TOKYO - The United States has never won an Olympic medal in men's triathlon. Maybe the sixth attempt will be the charm. This spring, Morgan Pearson super-charged the nation's hopes by posting a historic result, but the former Colorado runner has taken an unconventional route to Tokyo.
Even now, she is coached by a man known for working with top female cyclists (Dean Golich). He swims with a high school club team in Boulder and calls those kids "my primary training partners." And when he graduated in 2016, his goal was to become a professional runner. But five years later, he rose to the top of the triathlon world with two podium finishes at the World Triathlon Championship Series, the highest echelons of racing. His first medal, a bronze at Yokohama in May, qualified him for the Olympic team. The second, a silver, three weeks later in Leeds, England, was unprecedented. No American had ever won that many medals in the WTCS.
But it's not an award and Pearson, 27, knows it. Since then, his goal has been to do what first-time Olympians sometimes fail to manage: "Keep my head straight and focus on performing in the Olympics. When you're doing well, you don't get complacent." Want. You want to keep that edge… the mental anguish I'm proud of."
Mental grind? Six days after capturing that silver in Leeds, he ran 15 miles at 9,000 feet in Colorado, "not even for physical gain," he said, "but just to be polite. And destroy himself." .
After graduating from Colorado in 2016, with degrees in math and economics, he applied for jobs in analytics, but felt he had more to run. He gave himself a year to get a running sponsor. Otherwise he will give. Six months later, he signed with 361 Degrees, a Chinese shoe and sporting goods supplier, but he lacked direction. "I didn't know what I was doing," he said. "I was tutoring at night, working as a swim instructor, doing retail work on the weekends." Eventually, he said, "I was over it. I was like, 'This is stupid,' so I walked up to [USA Triathlon] like, 'Ah, what's going on? I run.'"
USA Triathlon was interested, but just then, Pearson started running better and suddenly, he was torn. As he was driving home to New Jersey to spend time with his brothers, USA Triathlon told him, 'If you do this race in Omaha, we'll give you a hotel room for the night and we'll get your gas. ' So I was like: I should do this. I could do it and no one would care. I didn't even tell anyone. I had no idea that age group citizens was a big deal for some people. I did it just to see if I liked it, and see if I was good. Then I won it, which was good."
In the fall of 2018, he moved to Arizona with the goal of making the 2020 Olympic team in triathlon. "It was never an easy target," he said. "I don't have easy goals. It's no fun."
Their first race was the World Cup, a level below the WTCS. He placed seventh. "Looking back, I think I could have been in the top-five," he said, "but here's the thing: I knew after that seventh place I could do it. I was water sick. And I was still with the swimmers' leaders. After that race, I said, 'There's no doubt in my mind that I can make the team. I've never doubted it since that day.
"The second time I really believed in it," he said, "was my fourth pro race" in May 2018, on the same course where he would later qualify for the Olympics. He finished 14th and thought, "Well, I finished my first World Championship Series top-15 with a 15-second penalty [for not putting my wetsuit in my bin], I didn't know what. I'm doing it. I know I can make the Olympics. I believed in myself every step of the way."
As a pure runner he never felt that kind of conviction. "Running, I loved," he said, "I loved training, I loved racing, I think I'm great, but I always thought: There's someone who's better than me. While in triathlon, I like Do: I can beat anyone.
The one-year Olympic postponement only helped. “It is important to increase my training time in the sport from one and a half years to two and a half years. You can't make it. You can't make those hours into a bike and a pool. "
Pearson, however, achieved more than skill. "I was listening to a lot of interviews from various triathletes at the top of the sport," he said. One, in particular, resonated.
Kristian Blumenfeldt, Norway, who won the overall series title in 2019, was talking about the 2019 race in Lausanne, which has a notoriously steep hill on a bike. Pearson was in the same race and he said, "I remember getting off the bike and my legs were just shelved, I was so tired," Pearson recalled. "And I'm a good runner, but I finished 11th." Yet Blummenfelt said he got off the bike and was refreshed. "If a switch flipped in my head," Pearson said. “When I get off the bike, I need to be fresh so that I can do my best. So I'm starting to ride more bikes, reducing my bike mileage."
"Honestly, that's what changed. More cycling, 14 hours a week — and little things like I try not to take a day off at the pool. Michael Phelps has always said take a day off at the pool." It's like a waste of the day.
Pearson also began doing the same speed workouts he used to do for coach Mark Wetmore in Colorado, including the famous 300m, 200m and 100m repeats (six to 10 times), with a 200m jog/rest between and includes goals with a time of 46 seconds, 29. -30 seconds, and 13 seconds, respectively.
And Pearson's bold attitude has already rained on his teammates. Fellow 2020 Olympian Kevin McDowell said Pearson changed the entire mindset of the US men's team.
"People in the USA would always say, 'I was the first American in this race, and it's like, 'Yeah, but you're 20th, 21st [overall]. What does that matter?,'" McDowell recalled. "When Morgan came over, he said, 'You guys [on the podium] are as good as these guys.' Stop thinking local. We're just as good. We can compete with them - and beat them. Slowly but surely, we started out doing better, getting more consistent medals, then all of a sudden gets to the podium. It gave me this newfound confidence."
Now both men are in Tokyo for their Olympic debuts. Pearson is going to bed early, trying to eliminate distractions, so when he dives into the water at Odaiba Marine Park on Monday morning, he says, "I just want a race I can be proud of." I don't want to think about any consequences, I just want to be in the moment... to put out what I know I can do. We'll see where I end up and what about Meaning, but if I have the output that I know I'm capable of, I'd be happy.