2005 NCAA INDOOR TRACK & FIELD CHAMPIONSHIPS
Interview with Nick Willis

Reported by Parker Morse

Nick Willis first drew attention as a New Zealand prep when he ran a 4:01 mile. His early NCAA career at the University of Michigan continued to show flashes of brilliance, including a share of the indoor DMR title with Michigan's team in 2004. After redshirting the 2004 outdoor season to prepare, Willis advanced to the semifinal of the Athens Olympic 1,500m, where he finished just 0.19 seconds shy of the final and was the fastest non-qualifier. After an injury cut short his cross country season last fall, Willis returned to win his first individual NCAA title at the 2005 NCAA Indoor Track & Field Championships, where he ran the mile in 4:00.69.

Willis talked with the press briefly after the mile before his coach, Ron Warhurst, pulled him away to cool down and prepare for the 3,000m.

On the effort required to win:
It was not nearly the challenge that I thought it would be. I was really looking out for the Jeffersons [Sean and John] and [Said] Ahmed, but I'm not quite sure what happened. My big thing has always been to do a big drive from 400 or 300 meters out, but with the 3,000m in an hour, I thought I'd best just wait for the last 200 and practice a smooth acceleration. I've really been training for the distance races this year, so the mile was almost a bit of a step down for me. I was really happy, I didn't expect it to be quite as comfortable as it was.

On where he is on his fitness curve:
Well, I'm really really pleased and blessed that I've gotten here. In December, if you'd asked me if I was going to be running indoors, I would've said no. So that was only three-and-a-half months ago. I had two months off with an injury. I did a lot of mountain biking when I was back home for Christmas, and the fitness came back really quickly. I'm just really happy that I'm healthy, and hopefully I'll just prepare myself for [the World T&F Championships in] Helsinki in August. I'm going to run the 5,000m in the outdoor season, just so I can sort of train through the NCAA stuff and get a base, which I missed out on in the fall.

On his reaction to winning his first NCAA championship:
Yes, I have never won an NCAA title before, but I have been really lucky to be able to go to a lot of other things, like the Olympic Games. It was more to help the team, to be honest. It was nice to win an NCAA title, but I don't think I would've lost any sleep if I'd retired never having won an NCAA title. It is a big deal to be over here, but coming from another country, you're not brought up with the whole national championship idea. It's always the big-scale things.

Willis was less successful in the 3,000m, where he had been runner-up to Alistair Cragg in 2004, and where he had been considered a favorite. This time, Willis looked drained, and though he still appeared to be within striking distance of the lead pack, he stepped off the track with nearly a kilometer remaining. Willis returned to the press area after that race to talk with MensRacing.com about the highs and lows of his day.

MensRacing.com: You came in with a double in mind, but you suggested before that you wanted it more for the team. It seems like both you and Nate [Brannen] were loaded up for this meet. Did you have big goals in mind?
Nick Willis: Yeah, we were really loaded up, and that's why I actually feel pretty disappointed with myself that I let the team down by pulling out of the 3K. That really wasn't a team-oriented thing to do. I need to reflect back on this weekend and learn to toughen up. There are probably a lot of people who aren't really happy with me, and I'm not really happy with myself. It takes a lot of the glamour off of the initial mile win, which really was for the team in the first place.

MR: You did win a race, and there aren't a lot of people who can say that.
NW: Yeah. But at the same time, it would be pretty arrogant to be saying, 'Ah, it doesn't matter about the 3K,' because I know my coach is pretty disappointed, I'm pretty disappointed with myself and rightly so. I didn't show the true pride that wearing the block 'M' on your chest should be about. It's just a split-second decision in your mind. Once you do it there's no going back, and as soon as you do it you regret it. But, oh well.

MR: Do you feel like part of being a great athlete might be setting big goals?
NW: You set big goals, but you also set realistic goals, close to the limits of what you're capable of. Through time, with your coach, you ought to, together, get a feel for what your body's capable of doing. We really thought this was an achievable thing. Who knows what could've been, but I might have just been mentally weak for the second race.

MR: Was one of the goals being able to run through rounds as you would at a major championship?
NW: Yes, and the first round actually went a little faster than I expected. We ran 4:03, and for some reason, I guess I was underestimating the NCAA, I thought it would be like 4:08. That didn't really take too much out of me, though. I do think, though, that my fitness — after having taken two months off with an injury — has gotten back to where it was last year, but I have a tendency to think that my recovery hasn't quite caught up to that, if you know what I mean. Because I haven't the background. The Big Tens a couple of weeks ago really reflected that, because I wasn't able to bounce back nearly as comfortably as I had been the previous year. So [it was] just not having the mileage under my legs.

MR: Was this the injury that kept you out of cross country?
NW: Yes, I got it in October. I ran one race in cross country. They diagnosed it as a stress fracture, but I think it turned out to be just a reaction. So we stopped it in time. I took two months away from the sport, and it was a blessing in disguise. I just got to chill out and take a look at things. No running at all. In some ways I really enjoyed it. It was quite nice not to have that as my priority. It really gave me an opportunity to reflect back on my running career so far.

Basically, I've done Stage A of my career, all the way up to the Olympics, which is the ultimate goal of most athletes. So, to get to that point, and then get an injury afterward, it was a chance to really look back and think about how I'd prioritized things. And I think at times I'd made running a little too much of an idol. It became the be-all and end-all of who I was. So now I have a hugely different approach, where it's just something that it's fun to go out and do, and it's a gift that I've been given. So I'll go out and I'll have fun with it, but it's not going to be something that's all of who I am.

If I'm to keep on doing it for the next 15 years, which I'd love to be able to do, I'd better be able to be a fun person to be around, and stay sane myself. I think that's a huge attribute which I've been able to acquire through this injury, which has taught me these lessons.

MR: We've noticed Tim Broe [a volunteer assistant coach for Michigan] has a similar approach. Does having him around help with that sort of focus?
NW: We trained together maybe two or three times a week for a couple of months leading up to the Olympics, but we've been for one or two runs since the Olympics, and that's it. He's been doing a lot of speeches and appearance work following the Olympics, so he's been out of town a lot.

MR: At the [USA Cross Country Championships], he was very clear that everything he was doing was pointed at Helsinki. Are you thinking the same way?
NW: Yes, the ultimate goal is to, a) make the final, and then see how I can do in the final there.

MR: Do you have qualification issues?
NW: They have an 18-month window, so my times from last season will carry through. I'll have to show standards of fitness, obviously, but I wouldn't want to go if I wasn't up to par, anyway. So that's a huge benefit I'll have this year over last summer: I can gear all of my training towards that without having to make all these minor peaks to aim for, trying to qualify each weekend. Because I missed out on a bunch of training, with my injury, I'd like to spend the next three or four months just getting back into base training, maybe focusing on the 5,000m. That's an option we've talked about a little bit.

MR: What's it mean to run for New Zealand? That's a big tradition to be part of.
NW: It is huge. And I forget how much it means to people to see the New Zealand name on the map. Because we're so isolated from the rest of the world, any time that you're actually able to show that we can compete with the best in the world in any sport, the whole country gets behind you. I was really overwhelmed with all of the support and the encouragement I received at the time of the Olympics. We have the Commonwealth Games coming up in a year's time, so that's the next big thing for New Zealand. It's basically the same size as the Olympics in terms of the following we have for it.

MR: It's a year from now, not in the summer months?
NW: It's in Australia, and they have to have it in the Southern Hemisphere's summer. So I'm not going to be running here next year.

MR: That will be tough on some Northern Hemisphere runners.
NW: Most people run indoors anyway, so they're in pretty good shape. But it's the same thing we have to go through all the time, getting ready for the Northern Hemisphere's summer. Now it's a fair situation.

(Interview conducted March 12, 2005, and posted March 25, 2005)