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Catching Up With Janet Bawcom

Published by
DyeStatPRO.com   Jan 15th 2015, 3:50pm
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Olympian Healthy and Ready to Race the Roads

By Scott Bush

Janet Bawcom is one of the most dominant runners in the United States. For years she's dominated the USA Running Circuit (now USATF Running Circuit). After getting off to a great start in 2014, injuries and the death of a family member slowed her down, giving her new perspective and new energy heading into 2015.

We caught up with Janet as she prepares for Sunday's USATF Half Marathon Championships. We discuss the season ahead, the struggles of 2014, she shares some great insights on training in Kenya and so much more.

Follow Janet: Twitter | Facebook | Website

Scott Bush (SB): You are set to race the USA Half Marathon Championships. How are you feeling heading into Houston and what are your expectations for yourself?

Janet Bawcom (JB:) I’m feeling pretty good, but a bit nervous. I haven’t attempted a really competitive half-marathon since the 2013 NYC Half, so it’ll be interesting to get back out there and see where I am. I’m also preparing for a spring marathon, so I need to use this race as a fitness test to guide the rest of my training.  

As far as expectations, I’ve got a couple of workouts left in Kenya, and based on those I’ll set some goals for race day. And of course the weather man always has something to say about race plans too! I’ll be going into this race to see what I can do personally – I don’t want to say just running for time, but the reality is that need this race to tell me where my marathon fitness is.

SB: You’ve been training in Kenya as of late. What group do you train with there and how has training gone?

JB: I do my own training here and just have a few guys in our area who help me out, so I don’t really cross paths with any groups unless we just happen to be doing the same thing on the same day. I use an 8 day “week” in my training too, so it’s unusual for my training to match up with anyone else’s. 

Training has gone well. I came to Kenya having done some decent mileage in the fall, just getting a base under me and racing some low key half marathons mostly, and since I was coming from altitude in Flagstaff, I didn’t have to adjust before I could get rolling. In the past, weather, specifically rain, has been something of a limiting factor for me here, but this time it’s really cooperated so far, and that’s made a big difference. My training is geared toward a spring marathon, and so far it’s right where I want it to be.

After so many years of training in the US, I’ve gotten used to having these perfect places to do workouts – a beautiful cinder track in Rome, GA, places like Buffalo Park in Flagstaff, nice flat roads with mile markers. Here I have to let go of some of those crutches and just learn to go by feel on the hills and dirt roads – to trust my experience and not just my watch.  In the end I think that’s probably beneficial on race day, but sometimes it’s a pain – just another way to stretch my comfort zone I guess.

SB: You had a relatively quiet 2014 racing season. Were you struggling with injury? If so, are you 100% healthy now?

JB: 2014 was definitely a tough year in a lot of ways – some running related, and some not – but it had some real bright spots too.

It started off great – I ran three races in March and April, and got two wins, three PR’s and a US record. After that things got a bit rockier. I had an injury that was tough to diagnose, and by the time we did figure things out, I’d lost quite a lot of fitness. 

Just after that, my father-in-law, without question my #1 fan, was diagnosed with a recurrence of his cancer and not given a good prognosis, so I had a couple of dips in my training there – in September when I took some down time to hang out with him, and again in October when he passed. It was a real reminder of where running belongs on my priority list and of what a great family I have. 

And then the hits kept on coming. When I finally got fit again, I had a bout of kidney stones. It wasn’t like a constant suffering, but it was unpredictable – I had a great race at Tufts, my second fastest 10k ever, and then crashed hard when things acted up at the 12k Champs, so I was glad when all that passed – literally. 

The cherry on top, so to speak, was when I pulled a muscle in my back running through the airport trying to catch a flight – those rolling carry-on bags only go so fast. It was just a small spot between my ribs, but it was annoying and put yet another dent in my training, but it’s all good now. 

Still, I won’t complain – I had some very good races, and it’s super flattering to think that people consider a year with a US title, a runner-up finish, and three PR’s to be a “quiet” year!

At this point, I won’t say I’m 100% healthy – I’m 36 and training hard for a marathon, so if I were 100% healthy it would mean I wasn’t trying hard enough! I’m fine with where I am, and I’m going to keep the pedal down for now!

SB: The 2015 season is here. What are your goals for the year ahead?

JB: I’d really just like to run some races, identify any weaknesses I need to address, and then get the ball rolling for the Trials in 2016. The fast times I ran in 2014 tell me I haven’t lost my mojo, but the injuries reminded me that, if I want to be in contention in 2016, I’ve got to keep the wheels greased and keep my focus where it needs to be. 

SB: You’ve had some major success both on the track and on the roads. With it being a World Championships year, do you think you'll focus in on one event more specifically?

JB: Oh definitely the roads. When I went back to the track in 2012, after seven years away, it was more out of curiosity. You run all these road races and sometimes wonder what you might do on the track, but to be honest I tolerated the track in 2012 because it was my only route to the Olympics. I don’t really consider myself a track runner, and right now I don’t have any plans to be on the track this year unless it really fits my schedule. I think I’ve only run 5-6 track races since finishing college in 2005, and there’s a reason for that!

SB: It’s a New Year...any fun resolutions you've set for yourself away from the sport?

JB: My only real resolution for 2015 is to finally take the pre-calculus class I need to complete my Bachelor’s in Nursing. I started the program in 2011 and was rocking along, got interrupted by the Olympics, and still have this one math class standing between me and this degree. I’ve been a registered nurse since 2010, but I really want to finish my BSN before I go out and look for that first real job!

SB: Having experience training in both Kenya and the United States, what do you see as the biggest difference between training groups in the two countries and how are they similar?

JB: It’s funny, people ask me this a lot, and I don’t really know how to answer it.

As I mentioned earlier, I don’t really train with a group when I’m in Kenya now. I was never really part of a training group in Kenya before – I left for the US as a 20:00 5k runner in 2000. When I’ve come back, I’ve always followed my own training program and never really joined up with a group. Since I’ve never really been involved with a training group, I’ll just speak based on what I’ve observed and what I’ve gotten from conversations with athletes from my home area.

Overall, I would say that people here are much more relaxed about their training – no one really seems to have it mapped out to the microsecond like you see in the US. In Kapsabet, where I’m training right now, there’s not even a track at the moment – they’re renovating – so you can’t get too uptight about needing perfect conditions to nail a workout. I’m just doing all my workouts on dirt roads, and I know that if I’m hanging with the guys in my group, I’ll be fine on race day. I think that’s kind of the mentality here – if you’re keeping up with the right people on workout day, who cares if the “mile” you ran was exactly a mile or not.

For the most part, there aren’t coaches here trying to fine tune the training to an individual runner – I think that’s where the group mentality here has its strongest effect. I think sometimes, when some coaches and athletes get caught up in personalizing training, it can put a lot of stress on the athlete – that whole “paralysis by analysis” thing. 

People in Kenya know who the big guns are in each training group, so it’s more about trying to keep up with those folks than hitting this or that split on this or that interval. Here there’s just a lot more “shut up and run” to it. Here it often seems like an entire group will try to train toward a sort of “ideal” – what it will take to win a race, not just what someone’s PR’s suggest would be good training for that individual, and there are definitely lots of casualties along the way! Sometimes that’s good, sometimes not, but that’s how it seems to be. 



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