Going Olympic with Matt Lenehan Going Olympic with Matt Lenehan

So, you’re originally from San Diego, but now you’re in S.F. Do you say ‘Hella’ a lot? 

[Laughter]

I don’t. I think it’d be a bit of a fraudulent thing if I did. If you’re a native, you can confidently say it. I do say ‘Gnarly’ because I grew up in San Diego. In college, I met a lot of people from the bay, and they would laugh at me for saying gnarly unironically like I’m some sort of cartoon character.

How about this—I still say ‘Rad’.

Rads good. I use rad.

Do you really? I feel like it’s such an dated term. I say it in our Slack meetings sometimes, and I’m positive the guys in Paris are looking at each other like, ‘Did he just say, “Rad”?’

[Laughter]

What’s the most the old-timey, depression-era word that we can bet on coming back?

Maybe ‘Capitol’? We should bring back ‘Capitol’. ‘Oh, that’s capitol, Charles.’

What’s that? I’ve never heard that.

It’s like old-school, posh Oxford twat slang. 

Oh, right. Yeah. I can hear it now. Capitol.

I’ll use it in the intro and maybe it’ll come back. 

Cool.

I was just looking at the Orlando Olympic Trials website, and they have a crazy detailed bio of you, including your favorite songs, T.V. shows, and movies. You listed the Flip video Sorry as a favorite. Are you still skating?

Well, I used to skate every day—

Not anymore?

Not really, but I’m still very tuned in to the skate video world. I mean, ever since third grade, I’ve watched almost an hour’s worth of skate videos per day. I’m kinda all about the skate video stuff, even though my board isn’t even with me anymore.

Where is it?

It’s at my parents’ house in San Diego. But, yeah, I watch skate videos every day, and that video [Sorry], and all the videos that came out at that time... I feel like that was the golden age of skate videos.

Was it a conscious decision for you to stop skating, though? Like, was it about avoiding an injury that might mess with your running?

Well, I was pretty bad at it... I think it was just a little more difficult for me [to skate] in San Francisco because there’s not a lot of good parking lots around. I mainly just do flat-ground and curbs, so even though I know San Francisco is loaded with historic spots, I’m not hitting Clipper Hubba or anything like that. But, yeah, I mean, I did a lot of running for a long time and I’d also skate after school. I think mainly [I don’t skate here] because the city is kinda hectic, and I like to be in a parking lot where I can just put on headphones and cruise around and not be hit by a car.

How did you get into running? 

In high school, my best friend missed football sign-up, but his parents made him do a sport. He was supposed to get on the football team, but for whatever reason, he missed sign-up, and the only other option available was cross-country, which doesn’t really take any tryouts or anything. So, he was doing that, and his parents kinda convinced my parents to put me in cross-country too. So, that’s how it started. It was my freshman year of high school.

Who was your friend?

He’s my best friend to this day—Dillon. And he was good at cross-country right away. I was one of the slowest people in the entire school for the first few races.

Why?

Well, for one, I had skate shoes. 

That’ll do it. 

Yeah. There are hilarious photos from back then where I’m wearing split shorts, but my boxers are right above my knee, like, showing outside the shorts.

[Laughter]

But I had one good race—I think it was my fourth race or something. They give you a popsicle stick when you finish with the number that you finished on it, and there might’ve been thirty or so people racing, and I was number seven. And to this day, I don’t know how I came in seventh. Like, when I die and meet the Higher Power, that’s going to be the first question—

How did I finish seventh?

Yeah, because I have no recollection of passing anyone. 

That’s weird.

And this is like pre-Strava. No one had GPS tracking, so there’s a decent chance I took a shortcut. 

Oh, you cheated?

Yeah, but it would’ve been accidental cheating. But that result gave me confidence, and something clicked that day. After that, I was always finishing that high.

So, has everything leading to your career as a professional athlete been an accident?

Yeah, definitely. 

Then you were on the U.C. San Diego Cross-Country team... At what point did it dawn on you that you could try for the Olympics? That couldn’t have been an accident.

Well, in my last year in college, I did an eight-mile tempo run where I think I ran 5:16 pace around the U.C. San Diego campus, and I remember telling my parents, ‘Okay, if I can hold that pace for a marathon, then I can qualify for the Olympic trials.’ So, that became my goal. I just thought that once I graduate, I’ll have that as a real North Star goal. But I didn’t think about it that much. It was just something I put out into the world; it was just there, way out in the distance, but I didn’t fixate on it. I just worried about getting a little better, like, how can I hold that pace for a ten-mile race? How can I do it for a half marathon?

Right.

I mean, I ran maybe eight or nine marathons before I got my trials qualifier. So, it was very iterative, y’know? Just get a little bit better each year and try to stay healthy; that’s the main thing.

What’s the qualifying time for the trials?

Well, they change it every Olympic block. So, the first time I qualified, you had to run sub 2:19—

Damn.

And this last one, they moved it up a minute for the guys. You had to run sub 2:18. But it always changes, you know?

And your P.R. is 2:17, right?

Yeah.

So, you’re right there, dude. You’re on top of it. 

Yeah, but... Well, I have no idea, but I think they’re gonna make the time faster again, which will mean I need a new P.R.

I don’t know if this was a joke—because it seemed like something you’d maybe joke about—but I read on your bio that your laces came undone twice in the 2020 trials?

Oh yeah, that’s true.

What happened?

Yeah, well, mile 17 of the Houston Marathon, I was running with the pack, and I had a fresh pair of shoes—you know, I wanted to have them fresh for the race—

Of course.

And I guess I didn’t know the risk of the laces on these shoes coming undone. So, they came untied, and it was really cold; I had to rip my gloves off—

Oh my god.

—yeah, I mean, it probably didn’t take that long, but I ditched the gloves there and kept going, and it was only three miles later that the same shoe came untied again.

Come on!

I know. And at that point, I was like, I just gotta ride this untied to the finish line if I can. 

Right.

But I was running with a big pack, and I was worried someone was gonna clip me from behind, and then the shoe would just come right off—

Oh, man.

—in which case, I was prepared to rip the other shoe off and try to run barefoot.

[Laughter]

At that point, there was only three or four miles, you know? I was like, ‘I can do it!’ But thankfully, that didn’t happen.

Do you want to name and shame the shoe brand with the dodgy shoelaces?

No, no. The problem was me. The problem was me learning how to tie my shoes properly.

[Laughter]

Okay. So, you tried out for the trials again this year, it didn’t happen, so have you got your sights set on 2028?

Yeah! I mean, a lot can change in that time, but I’d love to go back. It’s always a fun weekend with all the other runners; we all stay in the same hotel, and you run into people in the elevators and stuff. It’s a fun time, so I definitely want to make three trials in a row if I can do it. 

Maybe this is a dumb question, but how do you train for something that’s four years out? I can’t get my head around that. Do you just maintain a base distance and pace until the months leading up to the trials, or... 

So, right now, the window to qualify is not open, so if I run the time tomorrow, that’s not going to get me into the trials; it doesn’t matter at this point. So—and this is always true—right now, especially right now, it’s important to keep the relationship with running healthy. Like, you make it so you enjoy the process and don’t get burnt out on the whole thing because you’re stressing, like, ‘I’m not fit enough right now’ or ‘I’m too fit right now—I’m peaking too early.’

Right, that’s what I was thinking, like, how do you disengage from that serious training mindset and then reengage when the time comes?

Yeah, you just gotta do the training you want to do just off vibes, pretty much. Run distances that are not your primary distances so you don’t get lost in comparing yourself to past versions of yourself, y’know? Because you can play that kind of mind game. You just gotta keep it fun. Which is even true when you are in season, but right now, that’s what’s going through my head when I’m out there.

2028 is in L.A., right? So, it’s a home game for you.

Yeah, yeah, we’ll see... It’ll be cool. Maybe I’ll go and watch.

Dude, no. Don’t talk like that.

Look, if I make it, you and the readers will know that I’ve been taking steroids.

[Laughter]

Stop talking like that!

It would be that unbelievable. 

Come on! Okay, last question. I interviewed Courtney Dauwalter a couple of days ago [for the next issue of POSSESSED], and she explained how she deals with the voice in her head when she’s pushing herself through those crazy ultra races. Do you have any sort of psychological strategies to keep you moving at the pace you need to hold in a marathon?

Well, I can’t really comment on Courtney. She’s on a whole other level; she’s an absolute legend. But for me—especially when I’m running in a pack—it’s just a lot of fun. It just feels primitive, like you’re hunting deer; especially CIM [California International Marathon], which has these huge packs, like, it’ll be one hundred runners who are all in the same plus or minus ten seconds, and it’s like a giant herd. And it’s fun to turn off your brain and just listen to the footsteps or replay song lyrics in your head over and over again... Just keeping my brain out of the flow of the day is the best, like, I’ll run better if I can just think less. 

Right.

And maybe that’s true for people who do insane ultra distances, but that’s kinda my thing, like, switch your watch to time-of-day mode so you’re not looking at splits, and try not to see the time as it goes by at different mile marks.

Just don’t think. 

Just don’t think. That’s kinda it for me.

That and maybe Velcro shoes.

Man, yes. That’s the innovation I need right there. I’ll make the Olympics when they make a Velcro Vaporfly.