Tara Erdmann Welling: Dealing with Heat and Expectations

Tara Erdmann Welling has adjusted to expecations, heat, and a variety of distances in her running career. Contributed photo.

Tara Erdmann Welling certainly knows a thing or two about running in heat. She grew up in the Arizona desert, prepping at Flowing Wells High School. After winning multiple state championships in high school, she moved on to Loyola Marymount University where she became an All-American in both track and cross country. After college she was picked up by the Nike Oregon Project and enjoyed a couple of successful seasons there before going out on her own this past year as she preps for the 2016 trials. Despite being busy with marriage preparations this summer, Tara took some time to chat with Colorado Track XC about running in the heat so that we could get her expert advice to you when you need it most…the month of July.

Colorado Track XC: Growing up in Arizona, you certainly had to have some heat tolerance. What did you learn about training in the heat?

Tara Erdmann Welling: Training in the AZ heat when I had lived their almost my whole life was very different than training to race in very warm conditions [when you don't live there]. My body acclimatized to the heat. In high school, when I started running sophomore year, I ran at 3 PM, basically the heat of the day with temperatures ranging from 90-105 degrees. It was definitely hot and I constantly drank water throughout the day, wore as little clothing as possible, and jumped in my swimming pool at the end of a run if I could, but I didn’t know any different. It would never cross my mind to wait until 6, 7, or even 8 PM to run when it was “cooler”. Cooler just meant it was maybe low 90’s. It all feels the same… I learned more about heat after I moved to Los Angeles for college where the weather was perfect.

Colorado Track XC: Going to college in California I am sure was a little bit of a change as far as climate, and then up to Oregon was another one, not to mention traveling for races. What tips can you offer about adapting to a new climate?

TEW: Adapting to a climate definitely needs to be taken into account when traveling for a race where conditions are much more extreme than what one is used to. After being away at college for a year, I went back to Tucson for summer training and was constantly dehydrated and sick no matter how much water or fluids I drank. Long story short, I ended up going to the emergency room and received two bags of IV fluid because I was not used to the heat, despite running at 5 AM when temps were still over 85 degrees. In college, I traveled to Des Moines and Austin and had sub-par performances; which, looking back now was 100% due to heat. Conditions are not controllable, but I learned since moving to Oregon and joining the Nike Oregon Project than you can train to acclimate to the heat. For the 2013 USA Outdoor Championships I trained in Park City, which is not only at altitude, but can be very warm in the afternoons. I wore a sauna suit for the last few miles of every run and wore it during parts of workouts to stress my body when temperatures would rise to over 100 degrees in the suit [Note: MileSplit is not recommending that you run in a sauna suit to heat acclimate. This should be done only under expert guidance. The point here is that acclimating to racing in heat sometimes requires unusual kind of efforts.]. I cannot remember the temperature the night of the 10k in Des Moines, but I do know that all the heat training (dreadful, I have to admit) significantly helped by body stay efficient during the 10k.

Colorado Track XC: Running for a big name group like the NOP certainly puts a target on your back, how do you focus and make sure you are ready to go on race day despite the distractions?

TEW: Making sure I am ready on race day comes down to all the training leading up to the race. If training has gone well, then distractions are minimal because I am well prepared and racing to me is all about having fun and being the best I can that day. Wearing an NOP jersey definitely puts a target on your back, but I just focus on my goals for the day and run to the best of my capabilities. There are always going to be critics saying this and that, but I just forget about it and enjoy what I am doing.

Colorado Track XC: How do you deal with/embrace the role of favorite? I am thinking more of your sweep of the HS championships in 2007, though feel free to draw on whatever, I am sure wearing an NOP jersey comes with being a favorite many time in your life.

TEW: 2007 was a remarkable year for me and although I may have been the favorite for the mile and two-mile (not the 800m favorite), I never thought of it that way. To me, racing is all about who shows up that day. I don’t focus so much on what the competition is, unless it is a group of girls that I know I can run with and key off of, to race to a personal record. When it comes to race day, I focus on what I can do and usually that means running a PR. If I PR and lose it still sucks and I will be pissed, but I can deal with it. Being a favorite in a race is completely irrelevant if you do not show up and race that day.

Colorado Track XC. Training schedules that have leaked out of the NOP seem daunting, what keeps the fire burning when the going gets tough? Any big goals for 2015 or 2016?

TEW: The NOP training is very tough, but it’s no secret. We do the hard work and results come. The workouts are very basic in terms of the interval distance, but the time goals are what makes the workouts seem “daunting”. We train at goal pace, so it’s definitely hard. Many times racing actually seems easier than the workouts because when your racing you can only red line for so long, where as in training you can red line essentially longer because of the recovery interval.

The goals for 2015 right now are running a fast 10k this summer and potentially running a fast half marathon in the fall. Everything else is just icing on the cake! I love the longer distances, so a half marathon is definitely a distance I want to try. 2016 is a long ways out, so ask again at the end of 2015, but everyone knows it is an Olympic year! 

Colorado Track XC: If you could give 18-year-old Tara some advice, what would it be?

TEW: This is a very deep question with many possible directions, but assuming the audience is looking for college advice… Make a list of what is truly important to YOURSELF (and family) only! Don’t worry about where your friends are going, where you think you might want to be after college, etc…When it came down to choosing a college for me I know I wanted a coach(es) who truly cared about their athletes and had a training system that I know would work well for me, had a team that would support each other and have fun (no matter how successful we were or weren’t) and had a good academic program. I loved running and I wanted to have a positive influence on others to have fun doing it. I also knew that I wanted to directly help a growing program and expand it to the national level. I knew going to Loyola Marymount University I would find all of that! I also had doubts my freshman year that I was going to be top five because I constantly was striving just to be better.