spectacular and uneventful

That’s how I would describe the last month.

Let’s start with the Spectacular: Sierre-Zinal. 

An electric, visceral experience. An opportunity to see practically every friend I’ve met at every international running event the last few years. A grind in my favorite way.

With 7100’ of climbing and a fraction of the descending, it was easily the most grueling race profile I’ve tackled. Spectators were scattered all over the entirety of the 31 kilometers from Sierre to Zinal, some so enthusiastic that they had carried legitimate chainsaws to their trailside viewpoints and revved them nonstop as athletes paraded past. 

Running down the finishing chute I cried and smiled at the same time, completely overwhelmed by emotion. It wasn’t that my 6th place finish was a shock – I believed I could – but rather just the appreciation of what my body and mind had done for me in light of what I had been living through. I’ll just say that life outside of sport had not, and still has not, been the easiest. My strong result symbolized more to me than just my dedication to training. It represented my resiliency as a whole person. I was just so proud and exhausted it made me cry. 

Photo: Victor Barcus

I left Zinal feeling very motivated and inspired. With a crew of Golden Trail World Series (GTWS) athletes and staff, I next bounced over to Locarno, Switzerland, via a VERY windy road that had me feeling significantly more unwell than I did at the end of the race the day before. After a few hours of wondering when I might lose my lunch, I was relieved to leave the rental car in a parking garage under the city center. Emerging into the evening light, we took a small trek with our luggage over to a funicular train, rode halfway up a mountain to an aerial tram station, and rode the tram the remainder of the way to the summit. Our hotel for the next three days, as well as a magnificent view over the city and glistening lake below, awaited us. 

The next few days were spent exploring the location of the GTWS Final (which takes place mid-October) on exhausted legs. A few sleeps and a few more delicious meals later, we did the whole commute in reverse, plus a 1.5 hour (much straighter, thank goodness) drive to the Milan airport, and two flights towards Eastern Europe. Next thing I knew, we were in Zakopane, Poland, the site of the second GTWS race on this particular leg of the tour. I’d never been east of Austria and really had no idea what to expect of the mountains or the culture in that corner of the world. Despite the fact that I spoke not a lick of Polish and almost laughably could not find any gluten-free food other than boiled vegetables to subsist upon, the welcome felt warm. 

What wasn’t warm? The race a few days later. Within the first 5 minutes of the start, we were running through the thickest, heaviest rain I’ve ever witnessed. And actually, it was hard to see – I wished I had goggles to keep the stream of water out of my eyes. The sky was literally dumping on us like an overturned trough, and I couldn’t help but laugh. 

Running into the first aid station at mile 7, already completely soaked to the bone, I saw the four women who had pulled ahead of me on-course slowing their strides, talking with race officials, and dejectedly turning away from the mountain we were supposed to be running up… Moments later, rather than being handed my soft flask and gels from the aid station staff, I too was delivered the news that the race was on hold due to rain and lightning. The race might start again in 30 minutes, they said. Go stay warm, grab a tea in the hut over there, they said. We did as we were told, wondering how 100 shivering women were going to start running towards the alpine again in a matter of minutes… I realized quite quickly that this was going to be the first mid-race cancellation of my career. A lackluster and unexpected ending to my two week European escapade.

And that’s when the Uneventful began: Impromptu Training Camp.

The last few weeks, since my return from Europe, I’ve completely given myself over to training. While I typically put a lot more than just training hours into my success as an athlete (maybe one day I’ll share more about what I actually do other than run on a daily basis), I haven’t lately. The aforementioned chaos of life outside of sport has made me appreciate the comparative simplicity of my daily existence, if only I let it be that way. Lately, it has just been some combination of: run, ride, eat, lift, sauna, recover, sleep. I’ve let life be simple; I’ve let everything be forward motion towards the one goal of getting faster. And I’ve let everything else fall to the wayside.

This simplicity has afforded me the ability to refocus in a way that my Type-A brain usually cannot. I’ve been able to read for pleasure, watch a few shows (something I really don’t do much of), and write nearly every day. This routine reminds me a little of the 3-week pre-season cross country camps I went to with my college team each fall during my time at Washington. I always had more time for journaling, reading, cooking, and just sitting with friends being slightly bored but entirely content at the same time. And just like I would start to feel refreshed and excited to return to the rest of my life by the end of camp, I have begun to feel the same way about emerging from the at-home “training camp” I unintentionally just attended.

Last week, Ren and I went on a brief road trip to Oregon to reconnect with family and friends and say hello to some high-alpine mountains (all of which we are starting to sorely miss living in the Bay Area… to put it lightly). Just one day into our visit, though, wildfire smoke from some fires raging to the east of Bend blanketed the sky. Our frequent trips to Oregon have become a constant reminder that the climate is in peril, affecting quality of life for so many people and beings. After just one day of working out in the public gym, we made the decision to cut our trip short and return to more favorable air in Marin.

We arrived home well after sunset. And because I had not wanted to spend a single second more of my time running up stationary mountains or biking into manufactured headwinds generated by an electronic fan, I still had an 8 mile run to get in. I had permission from Coach to bail and make it a rest day, but weirdly enough, I was sort of looking forward to being enveloped by the darkness and joining the coyotes, deer, mountain lions, and whatever else lurked out in the trails behind the house at night. I felt like perhaps the growing, burning craving I’d been having for alpine starts and big adventures like the ones I have back home (Wyoming home, I mean) would be satisfied with a little extra fear of wildlife. I slipped into some shorts, cinched a headlamp over my tangly hair, told Ren where I was headed in case I didn’t return, and plodded up into the woods. 

For a few minutes, I did get a bit of a thrill. It was quieter than usual out in the neighborhood, and much easier to listen to my breath and feel my heartbeat. It was peaceful and meditative, watching my legs alternate rhythmically in the spotlight, like watching the same short clip over and over on a black and white TV. But once the relative novelty of being in these woods, alone, in the darkness, wore off, it became a little spooky. I lost track of how many times the bushes rustled a few inches from the trail and I jumped. At one point, I instinctively threw the beam of my headlamp into the woods, towards the sound of an unnervingly loud crack a few meters away. It met two glowing eyes. A hot gush of adrenaline pulsed through my entire body, and although it slowly subsided with continued motion, I spent the rest of the run jumpy and uncomfortable. As I remained mentally steadfast about pushing onwards, I could practically feel a head cold crawling into my immune system and a little niggle starting to wear on my body. It became apparent that I had been burning the candle from both ends already for over a week. And then I remembered that I could just go home, eat the hot dinner Ren was probably (hopefully) cooking, and get some sleep. I opted for that, and woke up feeling just fine the next morning. And The Uneventful wore on.

But if my calculations are correct, today is the final day of The Uneventful.

Tomorrow begins the excitement of the next round of Golden Trail races, here in the US, as it is the day before Headlands 27k. The race is here in my backyard in Marin. It’s funny calling it “home” since I’ve just barely been running here for 6 months (most of which was training for track!), but I suppose it is more “home” than “not home”? And then we all head up to Mammoth for the final race of the main season, taking place next Sunday. Time to buckle up.

a long overdue recap

Hello! I write to you from what must be one of the greatest porches in the world, at this little chalet in the Alps where I’m staying with some Brooks teammates. I arrived here two days ago, and now that I’ve gotten the chance to sleep two consecutive nights in the mountain air rather than that of a stuffy jet, I finally have a clear head.

The Mont Blanc Massif towers over the little town of Pre Saint Didier, Italy, in a way only Mont Blanc can. I felt immediately inspired this morning when I was awoken by the sun creeping down the canyon walls towards our chalet. I rolled away from the open window and covered my eyes, in an attempt to squeeze a few more hours of sleep out of the night. But my brain was far more awake than my body—contemplating all the people already high in the mountains, the two big Golden Trail World Series races I have coming up, and how I can possibly move here. Alas, I rolled out of bed to seize… my weekly rest day.

Last night, I felt tortured by the idea of being in a gorgeous mecca such as this and having to take a day off from training. Especially considering that my housemates were headed out to run for 6 hours on the UTMB course, in preparation for their races in a few weeks. What a waste it would be for me to sit around! Today though, I feel great about it. My mind is alive right now in a way that it hasn’t been for some time. My training load has comparatively lessened in preparation for Sierre-Zinal and Tatra Skymarathon, this weekend and next, leaving me with a little extra umph. And it’s truly peaceful here on the porch, listening to the river gush through the bottom of the canyon and gazing up intermittently at the rocky, glacial behemoths before me. I am reminded today that it’s not just the running in the Alps that’s amazing. It’s the existing.

I had every intention of promptly sharing the details about what it was like competing at the Broken Arrow VK and the US Olympic Trials back-to-back… There were so many truly epic moments, and it was one of the coolest weeks of my 25 years for sure. But the weeks since the end of my track season became jam-packed, and they also became an emotional rollercoaster I admittedly didn’t have the energy to share. At this point I’ll spare you all the minutia. But I will say that it was pretty profound competing in what feels like the pinnacle of trail running in America just 6 days before competing in what I know to be the pinnacle of track. It was as iconic of an experience as I imagined, if not more.

A few things were especially notable.  

one

The time between the events and the time after the events felt like far more of an emotional game than I anticipated. After placing 2nd in a world-class field at Broken Arrow and spending time with my family and so many friends, I was riding a high. I quickly went into hibernation (which I recognize as a type of low) because my body and mind instinctually knew that that much hype was not sustainable for an entire week. I battled my self-talk. Broken Arrow had been epically fun but also more demanding than I accounted for. So many friends to see! So many new people to talk to! So much time in the sun! So many things to take in! Had I committed to too much? Had I overextended myself at Broken Arrow to the point of self-sabotaging the Trials?

It felt like the first round of the 1500m was when everyone would find out whether doing track and trail at the same time was possible or not, depending on my result. I had chosen to be an experiment in human performance when I signed up for this. If I succeeded, I could be the reason why other people believed they could down the line. And if I failed—well, I tried not to think about that. The doubts marched in, but they also retreated like daemons humbled in some great battle.

There weren’t many daemons left in my head by the time the 1500m actually began because I was so busy enjoying the shit out of the experience and trying to do my best that I completely put Broken Arrow behind me. Tahoe felt like another world away, once I got into track mode. Things got especially fun after I qualified for the semi-final, and all that pressure of proving what I wanted to prove subsided. I was just like everyone else out there, competing as hard as I could for a spot on the most competitive Team USA my event had ever seen.

In hindsight, I am proud of my 18th place finish. In the moment though, I was disappointed in not qualifying for the final, and I was disappointed in not running the several-second PR I was certain I had in store. I had been balling out in workouts, and I was READY. So of course, I wondered after the semi whether I would have had more in the tank had I not accumulated so much mountain fatigue earlier in the week. But pretty quickly (like within 5 minutes of the finish), I recognized that I may not have even made the semi in the first place had I not been on the high from Broken Arrow. So ultimately, I wouldn’t change a thing. I would do it all over again (and probably will sometime)…

After maintaining composure and being acutely focused for days on end, I became an emotional scrap of myself. I cried lightly over stupid things in the weeks after, and I cried extra hard over things that weren’t stupid too. It was evident that I had used up every ounce of emotional energy I had within me. It took a while to feel fully like myself again. And that actually makes me proud. There’s something satisfying about knowing you gave your all, not just physically but in every way.

two

I was delighted by the outpouring of love and support I received from people near and far over the course of that week and the weeks afterwards. My partner Ren was selflessly by my side for everything, making sure I had what I needed and keeping life as seemingly normal as possible. My whole family came to watch. Ren’s family and many friends came to watch. My coach David flew from Colorado to Eugene to be there for me and keep things light. We had an absolute ball. And a few random people even stopped me in the streets, like “you’re that girl that just did that trail race”!

My phone was flooded with messages from close friends and complete strangers. I had people wishing me luck, hyping me up, and congratulating me over email, Instagram, text, and phone calls. I have never felt so genuinely loved and supported in my career. All that encouragement is still motivating me, many weeks later.

It’s not the recognition that I like about this. It’s the fact that I know my people are behind me. That this isn’t just about me, but about everyone that is part of the journey in some way. That anyone who reached out got to experience a slice of my experience. That maybe I made someone smile, jump up and down in front of their computer or TV, or feel proud or inspired to run up a mountain. Knowing people are excited—that fills my cup more than any performance outcome ever will.  

three

If you’re still reading, you’ve gotten to the part that it has made writing this take a back burner. While running was lighting up my world this last six months, I was also dealt some really hard times. There’s nothing I’ve experienced as painful as watching someone you love struggle, not knowing how to help. I’ve cried a lot of tears and spent a lot of nights tossing and turning.

For years, I had this notion that if something big in my life was going wrong, my running would go wrong too. This season, though, I’ve learned the important lesson that this isn’t necessarily true. Training (including the people I do it with) has been the best thing in my life these last few months. It’s my happiest place, it makes the rest of my life better. I understand now that whatever you’re experiencing outside of sport—whether it is something related to yourself or the people you love—it doesn’t necessarily mean that all aspects of your life will turn south. You have to find and lean into the places where you feel loved and alive and compartmentalize them from the places where you feel sad and stressed and out-of-control. Joy and challenge can, and many times do, coexist.

an ode to the alps

So it’s my third year in a row visiting the slice of runner’s paradise that is this area of France and Italy. My first trip, I was barely aware that the Italy side existed—my whole world revolved around Chamonix. I had a delightful 10 days that summer, even in light of the fact that I tested positive for Covid 5 days in and had to stop running and hole up alone in a condo (come to think of it, one with a similarly excellent porch with a similarly excellent view). The next year, I discovered Courmayeur, Italy, and ran the iconic Ponte Helbronner, a technical 7000-foot ascent, with my friend Christian. That day was so spectacular it will forever be imprinted in my mind. And this trip, we are just down the road from Courmayeur, where I will remember staring at the mountains with a clear mind on the-day-before-the-day-before my very first Sierre-Zinal.

talk to you on the flip side, friends!

the VK + 1500 double

So you thought I was crazy last year for doing Broken Arrow a week after the NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships, and three weeks before the USA Championships?

I know I was crazy. And I may have only gotten crazier since.

If all goes my way, this year I intend to race the Broken Arrow VK — 6 days before the first round of the 1500m at the Olympic Trials.

I’ve been hesitant to put this decision out into the universe so publicly. You see, changing plans is entirely a possibility, as I still need to officially qualify for the Trials (although odds are good) and I need to show up to both start lines healthy and ready to go. But the more I’ve questioned my fear of sharing, the more I’ve realized that there’s always a possibility you’ll need to shift your focus, as an athlete and otherwise. What makes this any different? 

The birth of this grand plan

It was a Wednesday and I was alone, running up the side of Mount Tamalpais. My legs were D-E-A-D from a hard track workout the day before and I felt that familiar burn of lactic acid in my calves as I plodded up the rutted trail. The California sun toasted my salty skin; it smelled distinctly like summer.

Running up the side of this mountain in the backyard of my new training base, my mind wandered to the Olympic Trials – a normal thing for track athletes to be thinking about, daily, for months in advance. The schedule for the Trials had been posted on the internet days prior, and I had been surprised to find the Women’s 1500m, my event, at the end of the 10-day meet – a different order than years past. I clambered over a little wash-out in the trail, feeling unexpectedly strong and agile for how tired I was and for how in-track-shape-and-out-of-trail-shape I thought I was, and that’s when the idea hit me: With the three qualifying rounds of the 1500 scheduled for the end of the Trials, I would technically be free on one of the best weekends of the year. Broken Arrow weekend at Palisades Tahoe. I’m not great at math, especially when I’m running, but it didn’t take long for me to count that there were 6 days between the VK (my favorite mountain running event) and the first round of the Trials. 

My immediate response to my own audacity was, ANNA – NO WAY. You can’t do that! That would be crazy. You’ve put so much into training for the Trials. Who would do that?!?!

But damn, I couldn’t get the idea out of my head. I thought about it for weeks before I told anyone. Then, three weeks ago, right after I ran a 1500 PR at the LA Grand Prix, I half-jokingly brought it up to my dad on the phone. He’s a sensible man and I really expected him to laugh and then return to talking about the elite women’s 5k we were simultaneously watching, me from the stands and him from behind his computer screen nearly 1000 miles away in Wyoming. The thing is, my dad also knows me really well and hypes me up to no end. I could instantly tell he thought the idea to double was a fantastic one... So I celebrated my new track PR by letting my brain have a heyday with the idea, thinking it would all stop in a few days when I came back down to planet earth.

Days later, and I still had Broken Arrow on my brain. I was so nervous to bring it up to David, my coach. I felt like a teenage version of myself professing some deep dark secret, and despite being close with David, I was giddy with excitement and absolutely terrified when I finally mustered up the confidence to shoot him a text.

It should be no surprise whatsoever to anyone who knows David (or listens to his podcast, for that matter) that he hit me back with an abundance of positivity. But that didn’t mean he was sold on the idea quite yet. I was on the edge of my seat for several hours while he thought about it, but by the end of the day I had a message in my inbox that read, all-capitals, “CRAZY LIKE A FOX”. Needless to say, this went over my Gen Z head – I had to Google the phrase before I realized he was also in the this-is-a-fantastic-idea camp. 

I wanted the thumbs-up from a few more important people, namely my friends at Brooks, before I really seriously considered the double as an option myself. I was met with excitement and eager anticipation everywhere I looked. 

Refining my why

Am I scared? A little bit, yeah. But that’s kind of the point, when I really think about it. It’s that little bit of fear – the question of whether I can, whether someone can – that makes this idea so appealing to me. I knew the answer to my original question, who would do that?!, was no one. Which is why I also knew that I absolutely must try and do the double. 

I have spent the better part of this first year as a professional runner doing things in an unconventional way. Not just haphazardly, but because I have prioritized my enjoyment of this whole “living thing” above all else. Because I think that whatever unconventional route I’m taking (e.g. doing track and trail at an elite level, training mostly with various non-professional friends rather than an organized pro team, deciding to post up in a new community I had never been to before… the list goes on) sounds like the absolute most fun and most exciting route to wherever I’m trying to go. (That’s not to say that people who follow the conventional path aren’t having any fun. I’m sure many, if not most, are living their dream. But that just isn’t my dream.)

Over the weekend, Lachlan Morton, a chart-your-own-path cyclist who has been a big inspiration to me over the last few years, won Unbound 200. It’s one of the premier gravel cycling events in the world that takes place in Kansas every spring. Lachlan reflected about his training and his win in an Instagram caption the day after the race.

“My hope was that regardless of the result I could be content knowing I’d done it in the way I wanted without compromising my simple enjoyment… I assumed this approach would impede, in some way, my ability to compete at the high level required. It’s so validating to know that wasn’t true.”

I have not a clue what it is like to win Unbound, but I certainly share this feeling. This post expresses a sentiment I’ve been trying to put words to for much of the last year. I do wonder, sometimes, would I be more successful if I specialized in either track OR trail? And then I start wondering, what even does success mean?

My trail friends would define “success” as defending my title at the Broken Arrow VK. Alternately, my track friends would define “success” as making the Olympic Trials Final and competing for a chance to represent Team USA in Paris. These are both goals that I train for, day-in and day-out. Accomplishing even just one would be enough to call this season of my career a good one. But I guess David was right (as always)… I am crazy like a fox. Because I don’t see any reason why I can’t chase both, simultaneously. Despite – and in spite of – there not really a script for that.

Just because others aren’t doing it doesn’t mean that you can’t. Maybe it really means that you should?