its been. Cross began with my best summer of training. Never have I ran so consistently and nearly as much over any other summer as I did this past one. The start of the season didn't seem to be so great with the time trial and Sudeck meet. I wasn't very happy with my own performance at either one. Especially Sudeck. Sophomore year was when I felt like something was wrong like I was burning out or something at the Sudeck meet. Had the same feeling this year. After Sudeck I was dreading Calvin because I thought I was going to shit the bed there. But ended up running pretty well there, which was a big turning point for me in cross. From then I felt really into it, taking my training very seriously, making everything else revolve around running. This shows how easily performance can affect attitude and how important attitude can be. A bad performance can be such a let down and a mental block that you just expect to be shitty from then on. but a good performance can all of a sudden turn the world around and make everything optimistic and wonderful. then, something that you didn't think you cared too much about just all of a sudden becomes the most important thing in your life.
I may have gotten too psyched out about all ohio, and had a really shitty race there, which lowered my spirits a bit but didn't affect me too much in the long run.
I came up with the motto for the house, The Road to Nationals: 1DAAT. that means 1 Day At A Time. That meant to train consistently, diligently, making sure you did everything you could have to be as good as u can be that day, and not worrying about upcoming challenges because you deal with it step by step.
Oberlin was my best race. Felt relaxed and confident from start to finish. Closest I ever got to Tim and Phil. This was when the season really began. We knew we had a legitimate shot at making it. We were decent this year, and we were a family. We had team chemistry, the most important keystone to victory.
Conference came around and this was where I may have started to feel some kind of a late season burnout. I tried to feel relaxed and steady like I had 2 weeks ago but once the race started I got winded really quickly. I had Tony to work with for awhile but I just felt physically shitty. It was the desperation of making it onto the regional team that made me pull my shit together and finish.
Great Lakes Regionals. This was the day we have been preparing for since May. We studied the other teams closely. To the point where I even felt personal aggression towards other threats like Mount Union and Hope. Definitely a late season burnout though, since I ran even slower than my previous race. Damn. I felt kind of guilty at the end that I didn't really do my part in helping out Tony to back up the top 5. But tears of happiness streamed at the finish-line wasteland as the excitement was overwhelming. It was so inspiring to see and hear about how people fucking dug deep and kicked it in hard. That was what made the difference. We felt truly as one unit, having each others backs.
Terre Haute, Indiana. This was by far the greatest travel experience. I saw teams and runners in person that I only hear and read about. It was like seeing real live legends in action. Nerves were sinking in as the minutes counted down til the gun, but seeing 55 Spartan helmets gleaming in the sun atop the hill overlooking the start was one of the most uplifting moments I've ever had. Race didn't go so well, my racing had been for the prior weeks, even though workouts had been decent. But that wasn't the point. It was for the greatness of being at nationals, the bonding, and the experience of it all. And to bring glory to Case's name to make it to a prestigious meet after years of drought. Oh, and the free jackets of course lol.
I never wrote a Post-nationals log because there was just so much I could have said then and it was overwhelming. I don't completely remember everything I thought back then but there was one thing that I do remember. It was about something I learned from this cross season. It wasn't the typical, cliches like hard work pays off or anything. But I learned what it was like to love a group of individuals so closely, and bond with them so much that you felt like every aspect of your life was intertwined with the other 7 individuals. I felt so connected with all of them, and depended on all of them. They made me strong and gave me the will to press on during the most painful parts of a race because I was doing it for them. I was willing to walk through hell for my 7 other teammates. I learned what that was like, and it was one of the most important and greatest lessons I have ever learned.




I came back from winter break actually in much better shape than I have ever been in, post winter break-wise. I had been motivated to get into good aerobic shape over break as I had my eyes on some fast track times and competing at the two conference meets, both of which had significance to me. The indoor meet was at Case and the outdoor meet was back home in New York, where it all started.
But there were issues in my life at this time that I won't get into details about here. It was not conducive to my training as my priorities and responsibilities were put on hold. I went through a period that was emotionally rough and that was detrimental to my training. Sure, I did all the workouts and all but my training run days were very lacking. My mileage was never even close to what it needed to be because my emotional instability took away the will to go run full mileage on easy days.
Throughout these few weeks, I had been lifting on my own, meaning I would do my own workouts in the weight room with the team after the running part of practice. Lifting wasn't new to me. I had been lifting on and off for the past 3-4 years. Most recently I lifted consistently through this past summer, pretty much every other day from May to mid-October. I stopped lifting after Oberlin week. Lost motivation at that time. Probably because I wasn't motivated for the right reasons in the first place to lift. I believe that I was lifting weights for the sake of other people. I cared about how they viewed me, especially people I had never met yet. This is very superficial and the motivation is extrinsic. So it doesn't last very long and eventually shit gets old and you don't like it anymore.
I started lifting again this past winter break, since I still had a working pass to Lifetime Fitness. I wasn't sure if I even was truly motivated by anything to start lifting. The lack of true motivation showed during the first 3-4 weeks of the spring semester. After practice I would go down to the weight room but I didn't really always want to be there. Some days if I felt like the workout was pretty tough, I just skipped the lift. If I lifted, it wasn't for very long and I didn't care too much about tracking my progress. I wasn't sure how long I would even keep lifting for, since I didn't really have a sense of purpose.
All this time I had been going through some rough patches in my life. Had emotional highs and lows. The lows would be awful, taking me down to the worst places in the world. I would lose drive to do anything. My academics had gone right down the fucking toilet as I was underachieving and scoring below average on just about everything. I sought the support of my friends, my family. They were very helpful and understanding and definitely helped walk me through these darkest days.
But one day on a Friday I just decided I would go do a shoulder workout. it went on for longer than I expected and when i came out of the weight room, I felt great, happy, like I haven't felt in the longest time. From that point I realized how beneficial lifting was to my mental health. And that's when I really got back into it, and took it to a new level. I started lifting 5 days a week. I spent all my free time doing research/learning about lifting, nutrition, supplementation. Lifting just made me a much happier person. It gave me purpose and drive. It gave me reason to live happily. It gave me reason to wake up each morning and do what I had to do, take care of my responsibilities because I knew I can look forward to working out. I began working harder in school because of it. I had gotten a 96 on a statistics test after spring break. it was only the 2nd time i scored above a 90 on any test during junior year. it was a sign that things were turning around. I began watching my nutrition closely, planning my meals out, eating clean foods only, and stopped drinking out of discipline for a healthy lifestyle. I can safely say that my motivation is intrinsic. I do it for me. I do it to live a healthy/happy life. I do it for myself, and no one else or because of anyone else. I do it for the love of bodybuilding. And so I started my first cycle of anabolic steroids with a stack of testosterone, trenbolone and dbol.... just kidding. I must credit bodybuilding for a large part of getting my life out of the slump, for helping me get my shit back together. The happiness it brought to me was genuine, unlike the fake and artificial happiness that was so short-lived and sporadic during my depressive period. Some nights I have trouble falling asleep because I keep thinking about my lift and can't stop feeling excited for my lift the next day. That is why I lift.
Before I knew it, I became so invested in lifting. The purchase of one supplement lead to another. Now my room is like a mini-apothecary. I track my calories and macronutrient intake each day. constantly researching/learning about the fine details of the sport.
I understand that distance running and bodybuilding are highly conflicting activities.. But I don't seem myself dropping either one anytime soon. I may be the only bodybuilding distance runner in the world who is so dedicated to both lol.

This outdoor track season I decided not to race because I had fallen so far behind on my academics that it was just not feasible for me to spend all my saturdays at meets. I had to find time for myself on weekends to get quality work done to catch up on what I had fucked up on in the first half of the semester. it was a tough decision to make but I was freaking out after seeing so many awful test grades and realized that my gpa would fall way out of respectable range if I didn't do something about it. I continued to practice because practice was something i looked forward to. it brought rhythm to my day and helped destress.


UAA's this weekend was the strangest feeling. I sat home and watched as people ran fast and had stellar performances. Congratulations to Chris, Brooke and Harry for breaking the school records and anyone else who may have that I don't know about, I wouldn't be surprised. it was the strangest feeling because on the one hand I felt so happy for them that they did awesome, but on the other hand I felt left out and wish I were part of the action, instead of sitting on my ass at home. Especially at this race, since it was back at home and it would have been the first time in my entire distance running career that my family would have seen me race. I had been thinking about this meet since freshman year. but it didn't happen. Do I regret this? Sure, but I feel like my decision to not race this season was necessary given the shit that went down earlier in the semester.
Now that the season is over, I am taking some much needed time off from running since my legs feel like death. I've got a lot of thinking to do with regards to the upcoming seasons and my commitment. But for now, peace out, it's been a crazy year, lots have changed.




I want to take this moment to just thank all the people who sacrificed their time for the sake of helping me out. Chris for the countless times you stopped what you were doing so that you can listen to me stream my thoughts and being so unbelievably supportive, I'm forever grateful for that. Ben for many times you'd listen and for being there, I think our thoughts processes click very well. Eric you were also there for me and listened to me vent endlessly without a complaint. I couldn't ask for a better friend. To David, who went on many runs with me where I felt down in the beginning but he helped turn things around for the better by the end of the runs. Big thanks to Ethan for constantly looking out for me making sure I was doing ok. And also Phil. Man, I know you had my best in mind. I told you I was very thankful of you helping me out and I do mean that. If you're reading this, I just want to say, I'm extremely sorry for what has happened between the two of us. I never had any ill-intentions but I won't try to justify went on, because the past is past and that won't change anything now. I just hope you know that I miss what we used to share. And Coach Lanese for being so understanding and accommodating to help me through the tough.