Shalane Flanagan’s Final Olympics? Probably.

August 15, 2016

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Shortly after crossing the marathon finish line in sixth place on Sunday in Rio de Janeiro, Shalane Flanagan said it was likely the last of her races at the Olympic Games, where she has now competed four times.

Though she hasn’t indicated that she is retiring from competitive running yet, her interests within the next four years are turning toward a coaching role and helping others achieve the kind of success she’s already experienced. Flanagan, 35, won the bronze medal in the 10,000 meters at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and owns the second-fastest marathon time in American history with the 2:21:14 she clocked for third place at the 2014 Berlin Marathon.

“I feel my heart starting to get excited about other athletes genuinely,” she said. “I’ve had 12 years of really high-level running and I think it’s fun to be on the other side.”

Flanagan has been instrumental in recruiting other women to join the Bowerman Track Club, an elite training group coached by Jerry Schumacher based in Portland, Oregon. The group was dominated by men until the past year when Flanagan and Emily Infeld, 10,000-meter Olympian, were joined by six other distance runners, including Amy Cragg, who finished ninth in the marathon on Sunday. In total, the group has seven women competing at the Games this week.

Flanagan has taken a strong hand in mentoring her younger, up-and-coming teammates. It’s a role she’s relished.

“I mean, you never know, but I think I really enjoy helping other people as much as my own training at this point,” she said. “I would love to be helping one of my teammates get on the podium at the next go around instead of it being me.”

Perhaps that will be Cragg, 32, who said after her race that she is not finished with the Games quite yet. Her partnership with Flanagan has made all the difference in her running career—and was a comfort on race day, too, when Cragg felt flustered at the beginning of the race.

“Having her as a training partner every single day, it has definitely brought me to the next level,” Cragg said. “I know I’m doing every single thing I possibly can to be the best I could today. A big part of that is being around Shalane. I never second-guess what I’m doing.”

Flanagan has the same adoration for Cragg, saying on Sunday that she rejuvenated her marathon training at a point in which it felt like it was getting “stale.”

“It’s going to be sad when I step away because we’ve had a lot of fun together,” Flanagan said. “She’s probably been one of the best training partners I’ve ever had. It’s been a great process.”

In the past week Flanagan has also released her first cookbook, Run Fast, Eat Slow, which she will spend time promoting on a book tour in the coming months, a time of year that she’s usually dedicated to marathon training. Her first stop is Good Morning America on Wednesday, she said, where she’ll be cooking up a few recipes from the book with coauthor Elyse Kopecky.

“It’s will be fun—a totally different fall than normal,” Flanagan said. “It will be a blast.”

But what’s left on her competitive to-do list? It’s no secret that the Marblehead, Massachusetts native has one New England race she’s always wanted to win—but she isn’t saying when she’ll be back. At the Boston Marathon she finished fourth in 2013, seventh in an American course record of 2:22:02 in 2014, and ninth in 2015.

“My heart’s always in Boston,” Flanagan said.

Although no medals are going back with her, Cragg, or Desiree Linden, who placed seventh on Sunday, Flanagan said she’s still pleased with her results. It seems enough to satisfy her Olympic experiences that all three made the top 10.

“That’s gotta be the best [the U.S.] has ever done,” Flanagan said. “I told Desi at the finish, ‘I’m so proud of us.’ We came here ready to run hard and I felt like we did.”

[Source: Rumar World]