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Larissa Kleinmann officially announces her retirement from competitive running
To whom it may concern: I am hereby officially and publicly announcing my retirement from competitive running. The 2002 SEC Cross Country Championship represented my last race in the University of Arkansas uniform, the finale of a running "career" that lasted more than a decade. In my 19 years of running I saw and participated in European Championships, World Championships and was a long-time member of the German national team. (For a comprehensive list of accomplishments see http://www.larissa-kleinmann.com). Despite two remaining cross country races (NCAA Regionals and NCAAs) as well as outdoor eligibility, I decided to discontinue the both demanding and very privileged life as a student-athlete in the U.S. NCAA system. Lying in the finish shoot at the SEC Championship, I realized it was time to open up the last spor on the Ladyback XC traveling team to a younger, enthusiastic runner with her NCAA Championship career waiting ahead of her. In my current condition, I am unable to contribute to the scoring team. I therefore drew the conclusion that it was better to step behind and take off my racing spikes as well as red-and-white Razorback uniform to prematurely clear the path for my Ladyback successors. I unofficially announced my retirement the day after the NCAA XC Championships on November 24th, 2002 and unofficially, to the team (and friends) a month ago. My heart had been trying to tell me to quit for a long time. It took me about a year of physical and emotional struggle to decode my inner language as well as acknowledge my personal findings. Most of my teammates had no idea about what had been going on inside me. They were quite surprised/shocked when I revealed it to them. They all have been wonderful and very supportive. Their reaction proved to me once again how honored I am having been a Lady Razorback and having been part of such an incredible women's athletics program. Lance (Harter, head track/XC coach) has been and is exceptional. I cannot express in words how thankful I am to him. He is the greatest coach I have ever had or witnessed. His care and support of his athletes is extraordinary. He capitalizes the personal well-being and is willing to sacrifice the overall team performance to ensure and safeguard the individual athlete's interests -- which is an extremely rare trait for a coach active in the NCAA team-oriented athletic system! I feel so very fortunate to have had the honor to have Lance Harter as both a coach and a mentor! There is no other person in athletics I would wish more to train and gain valuable life experience under. No one! In the past year I have been fighting innumerable physical and mental/emotional battles. I was injured for several months and various times; I was sick often; I was and am struggling emotionally during the process of a life transition: the transition from an athletically driven/devoted life to an academically driven/devoted one. It took me a long time to realize that I was done with being an athlete, burned out after so many years of living the roughness and toughness of athletics at the national and international level. Every step of running became torture. I hated it. I was sick of it, I was tired of pushing both my body and my mind to a maximum day in and day out. It went thus far that I did not want to go to bed the night before a competition because I knew once I woke up, it was racing time -- time of pain as well as unpleasant fight (against myself) and torture. I could not stand it anymore, could not handle it anymore -- both mentally and physically. It became more than apparent to me that I needed a break, a real, long break. I had already taken one last year. I was injured, could not compete. During the summer, I took it easy, did not run every day. I still was dreading all runs, never felt the urge of picking back up hard workouts and/or racing. I did not miss it at all. In fact, I preferred watching track meets as opposed to participating in them. This current cross country season, I have constantly been either sick or injured. I was lucky if I could train normally for two weeks straight. The shape to finish my running "career" on a good note could not be built. Embarrassing (according to my personal standards) performances were the result of the physical and emotional distress. Looking back at the final stages of my life as a runner, I am able to mark up one moment in which the traumatic experiences as an athlete started outweighing the many wonderful ones. From that point on I hated running, hated competing passionately (I never really enjoyed racing and working out hard beforehand already…). My performances and health, as well as devotion to running have been downward sloping ever since. That very moment was the NCAA Indoor Championship 2001 at home in Fayetteville: I was the favorite going into the 5,000m race but faded to tenth while suffering from extreme dehydration due to water intoxication. The lack of minerals and water in my body overshadowed my otherwise great physical condition. I ended up in the hospital with several IVs. I attempted to run the 3,000m the next day but my weak body forced me to drop out of the race. My first reaction when facing my coach was "I am quitting, this is not worth it anymore!". What back then appeared to be an immediate emotional overreaction later turned out to be a final one. I had been failing to live up to my physical conditions many, many times before at major championships. The traumata had been accumulating over many years and started to reach a level where the frustration overshadowed the positive things of athlete life. Looking back at the weekend of the 2001 NCAA Indoor Championships one-and-a-half years later, I can discover that this was the moment when my head truly did quit the sport. I have not been the same runner since. I am also not the same person. I learned a lot about myself in the past year. It was a very emotionally intensive, life-changing one. I did learn and am learning tremendously in all respects. I would call this phenomenon "life transition". What now? Good question, taken-care-of answer(s): I am currently enrolled in the Master's of Business Administration (MBA) program at the Sam M. Walton College of Business. I now want to apply the dedication from athletics to academics. I am in the process of applying to the PhD program in Marketing at my alma mater for the fall of 2003. I have been in close touch with several of my former marketing professors and am currently doing independent study with one of them. In addition, I have founded an unofficial marketing running club. I am coaching as well as working out with three of my former marketing professors (Dr. Jeff Murray, PhD student Hélène Cherrier, and Dr. Elizabeth Creyer). We have one common goal: to run the New York City Marathon 2003. A professional tennis player and former Razorback from Sweden (Oskar Johansson) is also part of our running club to get the endurance necessary for his arduous tennis matches. It has been such a wonderful experience running with my marketing fellows. They are wonderful people. I especially enjoy their innocent enthusiasm to work out. It has given me inspiration and helped me keep up with running. I have been on an athletic scholarship thus far, which paid my way through 4.5 years of college education. Lance talked to our athletic director Bev Lewis about my scholarship situation. Since I will not run next semester, I will have no scholarship to pay for my MBA education. Bev Lewis agreed to implement a graduate assistant position for me in the Women's Athletics marketing department. This position will not only pay for my MBA studies but also give me valuable professional experience in my area of graduate studies: Marketing. Provided that I get accepted to the Walton College PhD program in Marketing, I will be at the University of Arkansas until 2007. After that, I have all options with my BSBA, MBA, and PhD degrees. Moreover, I worked as a photojournalist for the official website (English version) of this year's European T&F Championships in Munich. I really enjoyed the journalistic work and would like to continue it "on the side" whenever I get a chance to do so. I will no longer be a runner. However, I will continue to "hit the trails" frequently and be a hobbyjogger, a triple H (happy, healthy hobbyjogger). I have been extremely fortunate and privileged all my life. I had the honor to meet an innumerable amount of wonderful people all over the world. I had the honor to form great, life-time lasting friendships with wonderful individuals from all different corners of planet earth. I was given the unique opportunity to receive five years of free U.S. college education through an athletic scholarship. It enabled me to finish a B.S.B.A. in Marketing (with a minor in Spanish) as well as start (and finish if all goes according to plan) an MBA with a concentration in Marketing. Running is what brought me here to the United States. I would not have been able to seize any of my privileges without it. I have no regrets for what I have done in my life, no regrets whatsoever. Running brought me into a position in which I might soon be able to receive the highest possible education available in the United States: A PhD to expand my free education to nine years total with all three degrees possible in business academics (B.S.B.A, MBA, and PhD). The path to appreciative fortune was curved through making use of my genetic privileges toward the sport of track and field. However, none of the above would have come true nor been as pleasant and as valuable of a life experience as it was without the great, supportive environment that I was in. There are a lot of people I have to thank deeply for their unbelievable support throughout my years as a student-athlete in the U.S. higher education system. First and foremost, I wanted to mention one special person whom I owe so much and am very thankful to. Athletes tend to miss mentioning her in public and maybe forget that she is behind everything and anything a Ladyback receives, experiences, and seizes: The University of Arkansas Women's athletic director Bev Lewis. She is the best athletic director the NCAA has ever seen. Just like Lance Harter, Bev Lewis cares about her Ladybacks and staff. She knows how to guide a Division I women's athletic program, which is a very challenging task to succeed in. She knows when to push her coaches and when not to. She has been extremely supportive of all sports. Lance Harter only has great things to say about her and always makes sure we as athletes know we have to thank her for all be are honored to receive as Ladybacks. When Lance and I decided to do a strategic redshirt or not compete for Arkansas, Bev Lewis always supported our decision. She never put pressure on Lance and respected his knowledgeable decisions. Bev Lewis was the one who implemented a graduate assistant position in the Ladyback marketing department to provide me with the resources to pay for my graduate education at the Walton College of Business. I am so very thankful for what she has done. I cannot believe what she has done for me and all Ladybacks. Which athletic director in the NCAA system would provide an athlete who decided to prematurely terminate her eligibility with a graduate assistant position? I believe nobody… nobody EXCEPT Bev Lewis at the University of Arkansas. Lance Harter is the person I have to thank the most. He supported me in good times as in bad. Where other coaches would let their athlete fall like a hot potato, he even increased his support and protected me to keep the outside pressure away. I am really unable to put it all in words what I think about Lance Harter. I cannot put my thoughts on paper at this point. There are just so many great things to say about him that are inside my heart and brain. Those things first need to be processed and they would bust the extent of this announcement. All I can say is that Lance Harter is THE best coach. I feel very, very blessed to have been under his tutelage! I also have to thank my teammate and roommate form last year, Andreina Byrd. She was witnessing the process during the entire academic year 2001/02. She was of great help to me. Having a great roommate as she was, it makes things a lot easier. I also feel extremely blessed to have found two wonderful friends outside of the athletic environment. Dr. Jeff Murray (associate marketing professor at the Sam M. Walton College of Business) and Hélène Cherrier (PhD student in Marketing) have been extraordinarily supportive. It is amazing to see how a student can become such good friends with former professors. Jeff and Hélène have helped me tremendously during the difficult time and their companionship is giving me as great motivation to keep running. I would not have won the SEC Outdoor 10,000m title 2002. They were my sole training partners leading up to the championship and inspired me with their innocent enthusiasm to work out. My current and former teammates have been great peers. Having such great teammates makes life as an athlete a lot more pleasant. As a distance runner, it is not only crucial to have great training partners and good direct coaching support; the sprinters, pole vaulters, and throwers as well as their coaches are crucial to create the synergy necessary to achieve our goals as one track team. The entire women's athletic department has been great all along. There is much more to succeed as a student-athlete than hard training and good coaching. There are the trainers working long hours every day, the strength coaches, academic advisors, the facility supervisors, the secretaries, the compliance staff, accounting, marketing, etc. . And the sports information staff makes sure that the program gets coverage in the media. As student-athletes we should all never forget to thank our college professors also. We constantly provide them with inconvenience. Make-up exams need to be given to athletes on a frequent basis and class absences need to be excused. Our professors are usually very understanding, which I thank them very much for. The athletic program at the University of Arkansas would not be as special and unique as it is if there were not those great Razorback fans, the best in the NCAA! The community on top of the university itself provides Razorback and Ladyback Athletics with great valuable and appreciated support. There is another person I am very thankful to: My former coach at Boston University, Bruce Lehane. He was the person who cleared my path to Arkansas by giving me a transfer release after my freshman year with the BU Terriers. Not every coach would do that. It was not easy for me to leave a place I was very happy at. I am very glad I went to BU for one year. It was a great experience and served as a fantastic springboard on the way to the University of Arkansas. I believe that it will take me some time to realize that 13 years of living the life of an athlete (out of a total 19 years of running) has come to an end. The business of the life as a professional MBA student has kept me distracted from thinking about recent occurrences since day zero at the SEC Cross Country Championships. I spent 43 straight hours awake and working on MBA projects. It is a weird feeling now to be able to spend all day and night working in the business building without the fear of being dead exhausted during the following day's arduous workout on the trails. No, now I do not have to still go out and run after long study nights… no more. However, the guilty feeling is still there… without a reason… a weird feeling, very weird feeling! One of these days I might come back to athletics. It is very possible. However, this would not occur in the next two or three years, I believe. My mind and body need time to recuperate, extensive time… time that I will need to learn how to enjoy the sport to the fullest. Who knows, I might just appear out of nowhere, out of the cold pants of hobbyjogger life, and run the SEC Outdoor Championship in the 10k… just to get a point or two for a program that has supported me so much over the years. Who knows, we will see. Only if you love what you are doing, your full personal, genetic potential can be reached! I did not have this necessary prerequisite for reaching my full potential… not yet. Now is the time to learn to love. I have great tutors for the learning process: my two former marketing professors and now good friends Hélène Cherrier and Jeff Murray. We are on a hobbyjogging mission, our Mission Possible NYC03: The New York City Marathon 2003. They have never run a marathon. I introduced them to the sport. I have been teaching them how to run. Now they are teaching me how to love it! And I am sure Lance Harter will give us some advice here and there on how to make the New York City asphalt burn on November 4th, 2003… Best, sincere regards, Larissa Kleinmann alias "Lilli" (To contact Lilli, e-mail her at Lilli-Hammer@web.de) (Written
November 4, 2002, Released 26, 2002)
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