20km Olympic Trials

July 17--Sacramento

I thought it would be hard to watch today's 20km Olympic Trials because I wasn't competing. My knee injury has cut into my racewalk training for weeks now and I knew if I raced I would likely overdo it. Coach is right, though, I have a much bigger race to focus on in just six weeks. Yikes, that seems like such a short time.

It was very exciting to watch the guys mix it up today. I had expected the race to be a bit more tactical than it was. From the beginning I wasn't surprised to see a slow pace and a large pack. But Kevin Eastler and Tim Seaman made a break for it much earlier than I would have guessed. The finish times of the top four ended up being a bit slower than some people anticipated, but given that it was a trials race it shouldn't have surprised too many people. It was great to see a few young guys getting into the thick of things with Ben Shorey and Matt Boyles showing only a few nerves at their first 20km Olympic Trials. With luck and preparation, perhaps they will be on the podium four years from now.