Frank Lara has the skillset to do big things at the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials in Orlando and the confidence to back it up.
Lara, who runs for Altra and trains with the Roots Running Club, has a personal best of 2:11.32 in the marathon, and he believes that he’s capable of more, especially with a spot on the Olympic Team on the line.
While most of his teammates at Roots Running trained in Florida ahead of the Trials, Lara went back home to Houston to get ready to run in Orlando. I had the opportunity to catch up with Lara, as he was a guest on the Lactic Acid podcast. Here is a bit of what we discussed.
Dom: You’ve been ballin ‘out man and you are coming to Orlando on a mission. How has this built up been for you headed into the trials?
Frank: It could not have been more perfect. Honestly, training has been going well. I’ve been here in Houston, I live normally near Boulder, Colorado, and I’ve been skipping the winters lately because they’re rough to train in and I don’t really like having to do hard workouts on a treadmill. But Houston has been pretty perfect for that – I get to hang out with my mom.It’s weird being coached remotely. Normally, my coach Richie will prepare all our bottles and our fluids and everything with what we’re like training with. And now he texts me directions on what to mix and how to do it. I’m very excited. I think what’s most exciting for me about it is that everyone that I know personally that I’ll be competing against are trying to be at the top of their game right now. And I’m just excited to see who comes out on top of everything.
Dom: Is there one thing, or I guess I’m trying to say, what continues to hold that confidence even when it dips? Like is there something internal that you draw back to? Is it like training?
Frank: Honestly, for me, my personal journey with the marathon – every single one that I’ve done, I’ve come out of it thinking, Alright, we figured out some stuff from the last marathon, and I know what we’re going to work on going forward. And every time that I’ve lined up and raced the marathon, I’m like, okay, I know we need to fix some stuff, we’re not quite there yet. But every time I do it, I feel better about how I did. So every marathon build that I’ve done has given me more confidence going into the next one. Because I know what to do, how to do it, what we need to maybe fix change. And it’s like an ongoing conversation I have with my coach. So there’s nothing that I would change personally about how I prepared for this which would affect how I’m feeling about things. I know I’ve done everything I can, and that’s all I can do. And on race day, I have to just assume it’s gonna play out best for me, because there’s nothing that I would have changed about how everything has been going.
Dom: Obviously, the talk of the town happens to be the men, and two people have the standard. And I’m sure you’ve heard all about that, I’m sure you know that. And I’m sure you’re tired of it. And that’s okay, because I’m tired of it too. Do you feel any added pressure going in? Or do you feel like, if I just do what I got to do, it’s all going to work out?
Frank: I mean, not in particular. Part of me at (the Chicago Marathon), I was trying to unlock that third spot for us too. And in that race, it was very cool to be there because everyone was – I felt collectively, we were like, Let’s do this for our country. Let’s get those three spots, we can send our best to Orlando. So when that didn’t pan out, the opportunities to unlock the third spots are kind of dwindling, but based on rankings, I think it’s possible that it will unlock it later in May or whatever. But that’s not something that I’m thinking about going into Orlando. All I know is I gotta have my best race. And if I shoot for the win and win, or get third, I’ll figure out what to do next from there.
Dom: How important has your group at Roots Running been for you in this journey?
Frank: “It’s been a very long journey. And when I joined the team, I was the youngest guy on the team. And I really leaned into Noah Droddy a lot and like Alia Gray, Willie Milam. And they’ve kind of, guided me through and my coach, of course, guided me through what it is like to race on the roads and what it takes to be a marathoner. When I got there, I was like the track guy, and it feels very weird that now I’m now focusing on the marathon. And the team since I joined, we’ve had a few people leave, but we’ve had like a lot of people join since then. So our team has really grown since whenI first joined the team, and it’s been really cool to see like how the team has progressed.
Great coverage Dom of Orlando Race