Begay competes in Olympic trials marathon in Boston
By Chee Brossy
Navajo Times
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| Font: N / N+ / N++ Elite Navajo runner Alvina Begay achieved a personal milestone March 20 when she competed in the U.S. Olympic Trials Women's Marathon in Boston, finishing 45th out of 148 runners.
Begay turned in a time of 2:43:30, 44 seconds off her personal best. Her top-third finish, however, was not enough to qualify her for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, as only the top three finishers earned a place on the U.S. Olympic team.
Deena Kastor of California won the race in 2:29:35, beating out Magdalena Lewy Boulet's time of 2:30:19. Blake Russell took third in 2:32:40.
"I am a little disappointed," Begay said in a phone interview while returning to Arizona after the race. "When you have a goal and you come up short of it, obviously everyone's disappointed.
"Everybody's goal is to be in the top three," she said, adding that beyond making the team, "I wanted to run a personal best.
"You can't really control what anybody else does in a marathon - it's such a long distance that anything can happen. But my time was pretty solid, not too far off my (personal record)."
Begay's average speed over the 26.2-mile course was 6:14 minutes per mile.
Her training leading up to the Boston marathon has been long and strenuous, and now that it's over she wants to take a rest. But make no mistake, more running is in the works.
"It's something I've always been passionate about," Begay said, "I can't just hang up my shoes and say I'm done, I've been doing it for so long.
"But right now I want to let my injuries heal and recover," she said. "I've been putting a lot of wear and tear on my body, I just need to give it rest."
For months leading up to the Olympic trials race, Begay trained at the Center for High Altitude Training in Flagstaff. The training center is internationally renowned for its facilities and high-altitude location - ideal for marathon training - and is the hub of a number of elite distance running groups.
The center made for an intense, focused training environment. But her time leading up to the Olympic trials was marked by emotional challenges as well.
In November, her friend and fellow distance runner, Ryan Shay, collapsed and died while running in the U.S. men's marathon trials in New York City. Shay had also trained at the Center for High Altitude Training.
A day after his death, Begay pushed past her anguish to record her personal best time in the marathon, qualifying for the U.S. Olympic trials in the process with a 2:42:46 showing.
What kept her going through that difficult time was the support from her family, she said.
"Training for the trials is a lot different than training for any other race," Begay said. "There was a lot of pressure involved, a lot of expectations. I learned that you can only worry about doing the best that you can do.
"On the rez you have so many talented athletes, and sometimes the people - coaches, parents - expectations get really high, and in the end you can only do the best that you can on the day you compete. That's what I've learned."
The future is wide open for the 27-year-old Ganado, Ariz., native and who knows, the next stop may be London in 2012.
"I'd like to train for the next Olympics," Begay said. "But I'm really not thinking about that right now. I'm still in the moment of just trying to enjoy the experience."