by Stuart Weir
Jenny Barringer Simpson is one of our finest American distance runners and a global threat from 1,500 meters to the marathon. Stuart Weir provides her thoughts on a very long and exciting career!
Jenny Simpson – a reflection on her career
Now that Jenny has announced that the New York Marathon was her last professional race, Stuart Weir reflects on 16 years of watching her.
I first met Jenny Simpson in slightly embarrassing circumstances. She had just won the World Championship in Daegu in 2011. At the end of the winner’s press conference, I asked her if she would do an interview with me the following day. She readily agreed but asked me to arrange it through the US team press officer. I went straight to the media center, next to the press conference room, and told the US press officer that I would like an interview with Jenny. She replied, “I know, ” which surprised me. When she added, “I think everyone knows that, Stuart.” I was more puzzled. Then she explained that the press conferences were broadcast to the media center and that when I asked Jenny, the microphone was still live! She and everyone else had heard my conversation.
Jenny duly turned up the following day and was very engaging. I was to speak to her on several other occasions subsequently, which confirmed my initial impression. I was privileged to see her run in three Olympics and six World Championships and talk to her about most of them.
2008 Olympic 3000m steeplechase 8th place but breaking American record.
“Beijing was such an incredible experience. There was a stadium with 90,000 people and a village with track and field and athletes from all disciplines. Perhaps the greatest gift from the Olympics was getting to experience the lifestyle of different athletes. Being in China was very special”.
2009 World Championships 4th 3000m steeplechase
“Berlin was very special for me. We commemorated Jesse Owens when we were there. The Berlin stadium is so historic; it has an incredible structure. To be in that stadium was so inspiring. I remember being aware of the dignity of the structure itself and the history of Jesse Owens competing there. It just made me proud to be a T&F and an American athlete. I ran a gutsy race, a 10-second PR. That was my first real taste of ‘I can do this, I belong here, and I’m going to get up there one of these days’”.
2011 World Championships gold medal 1500m
“Switching from 3000 to 1500 was a tough decision, but it was something my coach was very confident about, although she had to talk me into it a bit. I knew I had the physical ability to excel at the event because I had run 3:59 before when I wasn’t even specializing in it. But you must be a brilliant racer when running the 15. I did not know if I had what it took. But she watched me in practice and work out with my teammates, and she felt very confident that I had what it took. So, I credit her for seeing something I did not immediately see in myself. Winning in Daegu made me realize just how good I could be. The type of future I had ahead of me was to be one of the best in the world, not just the top in the US, And I think it signaled that also to the international community. After the race, things in my career were never the same again – in a positive way.
2012 London Olympics – eliminated in 1500 semi-final
“Winning in 2011 was a bit unexpected because it was the first time I’d ever competed internationally in the 1500 meters. And I was young – my first summer as a professional athlete. Having had that success, it can be tough to continue and outdo it the next year. So, getting ready for the Olympics and preparing for all the challenges involved in succeeding in 2012 was challenging. And it was an additional pressure to be the reigning world champion. I did as well as I possibly could have in handling emotional pressure. Unfortunately, I did not make the final. That was a big disappointment, not just to me but also to many of the people working with me. But that was a big growing experience, how to expect so much out of myself and deal with the reality of not delivering”.
2013 World Championships silver medal 1500m
“It can be tough to have success back to back, but over a career, to return to the top again was really important for me. So it was really fun to return in 2013 and show the world that the success in 2011 was not a fluke and that I would be a real contender for the rest of my career”.
2015 World Championships 1500m 11th
[She lost a shoe during the race].
“The one thing I will say for the record is that I don’t look back and feel completely devastated. If you want to be in the sport for a long time and be good for a long time, there will be days when everything goes wrong. It is bound to happen. And I have had days when everything has gone right. And unfortunately, it’s part of what you sign up for if you’re going to be good for a long time, to go and have misfortune along the way. Anyway, I don’t look back with devastation; I see it as one race part of a long career”.
2016 Olympic Games 3rd 1500
“When you win an Olympic medal, that is incredible, but the reality of how you remember that entire year continues to form the further you get away from it. It’s like how you remember history and your feelings about it on the day; years later, it galvanizes as time passes. About Rio, the more I reflect on the year as a whole, the more I realize that it was a really challenging year, and I will always remember the joy and excitement of getting the medal. But that achievement was more hard-fought than any other achievement of my entire career – in terms of having setbacks, having to believe in myself, and having to commit to a plan that I wasn’t sure was going to succeed as the clock was ticking, and I was not making as much progress as I thought. And just sitting here and thinking back to 2016, my overwhelming sense is that was really just a difficult year”.
2017 World Championships, London second
“My coach had been telling me all day, ‘Be willing to run your guts out, and you’ll be great,’ so I did exactly what she did. I ran my guts out for the last 300m, which paid off.
Having the experience is huge because having the ability to stay calm is so hard, especially at the World Championships when you’re racing in a beautiful stadium. It was down to keeping my wits about me to come out with a medal. I had been disappointed with my 2012 Olympics, so I had been looking forward to returning to the stadium and possibly getting some personal redemption”.
2019 World Championship 1500m 8th
In part two, Jenny gives her thoughts on a range of topics.
