Almost-Somewhat-Wrinkles

It has recently come to my attention that I am being to age. My body has shared this Breaking News with me by revealing the very beginning of wrinkles in the corners of my eyes. While I continue to be a vastly superior athletic specimen than my 17 year old self [see attached photo], I have come to terms with the fact that I am aging and that I will never be 20 years old again.

And to this realization I say: HALLELUJAH.

Getting older isn’t like anything I imagined. I spent my childhood years anticipating college with the kind of youthful desperation that made me the living embodiment of Springsteen’s Born to Run. At my elementary school’s 5^th grade graduation my friends nostalgically signed yearbooks while I, the angst ridden 10 year old, anxiously paced Mercerville’s gym thinking, “It’s time to get this show on the road, people!” The Boss’ escape from his hometown was a chrome wheeled, fuel injected suicide machine. Mine was a liberal arts education. The only downfall to my “last chance power drive” is that I romanticized college so effectively that I never thought about life post-college. For one who so fiercely craved the future, my post-graduation years were left unimagined.

So for four years I reveled in my Eden, my Haverford, which my brother Cyriaque once lovingly referred to as “a utopian version of the wild west” for its lawless yet peaceful nature. Everything was copacetic until the day I received my college degree and my pride turned to horror as I realized my diploma was a glorified eviction notice.

Having been handed a diploma written entirely in Latin (keeping it classy, H-ford) and promptly kicked off campus, I decided to pursue the most lucrative profession I could find: elite runner. Beside the handsome paycheck that racing brought in (ha!), it gave me the perfect opportunity to stick it to that professor who lectured me on priorities and informed me that athletics wasn’t a career and, no, I couldn’t have an extension on my history paper. Armed with a ludicrously difficult goal and a healthy dose of spite, I set out for the real world in a state of abject horror and confusion.

As I look at my other friends, who from time to time scratch their heads and have that WHAT IS HAPPENING look plastered on their faces, I know I’m not alone. Even my own mother admitted that her 20s were “disorienting and strange,” while her 30s were “where all the fun happens and you’re not so freaked out.” Hell of a pep talk, Ma.

The closest anything has come to describing the post college years confusion has been the immortal words of the Talking Heads:

Well we know where we’re going/ But we don’t know where we’ve been

And we we know what knowing/ But we can’t say what we’ve seen

And we’re not little children/ And we know what we want

And the future is certain/ Give us time to work it out

What does that even mean? EXACTLY! It’s cryptic and it’s terribly confusing and it implies you’ve lived and yet still have so much road left to travel, and that you, my friend, are totally lost. Welcome to your mid twenties!

Once I got a grip on that fact that there’s no getting a grip on your twenties, things became easier. The previously overwhelming Choose Your Own Adventure aspect of a 20-something-year-old’s life became less stressful and more liberating. I was startled to realize that I enjoy aging. I have more fun, I feel more attractive, I’m 20 seconds faster in the 1500m, and I am better version of my younger self. I let nagging teen insecurities go along with grudges and my motivating but emotionally draining spite that I’d been carrying around. And while I do have the to urge to yell, “How ’bout them apples?” at Mr. History Professor when I see him around campus, I now know, like me, he’s just trying to navigate his life.

Getting older looks good on many people and I’m determined to wear it well. I look to my grandfather, a newly minted 90, for guidance, and I pray daily that being a Powerhouse is genetic. My own parents are better dressed, wittier, and smarter versions of their 40-something selves, although my two siblings and I are entirely to blame for any poor fashion choices made in child-rearing-fueled states of exhaustion.

Not everyone shares my enthusiasm for aging. A young woman I coached once remarked, “I don’t ever want to be 25.” I remember thinking turning 25 sure beats not turning 25. At 27 I’m aware that many of the kids born in 1985 are not as lucky as I am in celebrating this milestone, so I never begrudge a birthday and I happily take a step closer to 30. So yes, young runner, you want to be 25. And 35. And 65, and you want every damn birthday you can get your hands on. But who wants to listen to person with almost-somewhat-wrinkles.

So happy birthday to me and all my comrades in celebrating the 10^th of December. May this year be wonderful and new and totally unpredictable.

Live and live well, TrackFans.

Annick

Left: 2002, Miss Gangly Limbed McGoo                          Right: 2012, Ms. Jackhammer-Merciless-Insatiable
One reason I would punch Doc Brown & smash a time machine if I ever found one. I refuse to go back.

Cross Country Camps!

Happy fall, Track fans!

It’s been a great summer of racing and traveling and I closed out the season by working at two cross country camps in the Pocono Mountains. Running camps have long been one of my favorite ways to spend my summers and I was very lucky to get the opportunity to help out at these great camps!

The first camp, Cross Country University, invited me to speak to their campers. I shared my running journey to full house of high school runners and had a Q&A session after where they asked some great questions.  After my talk/slideshow I toured the beautiful camp and was delighted to discover my good friend Jena Peacock ( multi time All-American for Rowan University) was working there as a counselor. Here, Jena joins me for the tail end of the Q&A session.

End of Q&A at XCU Camp

I was also interviewed for The Track Show by the camp director, Jim Schlentz. We discussed my evolution as a runner in high school to college to post-collegiate athlete and importance of patience in training. Here’s the link to the interview: 
http://thetrackshow.com/interviews/L/alamar/415postcollegiate1500.html

 

The second camp, RunningWorks, holds a very special place in my heart. As a 5x counselor there the RunningWorks staff feels like family! Working this camp has been the highlight to the end of summer, year after year. This year I did double duty as guest speaker/comedian and counselor. Thanks to Marc Pelerin for Instagramming my talk!

“5 Things I Wish I Knew In High School”

 

The chance to address 200+ high school runners also gave me an opportunity to showcase my most recent discovery in the the archive of Embarrassing Things Annick Did In High School. In this video I’m either helping land a plane or receiving a relay baton. You be the judge.

 

And I couldn’t talk about RunningWorks without sending a shout out to my Group A Gazelles/Giseles and my fabulous co-counselor and Syracuse All-American, Lauren Penney! Don’t let the good looks throw you, this is a group of tough and talented runners.

Running has never looked this good!

In less than 10 days I’m heading out to Portland and I’m taking with me a summer’s worth of great running camp memories! These camps always remind me why I started in this sport and they motivate me to keep going. I hope to see y’all next year!

Camp Off!

Annick

Go West, young (wo)man

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore–
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over–
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

I did not see 2012 coming. After joining NJNYTC and earning a spot on the USA Pan American team, I anticipated great things. Races won, records destroyed, seconds dropped, accolades earned. Instead, I was injured, I suffered from overtraining, I had dreams deferred, and the Olympic Trials slipped through my fingers.

Success is a slippery thing. Gold medals and first place finishes nail it down but success can slink its way into the strangest places. A stress fracture stole two months of winter training, so this spring I found myself this in the interesting position of possessing very little fitness but a great hunger to win. And in the face of injury, win I did. You didn’t see me on the medal stand, and the times didn’t impress you. You never saw me break the tape first, yet there was victory after victory this spring. You didn’t see the workouts I did, the endless intervals that threatened to break me. Workouts I shouldn’t have been able to stick, but I did repeatedly. My greatest athletic achievements this year occurred on the practice track, where a very stubborn woman ran miles and miles of repeats that she should not have been able to accomplish.

And you didn’t see my most proud, most private moment this year when I fought every urge to keep pushing and I stopped training for three weeks. You didn’t see the horror on my face when I realized I’d been overtraining, that there is such a thing as too much, that my adrenaline levels were shot and the final lap of every 1500m I ran was a soul crushing crawl to the finish. And you didn’t recognize my parents, both brunettes to my red hair, who watched every race, offered every aid, and gifted me a gold medallion of St. Christopher, the patron saint of travelers, which struck a match to help light the way through the darkness.

And somehow, after injury and overtraining and three weeks without a workout, I ran .71of a second off my personal best in the 1500m—success—and then watched as an amazing field of mid-distance women unseated me from my position on the Olympic Trials start list—a dream deferred.

So the Trials came and the Trails went, and my sojourn to Oregon on the off-chance that six women might abruptly all decide that they in fact did not want to be Olympians appeared to bear no fruit.  Mercifully, I was given the gift of distraction by whitewater kayaking on the Deschutes River during the exact hour I had anticipated racing. Let it be known that the fear of drowning is a highly successful way to forget about a foot race.

Having survived, perhaps even thrived on the river, I found myself on the other side of the Trials and in the high desert of Central Oregon. And aside from a miraculously short crying jag—one afternoon where I had to stop mid-run and sob into the arms of my boyfriend for ten minutes—I stopped mourning lost opportunities and started to plan for new ones.

I had presumed that post-Trials Oregon would represent my past, but after falling in love with its cities and countryside and one of its inhabitants, it very much represents my future. This fall I will call Portland my home and I’ll discover what the rest of 2012 holds in store. With a new city and new coach, my running career continues and I’ll come face to face with the answer to a question I have been repeatedly asking myself, in the words of Langston Hughes, “What happens to a dream deferred?”

Running Her Dream

I was recently interviewed by Paul Franklin of the Trenton Times about my running career as it leads up the Olympic Trials. It was great to sit down at my high school track with him and discuss running, my not so small obsession with Bruce Springsteen, the Olympics and my hometown. This fall I made the decision to get back to my roots and train from my childhood home. It wasn’t an easy choice but it was the right one. Here’s my story:

By Paul Franklin/For The Times

HAMILTON-Annick Lamar hasn’t forgotten her roots. But then, how could she? She still works out on the high school track where her running career began.

She has run in Europe, Puerto Rico, Mexico and across the United States since graduating from Nottingham High School eight years ago. But her most important runs are less than a week away, when she competes in the 1,500-meter event at the U.S. Olympic Trials in Oregon.

That’s a long way from Klockner Road.

Seated on a wooden bench next to the Nottingham High track recently, the Olympic hopeful, now 26, looked out across the field, thinking back to the 14-year-old girl of her youth who first stretched her legs in early enthusiasm for the sport of running.

“This was a really big scene of, I want to say, development, and kind of truth-finding,” she said with a wistful smile. “I loved running since I was a little kid. There was no middle school program, so this track was the first time I really got tested about whether or not my love of running was actually grounded in my abilities or I was delusional.”

For somebody trying something new, with no particular skill or training at the time, it took a while to become comfortable with the sport.

“So the first couple of years it was terrifying just because I had had no formal experience — just racing against my brothers or my poor friends who didn’t want to run with me. So this track really was humbling in the beginning. Then, toward the end, it was my home.”

Now 26 and a professional runner for the past four years, Lamar has come a long way since those awkward first steps on the Nottingham track.

She’s now sponsored by the New York Athletic Club and the Brooks shoe company, and runs for the New Jersey-New York Track Club, a group guided by well-known track and field coach Frank Gagliano.

She works out a couple of times a week at Rutgers University with the club and runs every single day, averaging 50-60 miles a week. For diversity, she hits the trails at Mercer County Park and Washington’s Crossing, or sometimes Central Park in New York City. She does strength and conditioning workouts at her local gym, Crossfit Hamilton.

Lamar ran four years at Haverford College, where she took up the 1,500 meter event. She was an assistant coach at her college for a while, but since the fall has focused strictly on her running.

“You have to be very sure about what you want,” she said. “You are not going to make a lot of money in track and field. It has to be very fulfilling on a personal level. Living at home at 26 would seem unappealing, but for me, chasing my dream, living with my parents and on a low budget, it’s not upsetting or concerning. It’s part of the game.”

“People never mean this in a bad sense, but they say, ‘Are you really going to keep doing this running thing?’ It’s a curiosity. I mean, I could be a clown and that would make more sense to people — joining a circus rather than being a professional runner,” she said.

With a personal best of just over four minutes (4:14) for the 1,500, she will probably have to cut close to 10 seconds to make the Olympic Team. She acknowledged that the goal might be too ambitious — but there’s always the 2016 Summer Olympic Games in Brazil.

“I’m not counting myself out. You never do that,” she said. “You always go to the line believing you have the ability. But it’s going to be hard to make the team.”
Lamar is perfectly willing to do whatever it takes to make the team this year.
“I’m determined, I’m gritty, and stubborn,” she said. “And stubborn in the sense that I refuse to give up.”

Sometimes that means that practices are not going to be enjoyable.
“It’s insanely painful. It’s very lonely and very exhausting, and if you don’t enjoy it you’re going to stop pretty quickly,” she said.

But it’s always been worth it, she said.

“I’ve never regretted the decisions I’ve made. I’ve never felt I’ve missed out on anything. My experiences have greatly outweighed any of that,” she said.

She has represented the U.S. at the Pan American Games, and said there is nothing like wearing the letters USA.

“All the opportunities are amazing and you want to do them all over again. You want to make another team and represent the United States again, whether it’s the Olympics, Pan Am Games or the World Championships,” she said.

“But the closer you get to the Olympics, the farther away it seems,” she added with a laugh. “I’m in a position to be at the trials; and being on the starting line, that is a huge goal in itself and an amazing dream in itself. But then you look forward and see all these women in the field … and you realize how much further you have to go.”

There is no stopping now, so she continues to run after the dream, negotiating with pain as she goes.

“In the 1,500,” she said, “the last two laps your body starts sending signals that it is ready to stop and it would like you to step off the track. My body will say to me at some point in every race, I think we’re done here. I think we should go home.”

Here’s the original link to the Trenton Times article with a few more pics. Thanks Paul!

 

Just like Eddie

Dear TrackFans,

Long time, no write.

With the Olympic Trials looming at the end of this month, and with my position on the 1500m entry list in question, I’ve been racing my tuckus off and there’s lots to report. But tonight I don’t really want to think about races that are yet to come; instead, I’d rather consider races of the past.

I found out today that a young man I went to Haverford with passed away at the age of 29. I was a freshman when he was senior, but during that one year overlap he made a huge impact on my racing. During that first year of college I was the fastest 800m runner on the women’s team. The 800m was a new event for me, and the intensity and stamina it required scared me. I was at a loss at how to handle it. I wasn’t at a loss for exceptional teammates to look up to, but I needed an 800m role model, so I chose Eddie Papalia.

Almost all of my memories of Eddie revolve around Centennial Conference Championship relays, in which both Haverford teams were in complete hysterics over the outcome. Goats and Bees jumped and shrieked encouragement to each new leg. And during all this intensity I’ll never forget how I felt when Eddie would get the baton. Despite the unknown race outcome, the advancing competition, and the screams from the sidelines, I was overcome with the feeling that it was all going to be okay when Eddie got the baton. I would relax because the thought in both my mind and in the minds of many other Haverford runners was: “It’s okay now, Eddie’s got this.”

After seeing him race just a few times I began to try and emulate his style of racing and his fierce kick. I wanted to be that strong runner that my teammates could entrust with their faith. I wanted to be fast like Eddie, aggressive in races like Eddie, and humble, so modest that you’d think I was detached from winning until you witnessed how hard I tried, how much I gave. I wanted to be reliable in just the way he was, and I wanted to be as valuable to my team as I knew he was to the men’s team.

I remember celebrating when he took 3^rd at Outdoor Nationals that year behind Nick Symmonds (
http://scripts.mit.edu/~hwtaylor/otf/04-05/ncaa.res.html
) and I remember his amazing Dad cheering for me when I raced. I remember my parents consoling me after I lost my junior year of indoor track to injury and illness by saying, “Remember how Eddie had a really hard junior year, too, and how he went on to get 3^rd at Nationals his senior year.” I remember how this made me feel instantly better. And I remember going on to get 3^rd at Nationals my senior year and thinking, “Just like Eddie.”

With the Trials just weeks away and with more races down the road, I’m reminded of a role model who made me less scared of racing and the possibility of winning. I’m in his debt for showing me how to be a better athlete, and I send my thoughts and love out to his family.

So TrackFans, choose your role models well. Let them be fleet of foot and steadfast, unassuming and excellent, just like Eddie.

May the Penn Relays be ever in your favor!

This Saturday I’ll be racing in the Olympic Development Mile at the 118^th running of the Penn Relays. It will be my 6^th appearance at the Relays (three times with my college 4×4, twice in the mile), and I anticipate it will be, like every time before, absolutely and without fail, utter pandemonium. With over 100,000 people attending the 3 day racing carnival and with over 400 races taking place, this is the most insane track event in the United States. Warming up for USA Nationals at Hayward Field last summer was downright civilized when compared to the mayhem that is the Penn Relays’ paddock system. The crowd at Pan Americans this fall seemed like attendees of garden party when compared the riotous crowd in Franklin Field.

(http://news.pennrelaysonline.com/2009/04/24/high-school-boys-4×100-heats/)

Hell, even the Penn Relays’ website calls their paddock “controlled chaos.”

Let me be clear. The noise, the crowd, and the intensity are exactly why I love the Penn Relays. If you can successfully warm-up through the packed streets and food vendors, handle the potentially extreme heat or freezing rain that is April weather in Pennsylvania, make it to the starting line and navigate a huge a field of racers, AND race well, then you can race well ANYWHERE. A win at Penn Relays is a win against the odds and a huge confidence boost. My parents and I joke that the Olympics have nothing on the Penn Relays. As far as I know, no Olympic stadium has broken out into a deafening choir of “whoops” when a runner makes a decisive pass on the top turn and catches the leader.

The Penn Relays are like a mini-Hunger Games. There are 23 women in my race on Saturday, just 1 person shy of the 24 tributes featured the books, and only one gold-watch winner. And while no one dies at the Penn Relays, there are a fair amount of injuries. I’ve been spiked twice, fell once, and received a bruise from another racer last year that made me look like I’d been in a bar fight. And if you think the Penn Relays aren’t dangerous, don’t tell this girl:

(http://www.runnerspace.com/news.php?news_id=2173)

I’ve also got my own personal Haymitch in Coach Gags to mentor me through the race. Here he is working his coaching magic at the Penn Relays 20+ years ago with Georgetown.

So Happy Penn Relays, Track Fans! And may the odds be ever in your favor!

Runners ♥ Dogs

Dear Track Fans,

Follow more than 10 runners on Twitter and you learn that runners (as a whole) love two things more than they love running: coffee and their pets.

I’m no exception and my BFF is Ella, a blind, diabetic black labrador. She likes all the things that I like (napping, eating, West Wing) and she’s an amazing listener.

While Ella and I are 99% of the time having a serious chill session, her only failing comes when we take her out of the house. Give her a leash and she’ll lose her mind. Put her in the car and she’ll start to shake. Take her anywhere and prepare yourself for wiggly dog mayhem.

I once took Ella to a “Dog Party” where she distinguished herself by chasing the host’s dog under the deck, making a 13 year old girl cry and vomiting all over the patio. While I spent 20 minutes hosing Ella’s lunch off of paving stones, she fell asleep in their kiddie pool. Needless to say, we weren’t invited to the next party.

So if you (like almost all Americans) like to watch dog videos, enjoy!

 

One Track Mind

(Explosions, escaped circus animals and Ryan Gosling: Things I wouldn’t notice on race day.)

 

Saturday’s 800m at Princeton will be both my first race of 2012 and my return from injury. As I haven’t competed in quite a few months, I’d forgotten that distinct pre-race feeling that begins the Wednesday before I race and stops only when the starting gun sets me loose. Pre-race jitters are not just about being nervous. For me, they are a way of mentally preparing myself for the extreme effort I’m about to undertake.

Racing can be extremely painful. With 300 meters left in any given race my body experiences a new level of distress far beyond the initial discomfort. As my legs go numb, my breathing becomes ragged and my arms uselessly flail, and my body shows signs of starting to fail. It’s when my body shouts at me, “Stop!” that I’ve got to draw on my mental fortitude, override this natural response, and instead pick up the pace.

My pre-race countdown is a learned behavior and it helps me cope with the pressure, anxiety, and pain that racing brings. It involves setting aside time to visual how I’d like the race to unfold, reviewing mantras about my own agency and abilities, and trying to keep the nerves at bay so I don’t unravel before I get to the starting line. A healthy amount of tunnel vision means that as the week progresses I slowly lose interest in things non-track and field related. By Thursday my friends know I’m zoning out. To wake me after 10pm on a Friday night is a friendship-ending offense. By this time my ability to watch or read anything of quality diminishes significantly. Racing has already taken root in my mind and leaves little room for much else. Only the most trashy and absorbing of all art forms can distract me. In college I took to reading romance novels. As they required only 2% of my brain power to read, they offered the perfect escape. The pursuit of excellence in running has caused me to read over 100+ romance novels, and although I’ve since kicked the habit, I’m still waiting for the emotional scars caused by such an undertaking to manifest themselves. 

All this strange behavior does serve a purpose, because on race day I’m so focused that all I care about is my race. As I’ve given myself adequate time to achieve a state of pre-race Zen, few things can distract me from my task. Explosions, escaped circus animals, and Ryan Gosling would all go unnoticed. I have a one track mind and I’m able to get down to the very serious task of racing.

After a long season of track races, this routine of tunnel vision can get a little boring. Thankfully, as I’ve gotten older I’ve tamed my nerves and I can mentally prepare for a race more quickly. Traveling on the racing circuit is a welcome distraction, and the constant influx of new athletes to meet means my social life need not end on Wednesday night. Still, for the first race of 2012 I’m embracing my pre-race countdown like an old friend, an old friend that makes your stomach churn, your palms sweat, and forces you to read books titled The Very Virile Viking and A Highlander Never Surrenders.

Meet the New Jersey*New York Track Club!

Dear Track Fans,

For my inaugural post, I’m pleased to introduce you to my second family, The New Jersey* New York Track Club. In August, this fantastic group of athletes and coaches welcomed me with open arms and I’m eternally grateful for their love, support and jokes. With our fearless leader, Frank Gagliano, putting us through our paces and keeping us on the right track (pun!) we’ve developed into a team of running machines and, to my delight, friends.

During my break from competing I filmed a few workouts and decided to throw them together into a video. As post-collegiate runners with Olympic aspirations our lifestyles tend to mirror that of struggling artists rather than pro-athletes. If you feel compelled, please check out our website (www.NJNYTC.com) and donate. Your donations go toward medical care, transportation, race entry fees and the box of crayons I’m using to write you all thank-you notes.

Best,

Annick