- Jason Byrne, flrunners.com What an amazing opening you have had to your season with solo 4:16 and 9:09 outings in the first two weekends! What made you want to attack these early season meets so hard?
- Colin Barker, Bishop Kenny Thanks Jason, well I wasn't too sure what kind of shape I was in when the season opened up. I decided to just see what I felt like in the 1600 at Bolles, and it felt pretty good. Just cruised through the laps comfortably and came close to my PR. Then at Episcopal I just started clicking off laps and ran a PR, and that felt comfortable too. So I am really excited for the season to really get going.
- JB Does committing to Auburn make it easier to focus on your track season or does it make it harder because you already have one foot out the door, so to speak?
- CB It definitely makes it a lot easier to focus, but I remember on my visit to Auburn just wanting to quit high school running to start my training up there. I am very excited for my last season of high school track though.
- JB Are you planning to stay in state or are you going to travel to any big national meets this season?
- CB Well I'm not too sure yet, I've been talking to Coach Curran about the possibility of running some meets out of state but have not decided yet. I ran Arcadia last year though and would like to go back out and give those West Coast guys a race.
- JB Is there anything special that you really want to accomplish before you close out your high school career?
- CB I have a few things in mind but we'll see how things play out.
- JB You had a great cross country season, culminating with qualifying for Foot Locker Nationals. That race did not go like you wanted and I know that was hard on you. In retrospect how do you reflect on it?
- CB After Footlocker I was pretty bummed, but looking back on it I had a great time and got some good experience. The whole event was unbelievable and I would like to thank everyone who helped setting it all up.
- JB To what do you credit for the huge improvements that you've made in your running over the last year?
- CB Last year when track started up I had just about finished my eight inch growth spirt and was filling out a bit. I also started running some really good workouts and everything just fell together. Over the last year though I started to increase my mileage from about 30 mpw (2009 track) to around 48 mpw average over the 2009 cross season. It was really that I had stopped growing last year and was actually able to train.
- JB Are you fanatical about your diet or stretching or any other habits or are you pretty laid back?
- CB I'm not too paranoid about my diet, I just make sure I am not eating a bunch of junk. I do need to spend some more time stretching though.
- JB So to the freshman who is looking up to you and who says wow I want to be at that level when I'm a senior... what would you tell them they need to do starting today?
- CB My advice is to just be patient. My parents were so helpfull all throughout high school, especially when I was a freshman. I used to get so frustrated that I couldn't break 17 minutes in the 5K, but they kept telling me to be patient, and that my junior and senior years are the ones I want to be the fastest. Well... they were right on, and in retrospect I wish I could have taken their advice a little more seriously. Train smart, listen to your body, and enjoy all of it!
