19.09.2007

The right reasons

At 34, Olympian Lee Troop feels younger than he has in a long time.

For a man whose injuries have taken him to hell and back, he feels refreshed. Good in himself. Pleased to leave what’s passed in the past and focus on the things he enjoys most.

“I’d definitely say that’s the correct word to use,” he mused when asked whether ‘rebirth’ is a fitting description of where he’s at and what lies ahead.

On September 30, Troop will contest the Berlin Marathon with his sights on little more than “running fast”.

“It’s been a long time for me that I can honestly say that I’m 100 percent healthy with my body and obviously as keen as mustard to get out there,” he said.

“I’ve still got the hunger to race really hard and obviously with the Olympic Games being less than 12 months away, I don’t need any more motivation than what’s been presented. I’m really excited and looking forward to seeing how fast I can run and I’d really love to run a personal best.”

Troop’s headspace these days is close to the KISS principle - Keep It Simple Stupid - though his outlook, based on experiences, a dogged determination and what he believes he is capable of, is as sharp as vintage cheese.

“I really did complicate things and I probably ran for a number of years with a few chips on my shoulder,” he calculated. “If you’re running for different reasons and the wrong reasons, when things go pear-shaped you’re not left with much standing around. I’m just in a good place. I’ve got a great wife and we have a beautiful baby girl who’s 19 months old and I just find myself going out there and enjoying running.”

The last 18 months have been kind to Troop, though it’s still working its way towards feeling familiar. Missing the Melbourne 2006 Commonwealth Games ate away at him; resentment towards post-Athens injuries his bane.

“I had a bit of a horror run over the last six years with injuries and missing the Commonwealth Games was probably one of the hardest things I’ve had to accept,” he said. “I’ve worked really, really hard with a practitioner down in Geelong who after 18 months has been able to strip my body back completely to where it was in the late nineties.

“I don’t have any injury concerns and a lot of the underlying problems I’ve had have been from early injuries that I had in 2000, so we’ve addressed all of that. I’ve worked extremely hard, doing some pilates and strengthening some deficiencies I’ve got and (wearing) orthotics.

“My training for the last 16 weeks has been as good a preparation I’ve ever had going into a marathon. It’s fantastic to realise that at 34 I’m still able to run as good as I ever have.”

Commonwealth Games aside, last calendar year saw Troop turn his back on a rotten 2005 and a body debilitated for a return to the track, road and terrain. And with success.

Victory in July’s Gold Coast Marathon - doubling as the Australian Marathon Championships - was followed by an August win over 12 kilometres in Tasmania a solid run over 10,000m at the Zatopek Classic to close; Troop the first Australian over the line.

“It was fantastic,” he said of his Gold Coast win. “When I started back at the start of January in 2006 and obviously I wasn’t going to be running at the Commonwealth Games, I set some realistic goals for myself.

“I decided not to think of myself as an international athlete anymore. I wanted to just try and win as many State titles and national titles as I could. I just felt that if I couldn’t win them at a local level, how could I actually consider myself to be an international athlete?

“I took a really big step back and it also allowed the practitioner who was working with me to work and focus hard on me. There wouldn’t be any pressure on myself to have to cut timelines to get ready for big races. That’s a problem that I faced over those four or five years. Every time I got injured it was always a timeline to have to get up for another big race. We would probably push the boundaries on a few of my injuries and I would come unstuck. We decided that I would spend a good 12 months getting my body completely right and doing everything I could to try and get right, because if I couldn’t then there would be no Beijing.

“Gold Coast was an easy option because it was obviously here in Australia and I wanted to win three national titles; I wanted to win the marathon, the cross-country and the track, which I did achieve. Even though I only ran 2:13, which is nothing to be beating the door down with, it was just a great indicator because I was able to go into it healthy, finish the race with no injury concerns and what let me down on that day was just my fitness. I’d only been back running for about six months. To run 2:13 off the limited preparation that I had was just great for my confidence, obviously a very, very small step towards what the bigger picture is which is next year’s Olympics.”

Quite obviously, Beijing is Troop’s main focus as it is for his coach and mentor - Australian marathon great Steve Moneghetti.

Troop reveals that “Mona just wants me to run 2:11.59…the qualifying time” (the A-standard is 2:12.00) and the pair is hoping it comes in Berlin.

However, they did give it an opportunity at this year’s Paris Marathon.

“I chose Paris in April over London earlier on in the year to try and get my qualifying time but had just the most horrific experience I’ve ever had at an international race,” he said. “Not that I want to make excuses, but I never really got a chance to see what level I was at because there was so many extenuating circumstances that led to me pulling out of the race at 30k. Mona had a similar experience in 2004 and he thought it was just a one-off.

“I guess my decision was already made that I had to select the marathon around this time. Obviously there’s Chicago and Berlin and I chose Berlin. I didn’t want to leave it to London of next year because that would mean that I’d only have one chance to qualify. I’m going out there to get a qualifier as early as I can and should it fail, well then at least I do have one more opportunity left next February, March or April.”

The right result will force Troop to consider being an international athlete again and re-visit territory that’s very much his. Our country’s premier marathoner.

Beijing would be Olympic Games No. 3 after a Sydney 2000 debut still lauded by many athletics faithful. Tearing a stomach muscle soon after the halfway mark, Troop pushed on to finish in 66th place and in just under two-and-half-hours. Stirring, given his condition.

Though Athens 2004 was a prettier picture (28th in 2:18.46) from there it was downhill. Troop was learning lessons the hard way and on the biggest stages.

“I guess Lee Troop’s biggest critic is himself,” he noted, self-assessment encouraged. “For me, it’s one of those things where I don’t get caught up in what I’ve done. I’m always looking forward. I remember in Athens in 2004, I ran for two-and-a-half years leading into Athens and it was anti-inflammatories every day and getting cortisone injections whenever I could and I just really pushed my body past its limits.

“I was just so focused on trying to make amends for what happened to me at Sydney and trying to eradicate that performance that by the time I got to the Olympics I was spent. I was like a car that had five gears but only four gears were working. It was just amazing that when I ran at the Athens Olympic Games that it finally hit me like a lightning bolt that ‘this is not what it’s meant to be like. I’m not meant to be chasing my tail, I’m not meant to be out there complicating things.’

“My worst enemy was myself, I just kept putting pressure on myself and probably felt like I was running for the wrong reasons. Coming through the system in the nineties through to ’99, when I broke Clarkey’s record (Ron Clarke’s 5000m) and had a stellar year, there was no pressure. I was just running because I loved it. All of a sudden you go from being a nobody to a somebody, the pressure that was there was just the pressure I was putting on myself.

“When I finished Athens, I remember running to the top of the Acropolis with Mona and my wife,” he continued. “I just made a pact that I was going to keep it simple and I was going to do all the right things to get to Beijing and just go back to the simple philosophies that made me a good runner. It was just unfortunate that three or four weeks after Athens I broke down again and it was just a result of those 240km-weeks, twice a day every day, not missing a day for two-and-a-half years that finally brought me undone.

“I was true to my word when I sort of did get right. (I made) that decision at the start of January in 2006 that I was going to do everything right and I’d do whatever it took to get me right, regardless of the timeline. I probably think then that I’ve reverted to being the athlete that I once was just in my line of thinking. For me, I don’t worry about what I did at Sydney or Athens and all those things. As much as they were tough races, I’ve just used them as launching pads or learning curves for me not to go down that path again, just to run for the right reasons and run for why I want to run and just keep it simple.

“Since I’ve done that I’ve had a great 18 months so I’m really happy with where I am at the moment.”

So he should be. Blessed with the support of a strong network and wife Freyja, daughter Macy and Moneghetti by his side, Troop identifies the need to “maximise the opportunity.”

He also recognises the particular strength of an ally in the widely-respected Moneghetti.

“I know that I’m still not the athlete that I once was but they’re still stepping stones towards the bigger picture,” Troop stated. “People can be quite critical and scathing in stating ‘he’s meant to be back at his best but have a look at him, he’s not going that well’ but Mona’s just always there to defend me and say ‘look, we’re not selling sheep on this, it’s just all part of the big picture.’

“He’s been a great advocate for me and supported me through thick and thin and he’s a guy that I owe a lot of credit to because of the fact that he’s supported me and knows that I’ve got an ability. Other people behind the scenes, the practitioner that I work with, Shane Hamill, I just know that if it wasn’t for him I wouldn’t be running. He’s worked tirelessly in getting me right and sending me down the right paths.

“As you get older you just realise that there are so many small one-percenters that you need to do to keep yourself healthy. It’s like that old cliché that you can’t put an old head on young shoulders. For me, it’s just taken a while for me to mature and accept where I was but then realise what I’ve needed to do to get right. It’s been really encouraging that despite some of the lowlights I’ve had in the past number of years, there are still people out there that believe in me and support me and obviously that’s comforting to know.

“I can say that last year was just a fantastic year even though I wasn’t at the level that I once was. Just to be able to get up and go for a run pain-free was fantastic. People would have no idea the amount of pain I’d gone through in order just to get to the start-line of Athens. I’ve slowly got better and better each week to where I am now, where I honestly believe I’m in the best marathon shape that I’ve ever been in. By taking that little bit of pressure off and just keeping things simple, things are a heck of a lot easier to achieve.”

They’re messages that Troop passes on to his own understudies, three who will compete in next month’s Melbourne Marathon.

Truth is, it’s on those notions that the great divide of runners unite. Sharing goals. Running for the right reasons.

“They’ve got to enjoy it,” Troop said. “I think sometimes, whether it’s the fun run warrior or whether it’s the elite athlete, we look for too many things to try and help us rather than just having patience and realising that to get from point A to point B it takes time. We live in a society where we try to rush everything.

“Be patient, be committed to the goal that you’ve set but, more importantly, just enjoy it regardless of whether it’s to break three hours for the marathon, complete your first marathon or, for me, trying to qualify for an Olympic Games.

“We’ve all got to have those attributes or we don’t achieve what we want.”

By Steve Lavell

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