Post-Race Interview with Chris Solinsky, December 8, 2001

By Alison Wade

Chris Solinsky en route to a third-place finish at the Foot Locker Cross Country National Finals.

Chris Solinsky gets Suzy Favor Hamilton's autograph the night before the race. (Both photos Alison Wade/New York Road Runners)

Chris Solinsky Bio

Congratulations on a great race today, can we assume that you met your goal?
Yeah, on my pre-season goal sheet I had, first of all, win Regionals, which didn't happen, I took second. Then I reset my goal to top five here. I originally had top three here, which I met. My season-long goal was to go under 15:00 and I got that, finally.

We read about your sub-15:00 goal in the newspaper and you were close at the Wisconsin State Meet (where he ran 15:07).
Yeah, at the end of the team season, I just ran into a few bad meets and finally, at States, I had a good one. It's been a long road to get under 15:00 and I finally got it.

When you put "Top Three at Foot Locker" on your goal sheet at the beginning of the season, how deeply did you believe you could do it? Did you ever doubt yourself?
Sometimes, when I didn't have a good race or something I was like, "I don't even know if I'm going to make it to Nationals." But one thing that helped was that my dad always told me, "I really think you can win it." And that just made me confident in training, even when things were going badly.

Your dad also ran for Donn Behnke at Stevens Point Area Senior High School. Does he give you a lot of advice about running?
Just about every day my dad and I sit down and talk about running... It just keeps you loving the sport.

You broke Tim Hacker's "state record" in winning the Wisconsin State Cross Country title this fall. Was it on the same course that he ran?
It was a different course. I think the course are comparable but you never know. I ran the same course that he ran at his state meet but it was in the middle of my season. I wasn't in peak condition but I ran a 15:36, so I was about 20 seconds off.

Did breaking his record give you a lot of confidence?
Definitely. That was something else that was on my goal sheet. I really wanted to get the record, so that was a confidence boost, but I wanted to go under 15:00 doing it. Next year I'll have to try to get that one.

You're going to be the top returning runner next year, based on today's results. How does that make you feel?
Right now it hasn't sunken in totally, but it makes me feel good... But I also have to realize that everyone's going to be looking at me and watching me. It's kind of stressful but I'm not really going to think about it too much, I'm just going to kind of blow it off until we get here next year. That helped a lot with this race. Thirty minutes before the race, I wasn't even thinking about the race, I was just joking around with the guys, which I never do. That helped a lot.

We talked to Tim Moore at the beginning of the season and he was very quick to point out that there were other runners right behind him last year, sort of passing that "favorite" status off to someone else.
I'm never going to say that I'm the clear-cut favorite for next year because the seventh-place finisher, Yong-Sung Leal, is a junior, even though it doesn't show on the [results] sheet and he's run impressive times. And even though Bobby Curtis didn't run as well as he normally does, he's definitely going to be up there. I'm not fully going to take the role of "top returnee" because there are so many guys who could pop up, just like I did in the last two years. I'm just going to try to use this as motivation to train harder.

You're from Stevens Point, Wisconsin. Did Suzy Favor Hamilton go to the same high school as you do?
Yup. We've got a big poster of her in our fieldhouse.

Has she been an inspiration to you?
Definitely. Having someone else from our small town go out and be successful lets you see that it can happen. When we got here, she pulled me aside and gave me some advice, it's been real cool.

Had you met her before?
No, I was hoping to meet her, so this is nice... We also have another Olympian from our school, Curt Clausen, the racewalker. He came and ran with us one day so that was kind of nice.

Everyone's talking about the close finish between Bobby Lockhart and Tim Moore but you were also right there.
Two and a half seconds, I've studied that already (smiles). Coming around the turn, I just pulled even with them, I just came up to them. I think that kind of put the crap in my legs for the kick. I think I had the best kick of my life but those guys are just so fast that they took off.

At any point did you think you could win it?
When I pulled even with them, I was thinking there was a chance. But then we came around that wide turn and I felt I was kicking to my full ability and they were just pulling away. I was like, all right, third is really good too.

What kind of training did you do this season?
This summer I did 80 to... I hit 100 once. And then during the season I was doing 60-70 with longer intervals. At the end of the season I just did some fast, short intervals. This week, this is the most I've ever tapered, I think I went down to 30 miles. I felt 100 percent today.

Your state meet was a long time ago, right? Did you try to peak twice?
It was six weeks ago. I semi peaked before State, and the week after State, I went back into hard mileage and did 85 miles, kind of to offset being peaked. I kind of did a mini season: hard mileage, then mileage with a little bit of speed, then speed, then taper. I feel it helped me a lot. I'll try to use the experience and hopefully capitalize on it even better next year.