Nicole Blood: Off to NCAAs After  Solid Run at Regionals
Thursday, November 19, 2009, 5:00 p.m.

Hello there!

Again, a special thanks to anyone and everyone who came out to Springfield last weekend to cheer us on at the Regional meet.  It’s really great to have so much support—you can feel it during the race. Other teams even enjoy running on our course because they feel the excitement of the crowd, but they have no idea what it’s like in a Duck uniform.

As a team, I think we got a lot out of Saturday’s race.  First, the slow pace kept the majority of the field together through almost two miles, which prepares us for the much larger field of runners we will run with in Terre Haute. It’s difficult to get comfortable with so many people, but you have to. Second, the mud fatigued our legs, which made it very difficult to keep powering forward, especially when the race took off at two miles. At nationals, people will take off, and we have to be ready for that too. I think even though some of us made the mistake of being too far back with a slow pace on Saturday, everyone was tough and fought hard in the last few minutes of the race. At nationals, there is no doubt we will be tired toward the end—everyone is. But we will be tough.

So that’s it. We’re ready. We put in miles of hard work and hours of drills, stretching, rolling and icing all season long. Now it’s time to have some fun in Terre Haute. Forget rankings—nationals gives teams an opportunity to compete against the best in the country to see where they stand. Every year, it’s a great experience and we’ve always had a lot of fun. We leave Friday afternoon, and the race is Monday morning. Terre Haute, here we come!

Until next time, go Ducks!!