I am overseas! I finally made it over here!

Brief disclaimer: Anyone who tried to get in touch with me, my phone was jacked up. I was about to pull the plug on sprint, but I had the SIM card upside down so...my bad. I’m back now! Texts messages are expensive so hit me via BBM, email, or Facebook if you need me.

Recap of the past couple of months. I went into USAs with a season’s best of 147 @ New York in a Diamond league 800. So, as you can imagine, running three rounds was going to be a little grueling. I knew that I was strong, so I had to have confidence that I had done everything right up to that point #zeroroomfordoubt. I ran 3 x147 to claim third at Outdoor Nationals. Overall, I was happy with the result, but I am not content with the time thus far. Not to worry, fast times and podium spots will come soon!

That brings us to more recent developments. The last time that I posted I was excited about racing more and I had yet to decide on a racing schedule with Ryan and Cook. That is set in stone now and I'll be racing in Nouro, Italy on the 14th and then Lagnano on the 18th. I will do my best to get video up from these races.

Considering all the travel and racing I've been doing these past few weeks, workouts have been going very well! I'm excited to see this progress translate into some good openers in Europe! I'm also looking forward to getting more experience racing meets back-to-back. I'll put up the schedule for the rest of the season a.s.a.p.!

I know that this summer season is barely starting, but I want to get sentimental for a moment. I would like to touch briefly on my experiences up to this point. I have had a lot of setbacks, I mean A LOT. It wasn’t until I realized that there is truly a small population of people that care about you and that you need to honor this. No matter how bad the set back was I found strength in these people and was able to put my head down and push forward. Don’t get me wrong, it was uncomfortable and was not easy.. injury is no joke.

Once I started to gather a little momentum from the group of people that sincerely believe in me, I found my passion for racing and training again. I am thankful for this. I would like to thank my family, friends , and the small camp of people who actually think that what I’m doing is the bees knees. Again, THANK YOU. Have faith in yourself.

That being said...It’s crazy in the Netherlands! We flew over with the World Cup Final approaching and the Netherlands made the final. They are ready to burn this place down. Meanwhile, we keep getting reminded by Cook about the time he was with an athlete in a country who'd made it to the World Cup. Apparently, it was chaos in the country the people rioted. Bad News! People got hurt. (Sorry about my blogs being so tragic/Jean Claude Van damm/ Last Action Hero movie, its not that bad). So, fair warning coach. Despite the risks, we are going into Amsterdam to check out the game anyway! hahaha

Thank you all for your support!

J.Hern


Ps . I think the contact section wasn’t working, it’s working now.
Pss. I’m ready for Texas Football
Psss. Quit farting, u know who u are. Lol
Pssss. Mulder 1, J.Hern 1

 

Its time to go to work.

 

I am almost on my way to Europe! I have a couple more races in the US and then I am jet setting.  I guess before I address all that. I wanted to talk about the past couple of months.

 

    As soon as I caught my flight out of Mexico on the 26^th of April, I was racing two days later at Penn relays. Not only was this a great transition to racing, but it was a great introduction to the outdoor mind set. If you didn't get a chance to see the races check them out (my teammates Leo Manzano and David Torrence were the anchors)

     Aside from the traveling and setting future travel plans, I am in Austin. I'll soon be heading out of town on June 10^th for a big meet in New York, then to North Carolina for training till USAs, then to Prefontaine, and wont  come back until the  July 4^th –July 7^th. Then I will be gone till September with our travels over to Europe.  From what I've gathered from others in the group we will be staying 20 miles Northeast of Amsterdam in Castricum. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castricum). We may possibly stay with some guys from the Netherlands who we met in Mexico at the training camp, so I'm super pumped. 

 

     My feelings are still the same toward my training and my focus is clearer than ever. I am very happy with how I am able to handle some of the workouts that are thrown at me. Also,I couldn’t speak more highly of the training group that I am in.  Furthermore, I couldn’t be happier to get the experience of racing abroad (since my travel abroad only consists of going to Mexico and Kingston, Jamaica, which by the way hit the news under a darker headline - http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/americas/05/29/jamaica.violence/index.html?iref=allsearch )

 

Kinda crazy.

 

Other than that, I am just trying to figure out where I am going to put all of my furniture, where I am going to sign a lease for the next year, and trying to tie up all the loose ends before I leave. Alsoooooo,  I am planning to attack a new business venture (hopefully), it is in the process. I hope it really takes off, but I won't talk too much about it until it hits the World Wide Web. So,Stay tuned.

 

Let me know if there is anything I can answer for anybody. Thanks a lot for following our journey this season and more importantly, taking interest in my career.  There is a lot of work to be done!

 

Thanks!

 

J.Hern

PS. Back to the Aluminum Package with sprint !
Pss. Ill do a better job @ my schedule, slacking.

           I wasn’t supposed to say anything, but I finally got the OK! Congratulations to my sister Melissa and her husband Jimmy! I’m so happy to be an uncle and have the opportunity to be part of their child’s life. Who knows, maybe I’ll learn something before I start getting the pressure to have little Jacob's running around. Again, I am very proud that I’m going to be an uncle. Congratulations , Jimmy and Melissa Spence!

            Whats new? Recently, we took a trip to San Miguel de Allende (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Miguel_de_Allende) for the weekend. I had never heard of the place being a tourist spot, but it was great! As I’ve been seeing more and more, the town was marked by an old Spanish and Mexican influence, but not to the exclusion of American businesses (i.e. Starbucks, Can you tell I’m a coffee connoisseur?) During the brief trip, we caught the end of a Good Friday parade (a demonstration of Jesus rising) and then headed to dinner at a nice restaurant with a terrace overlooking the city. Enjoying the night on the town was a much appreciated change of pace from 2-A-Day track work. We also had the opportunity to make our way back towards Leo's hometown, where I discovered the final piece of the puzzle that is Leo!

             Training, training, training. I have ’till the 21st and then I am free! I am ready to roll out. Although I would love to stay and make this my training spot, I am ready for the states. I recently found out that I am running at Penn Relays on the 24th, the one thing that I don't know is what leg I am running or who will be running on my team. We are hoping to run the team that we have here (David Torrence, Leo, and I). Regardless, I can’t wait to race with the ol' Red, White and Blue at Penn. It will be my first outdoor professional race. See how it goes.

                  Overall, I think training is going well. I have two and half weeks and things are starting to pick up. I am really excited to get into the season. I will be in Austin on the 24th after the race and off to Jamaica on the 28th. I may just avoid the beginning of Texas heat…

See y’all guys in a couple weeks.

Thanks,

Jakob

P.S. If I run 2:15 for the 800 leg, expect the website to be taken down.

P.S.S Congrats to the Longhorns on the DMR win.

 VIDEO:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ftOVyCZiWI


AYE AYE AYEEEEEE, ARRIBA!

          Sorry for the delay in blogs! Before diving into the adventure that is training in Mexico, I want to talk briefly about my indoor season.  Although it was short, it was beneficial to my development as an all-around mid-distance runner. Running the mile twice, I set a PR of 4.04. I also had the opportunity to mix it up with some of the nation’s best 800 runners. I’ve come away from indoors with a taste of how things are done in post collegiate track and field.

        Fast forward to today, I am in Mexico!   I’ve only been here for a couple of weeks now, but I want to blog about this experience as often as I can ( so stay tuned). So far, it has been an exciting and eye-opening experience. I’ve confronted my heritage in a way that just hasn’t been possible in the States. For the most part, these confrontations have gone smoothly thanks to some familiar faces (e.g. starbucks). However, I sometimes catch myself saying "Si" and "gracias" when I don't need to…this mutterings are usually accompanied by a confused/dumb look on my face. I mean lets be honest, I should know spanish. Hernandez is probably one of the most mexicano names in the book.. its kinda embarrassing. I have a long way to go, but I’m pretty sure my translational team (Rosetta Stone, Leo, Ruiz, and Torrence) can pull me through.

             San Luis Potosi is a small, but beautiful city that we sometimes visit to get away from the running shoes and dri-fit for an evening. It has the basics of any modern town and is dotted with tons of authentic little places to eat. As I mentioned before, familiar chains have eased my transition, but I am still surprised when I see another Starbucks or even Wal-Mart down the street.  One thing I didn’t expect was that even the American chains have their own little twists. For example, MexicanTony the tiger has a tan, the shelves at wal-mart are shorter for reach and los ninos soccer teams are sponsored by Corona...and you can buy pig feet right next to the bannas (not even playing, you can't make that up).

          Overall, we have a pretty nice set up, we are staying at an apartment right across from the training centre ( La Loma, check out some pictures that I posted), we are rolling around in a 1990 throwback candy green-suburban with a tape deck with a sweet selection of music that this guy left us (serenta, google it), and perfect weather ( 70 cool in the morning, gets up to 80 during the day.. im getting to be tanned latino heat). Aside from the training centre where we do a lot of our work, there are endless places to run. Tangamanga park, where parades, soccer games, gardens and even zoo animals exist, is a runner’s paradise. Not to be cheesy, but it has endless soft trails and great scenery to go along with it. If you get tired of that, you can just head out to a trail immediately outside of the city and get lost in some mountainous terrain (where you can see sheep herders and real cowboys).
          
        As far as training, its only the second  week and I am tired. We are working hard, but it comes easy when you have to line up with these guys everyday (Count on Shannon for pushing the easy days).

         Everyday I wake up and think. Today all you need to do to be one of the best in the work is:  Get up, drink coffee, work hard, eat, sleep.

      I am planning on my first meet on being In Jamaica on May 1st. So there is something to gear up for. Stay tuned, I will post more pictures and blog more! I hope to hear from some of yall!

Vive la Me·hico! Look for more blogs.. it wont be another three months

J

P.S.  -- For some reason my aluminum package Sprint plan-text messages are not going through ( or maybe its because I don’t have any friends).  So if you really want to talk to me, email me or face me.