A year in Review 2008

So the New Year is here and id like to take time to look at all that happened in 2008

After graduating from ECU i accepted a job offer in Lynn, MA to do Mechanical Design work at an Engineering firm.

so I...
-Moved to Boston on December 28th 2007.
-I stayed in the living room on a blow up mattress of my good friend Dominiks Apt.
-I officially gave up on track and field
-I searched for a coach in the Boston area because i missed track
-I met and started training with my current coach Carl Valle
-I woke up at 5am daily, worked from 7am-4pm. trained from 8pm-10pm and made it home by 10:30pm in time to eat dinner, shower and sleep.
-I showed up late for work and/or left work early in an effort to have more energy for practice.
-I was terminated from work due to the above problem.
-I started training "full-time" in March
-I lived off of $800 a month that PR would send whenever they were in the mood (on average every 3 months)
-I had a very understanding Landlord in Matt Sarbanis whos sister was a former Olympic and World Championship athlete herself. I was very lucky here, as i was forced to pay my landlord on average every-other month because PR never sent checks on time and he completely understood
-I started my track season at Mt. Sac relay with an Injury, and a time of 14+
-I continued to run piss-poor until May when i ran 13.64 in Ottawa, Canada.
-Coach Valle and I got on bad terms and we parted ways.
-Instead of running in Europe for the first time, i ran in Colombia at the CAC games, due to what happened with coach.
-I posted another PR at 13.61, and won Bronze at the CAC games with a 13.55w
-I decided to continue training with Carl, despite the nonsense that caused me to skip out on Europe.
-I won Gold at USATF into a very strong head wind (which for some reason is posted as a tail wind)
-I competed at the 2008 Summer Olympics.
-I ran like crap.
-I came home to another "late" check from PR and was not able to pay my landlord for August rent.
-I sold him my bed, my tv, my dressers etc.. for $700 and promised to pay him the final $100 (plus utilities) in the future
-I moved in with Coach Valle and others in Waltham, MA. Coach found some local sponsorships for me so i wouldnt have to worry about rent.
-I never received my August check from PR
-I started traing for my first indoor season since 2006
-Finally received a check from PR. Not Augusts check but a "to help you get by" check.
-I posted 2 Personal Best in 2 meets.
-I sit here hanging on by a thread but greatful for all that has happened.

WOW alot can happen in a Year.

I finally feel i am in the right situation to run fast though. I have dedicated my life to training for track and field and i am finally able to do so with no distractions. I dont have school, and i dont have work. I relax at home all day, train hard on the track and in the weight room, and repeat 6 days a week.

Ive been saying all year that 2008 was my "Get in there" year, and that 2009 will be my "Blow up" year. lol.

In 2008 I made the Olympics. This year i plan on establishing myself as one of the up and coming hurdlers in the world.

The year did not go exactly as planned, but i kept my eye on the prize and i accomplished just about everything i set out to accomplish. I am an official Olympian, which no one can ever take away from me, and im on my way to fulfilling my dreams.

I am a firm believer that everything happens for a reason, and whatever is meant to be will be.

So Happy New Years to everyone, i hope your 2008 was as good as mine, and i hope 2009 will be even better for all!


Happy New Years!

Ending the year on a good note

So yesterday 12/30 was my last practice of 2008. I ran at the track and lifted afterward as usual.

At the track I ran 2 of my fastest times in practice, and am right on pace to meet my goals for this indoor season. After the usual hurdle practice, i ran 2 flys, and 3 block starts to 18m. I was feeling pretty good so i asked if i could run one more to 30 meters in which i did and ran 3.85 which i supposed is decent after a full workout.

In the weight room i was still feeling good and was able to match my previous max on the Power Clean at 264.5 pounds (120KG) I then squatted 3x6 at 250 and got some pretty good depth on all reps.

I feel i could power clean 130 were i to come in fresh, but that will never be the case so ill jsut have to work up to getting it after a full practice.

Here are the goals i set for myself in October when i started training.

1. gain 15 pounds- this would have been 193. Instead i weighed 190 yesterday and so i was off by 3 pounds. Still pretty good i believe.

2. power clean 300 pounds. This was a goal that was a bit much. Gaining that much on my power clean would have been nearly impossible, the goal maybe should have been 286.6 (130kg) and if that were the case i feel i would have accomplished it. I instead power cleaned 264, which was my previous max, and cleaned 250+ on 4 occasions.

3. Bench 315 pounds. I havent done this, but will attempt my max on Saturday Jan 3rd after my track meet. My current best on the year is 295 which i posted some weeks back

4. Vetical jump 40" - I never got a real opportunity to do this, but after practice on a random day we had a Vertec machine at the facility i was at and i jumped 38". We will test this in Jan. BEFORE a workout to get the proper results.

So i feel things went pretty well this fall. Most importantly i broke my previous 60 hurdle record 2 times during my second meet, and my practice times show that im ready to break my records again.

The weight room work is only their to compliment my track work. So long as i am running faster on the track, the weight room doesnt matter.

here is a video of my 264 power clean attempted last night.

A visit to 4th Grade

So on December 11th i was privileged enough to visit a local elementary school in Needham, MA. A good friend of my coach, Mrs. HB :) teaches 4th grade and asked if i would be so kind as to stop by and visit her class. It was to be nothing formal, i didnt have to prepare a speech or come dressed in a suit, but simply show up and answer some questions. Of course i said yes and got excited because i love kids.

Mrs. HBs class had done a project on the Olympics and had learned about many of the different sports and athletes. To their surprise Mrs. HB knew an actual OLYMPIAN!! OMG! so ofcourse they were excited to see me. She wrote a small report on me and talked me up in the weeks prior to my showing up, but she didnt inform them that i would actually be stopping by one day. The day before i was supposed to show up though it slips and so the word gets out that i would be coming to class. You can read about how it "slipped" at her blog

So anyways, we know im not huge superstar (yet) but she talked me up and they were really excited to see me. Sure theyd never heard of me but i was excited to visit them because i remember when i was little i always looked up to the older kids and always enjoyed when i got to meet an elite athlete, so i knew they would enjoy my visiting.

I stopped by with a training partner of mine Shane (muscly-amrs (in my Mr. Herbert from Family guy voice)) and from the moment we walked in the door it was a blast. The kids went crazy! The first thing i heard was HE'S HUGE!! haha which of course made me laugh. I stood at the front of the class with Mr. Muscly arms and we answered questions. A couple minutes into it a second class came in and sat down right in front of me to join in on the fun!

They asked me a wide variety of questions such as How tall are you? how high do you jump? do you know how fast you are? one kid asked me if id met Usain Bolt, and ofcourse i though it was cool that these kids even knew who Bolt was. Track and Field is not a very big sport in the US and to see how these 4th graders knew who Usain Bolt was, was pretty cool. They asked a million and 1 questions, most of which made me laugh.

My favorite question though was "What do you do when youre not training". Now i dont have a part-time job because my coach and I decided that the best way to improve was to go at this Full-Time, so when im not training i usually just sit on the computer, eat, and watch TV. So i told the kids i usually just sit around and eat alot. lol. but that wasnt good enough! So i said ok, ill walk you through my day.

I wake up, i eat breakfast, i sit on the internet.... and one of the kids stops me and says "you dont brush your teeth???" hahha and of course i bust out laughing, she also says "you dont make your bed" another HAHA. so i have to restart while laughing and say OK. I wake up, i brush my teeth, i make my bed, i eat breakfast......etc. I thought that was pretty funny.

The entire time was a good laugh. Kids ask the funniest questions and i had a great time. After the questions were asked i signed about a gazillion autographs. i signed pieces of paper, shoes, hats, teddy bears, you name it! lol

We finished off with a couple videos of me going over hurdles and they were impressed. They all begged me to come back and visit them next year when they are in 5th grade, and i sure wouldnt mind. So Mrs. HB let me know!!

Today Mrs. HB (Stephanie) stopped by the gym where i train and brought Shane and I a delicious Honey Baked Ham as a special thank you for visiting the class. The Ham was given to us maybe 2 hours ago and its just about GONE. I love that Honey Baked Ham!

She also brought in a bunch of pictures that the kids drew for me and Shane saying thank you! Here are a couple!

The first on is of Mrs. HB (Stephanie), Shane (Muscly-arms), and Myself rocking the ballin Gold medal that one of her students made for me. And the second two are beautiful drawings of me going over a hurdle.





Thanks alot Stephanie for inviting me! and thanks to the Kids as well for being so much fun!

Harvard Open

Ran my second indoor meet of the season on Saturday at the Harvard Open. I set a new PR twice and broke 7.85 as planned.

The prelim round was 7.91 and the final was 7.83. I won both races by about half a second so im sure had i had a bit of competition i could have broken 7.80.

Either way i am happy with the results and it seems i am on the right track to meeting my goals for the season. I will not run again until January though but will train everyday except 3 (vacation) so i plan on picking up where i left off.

In other news, i power cleaned 253 pounds the other day. that puts me only ten pounds under my previous best, and i weighed 191 today :)

here is the Prelim race and the Final from the Harvard Open on Saturday December 15th