July 2, 2009

By Peter Gambaccini, runnersworld.com

Phoebe Wright of the University of Tennessee placed third (behind Hazel Clark and Geena Gall) in the 800-meter run in a personal best 2:01.12 at the USATF Championships in Eugene last weekend. This year, Wright was a Southeastern Conference champ indoors and outdoors in the 800. She was second at the NCAA Indoor Championships; outdoors, she was first at the NCAA Mideast Regional and fifth at the NCAA Championships. Wright has been part of the Tennessee Lady Vols' phenomenally successful relays in 2009, which included world records in the Distance Medley at the NCAA Indoor Championships (10:50.98) and in the 4x1500 at the Penn Relays. She and teammates also won the Distance Medley and 4x800 at the Penn Relays. Wright, a native Tennessean, has a personal best of 54.43 for 400 meters. She is a double major in biochemistry and ecology. In high school, her best 800 was 2:15.95, and she was fifth at her state championships.

What were you planning on doing this summer if you didn't finish in the top three at the USATF Championships and didn't have a World Championships "A" standard (2:00.0) to chase? Would you be starting to take a break, or continue racing through?
Phoebe Wright: I would keep racing through, but it depends on if I had the means to do it. If I had the chance to make a World team in any situation, I would attempt to make it. That's something you don't pass up. If I didn't have a chance, I'd probably take some time off and start building up my base again.

What are the immediate plans to try and get the "A" standard? We read something about Hazel Clark (the sister of her coach, J.J. Clark) possibly pacing you in a race. Have you made a quick decision as to how you're going to go for the standard?
PW: (Laughs). I wish I had. All the plans are up in the air, and I'm ready for any last minute situation. It's just like "we might find out Friday what you'll be doing, and you'll be leaving Saturday if the plan goes right." My coach told me that. I was like "oh, that's not stressful."

Geena Gall is in the same situation as you (in the USATF top three but needing the standard). Could there be some race involving both of you?
PW: I'm not sure, because I don't really talk to her on a regular basis. But I'm pretty sure she's going over to Europe.

Having just done 2:01.12 for the 800, does something like 1:59.9, below the World Championships standard, seem within your reach at this point?
PW: Absolutely. All of the workouts I've been doing are on 1:59 pace or faster. I've been running 2:02s since February, and usually, when you're consistent, it's time for a big drop. I haven't had a non-windy race. Even at the USA Championships, every day, it was windy. That (final) would easily have been a 1:59 race if we'd had decent weather. It's just a matter of finding a good race where people are actually breaking 2:00. Good weather is important. I'll just get in there and roll with them.

Is it possible, at an NCAA or USATF final in the 800, to get a clear run the whole way, given the tight pack that there is?
PW: It is, but there's an art to getting in the front and staying out of trouble - and I'm not that great at it, but I've at least gotten a lot better than last year. The ideal situation would be to get in a big race and get in the front, right on the leader's shoulder in second or third place, and just stay there, stay out of trouble, don't get boxed in, and follow them straight to a 1:59. That would be ideal. Another situation would be I'd have a rabbit, and that would be ideal, too. I would prefer "racing" as opposed to "running" the time. There's a little bit of a difference.

The 800's tricky. My coach told me it's the only race that hardly anybody negative splits. You have to sacrifice so much to get good positioning. You have to go out and 27 (seconds for the first 200 meters) just to stay out of trouble, or else you're going to lose seconds fighting the pack.

There were some complaints about Alysia Johnson elbowing people in the USATF final. Did she elbow you?
PW: Yeah, but it's the 800. You expect to get bumps and bruises and fight for your spot.

You were much more satisfied with the USATF performance than the fifth at NCAAs, where you said you "overanalyzed" things. Can you explain that?
PW: I went in (to NCAAs) and I was timid. I was worrying about if I couldn't do it. I was worrying about my legs hurting. I was worried about not getting good positioning. By worrying about it, I didn't do what I was supposed to do. I was supposed to get in the front and stay in the front. I thought about it too hard, became apprehensive and let the pain get to me and didn't worry about racing and worried about running. It's a totally different mentality if you're going for the win as opposed to just going to run an 800.

But I'm kind of thankful that did happen to me, because it gave me a second to step back and realize that if you're getting ready for practice, you don't think about it all day. You don't worry about it. You don't worry if you can hit the times. You just go and you warm up and you get on the line and you're nice and loose and you run the times. So for USAs, my goal was just to not think about it, warm up, and run my times. I went into it with a totally different mentality. I went into it thinking I could actually win and I could run with anybody out there. And so I ran with confidence, and it really showed.

Do you know how you were able to make that switch in your mind? Was it just that disappointment made you resolve to be different?
PW: I really think regret was my biggest motivation. That (NCAAs) was my only flop all season, and it was like "oh, this is why I don't like losing." So you go step on the line and you fix it.

Your personal best going into this year was a 2:04.3. You're still young and maturing, but you've been consistently running far better than that this year. Is it just a matter of physically maturing and being able to handle more work in the course of the year?
PW: Last year, I was in a lot better shape than 2:04. I could have run 2:02. I was just too scared to race people who were running 2:02. At Penn Relays, I split 2:01 (on a relay leg), but that was just me and one other person, and I was just trying to get the baton to our team. But when I got to NCAAs, it was a whole pack of people. They had significant PRs on me. I thought about it way too much, and I never even put myself in the same league as them. So I never raced to my potential last year. But a lot of it is that I'm a lot stronger. I actually ran cross country this year. Last year, I was running 23:00 for a 6k, and this year I was running 21:00 and some change. I think that's the reason I've made it so far in the season. I find if you don't run cross country, you just run out of gas before NCAAs (in outdoor track).

You were a "walk on" (non-scholarship) athlete at Tennessee in the beginning, but you did have a pretty good high school career...
PW: You're the first person who said that!

Did you go to Tennessee with the understanding that if you improve, they'd be able to give you a scholarship?
PW: We didn't have stipulations like that, but I was "I will have a chance to run my way to a scholarship." I took a recruiting visit and met a lot of the people on the Lady Vols staff.

Obviously one of the highlights of being at the University of Tennessee is the success you've had with the relays. I don't know how much you could have anticipated that when you went there. It must be an expected pleasure to be running on world record and American record relays with your teammates.
PW: I don't think anybody could have expected that. That was amazing. I love all those girls on the relays. It's just amazing to run fast for yourself and three other people, and for them to all do the same.

And when you show up to a place like Penn Relays and win three major races, that's everything you could possibly want for that weekend.
PW: Well, last year we went and got second in every event. So when Coach asked me "do you want to attempt all three relays again this year," I said "yes, I have got to redeem myself." Second is a hard place to get three times in a row.

How did you get started in running? Was running your first serious sport?
PW: I played soccer for awhile until tenth grade or so. But I realized I'd have a better career in track than I had in soccer.

What are you looking towards doing after college?
PW: I'd like to coach.

So when you finish as an undergraduate, would you first be looking into some kind of graduate assistant type situation?
PW: I don't know. I think I'm going to apply to the masters program here in biochemistry. My fallback plan is that I'd want to do pharmaceutical research or genetic research. My gut's telling me to follow that.

So as we wonder what Plan A and Plan B are for you to get the World Championships standard, do you still feel fresh and that there's a lot more in your legs?
PW: Yes, because Coach (J.J.) Clark has this down pat. Hazel won NCAAs and then she made the Olympic team at 21 and she made it out of at least one of the rounds at the Olympics (Hazel Clark made it to the final in 2000 and finished seventh). I think a big part of it is that I trained through all the meets like SECS and Regionals.