Lindsay Flach, three-time Olympic trial heptathlete who competed 18 weeks pregnant this year, joins the show to discuss her journey and choosing life over her Olympic career. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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| - When I was in high school, I struggled to run the mile in gym class. | |
| I think I made it every time, but barely. | |
| I ran a competitive 15-minute mile, sometimes 16 or 17 minutes. | |
| Lindsay Flock just competed in the heptathlon, the Olympic trials, That, obviously, impressive enough. | |
| Shocking. | |
| She did it while 18 weeks pregnant. | |
| So, I now, I feel that I have absolutely no way to relate in any way to this sort of accomplishment. | |
| But there are many aspects of this story that are so impressive. | |
| The athletic aspect, the political aspect. | |
| It's just, at a time when there are so many I'm very pleased to be joined by Lindsay Flock. | |
| Lindsay, thank you for being here. | |
| Thank you for having me. | |
| So is the secret, would I have done better in high school had I been pregnant? | |
| Does that make it easier to run or no? | |
| I would not say that. | |
| This is a really stunning feat. | |
| I just had my first son. | |
| Well, I didn't have my son, but my wife just had our first son. | |
| And at various parts in that pregnancy, you can barely get out of bed. | |
| One feels sick. | |
| It's kind of hard to move around. | |
| And you did one of the most difficult athletic events that you can possibly do. | |
| Can you just take us through a little bit of that process? | |
| I mean, presumably, you did not plan your pregnancy to coincide with the Olympic trials. | |
| Congratulations on your son. | |
| This is actually my first. | |
| We did not necessarily plan to be pregnant at the Olympic trials. | |
| With COVID happening and everything last year, I truly believe that the Olympics were not going to happen this year just because of the postponement from last year. | |
| And so we just said, okay, we'll see what happens. | |
| I was actually very sick. | |
| In the very beginning. | |
| So if it was probably three weeks prior, I probably wouldn't have been at the Olympic trials. | |
| But I actually started to feel really good. | |
| And so I was just like, well, I can do this. | |
| It's something my body's used to. | |
| But it's not as though you just wake up one day and say, okay, I'm going to run a heptathlon. | |
| Obviously, there's some training involved here, so you were sort of down for the count during the weeks leading up to running at the trial. | |
| I should point out, by the way, you beat three people. | |
| You beat three non-pregnant women in the heptathlon. | |
| Yes, I tried to do as much training as I possibly could leading up into the trials and then we literally just took it day by day, hour by hour to see what events and I'm so glad I was able to make it through all of them. | |
| Now, there is a little bit of a political dimension here as well, which is... | |
| And it seems ghastly, like you wouldn't... | |
| I guess nothing surprises anyone these days. | |
| But there have been cases, including in the Olympics, where women found out they were pregnant, but they still wanted to compete. | |
| And they would get an abortion, because they would choose the Olympics over having a child. | |
| And you did not do that. | |
| You very, very courageously wouldn't do that. | |
| But then you... | |
| You didn't give up the Olympics either. | |
| You somehow, or the Olympic trials rather, you somehow just managed to do both. | |
| Yes, I knew that I could be capable of. | |
| I knew I wasn't going to be at the potential that I was 18 weeks or even probably 12 weeks before because I actually did do three meets pretty well for myself in my weeks four through six being pregnant, but that was definitely not an option for us. | |
| So, presumably, you're looking at 2020. | |
| 2020 gets postponed because of the lockdowns. | |
| Then it's 2021. | |
| And this is the last chance. | |
| You had already made that decision, correct? | |
| You were not going to compete the next go-around. | |
| Correct. | |
| So, what is that process like? | |
| You've been training at this thing. | |
| I mean, look, I'm not exactly the most Adonis of a fella here, but presumably you've been training at this thing your entire life. | |
| This is a very specialized skill for, you know, effectively the height of athletic achievement. | |
| And then it's just over. | |
| And then you've got to do something else. | |
| Yes, and that's what's crazy because in January of 2020, I actually left. | |
| It was my fiancé at the time. | |
| We hadn't gotten married yet, but I had left him. | |
| I had left my job. | |
| I had moved three hours away and, like, gave up everything to, like, Completely focus on the 2020 Olympics trials and then hopefully the Olympics. | |
| And when it all kind of shifted away from that, I just knew this was my third Olympic trials. | |
| This chapter at some point needed to come to an end, which is really hard for athletes to give up. | |
| And so we finally just decided, okay, let's just end one chapter and begin the other, however that goes about. | |
| I don't think that part has actually hit me because of what happened at the trials. | |
| Right. | |
| Because I love this idea. | |
| We go through chapters in our lives. | |
| You don't get to stay in high school forever. | |
| You don't get to stay in college forever. | |
| You don't get to pursue your professional sporting event forever. | |
| You don't get to pursue your career forever. | |
| These things are discreet. | |
| And it was so distressing when I read a story of one woman who had had an abortion just basically to continue to compete in the Olympics. | |
| I thought, oh my gosh, you're giving up the most important thing in your life, which will define the rest of your life. | |
| You're giving that up For this really time-limited thing. | |
| Obviously, competing at the Olympics, it's extraordinarily impressive, but that's only going to be a few years, and then you're giving up all the rest. | |
| So how did you have the foresight? | |
| I mean, I know a lot of athletes who are just even being that competitive mindset are really only looking at the near term. | |
| It's hard as an athlete. | |
| For us, we had just decided that was never going to be an option for us. | |
| It's hard. | |
| We got into the doctor's office at eight weeks. | |
| We heard the heartbeat. | |
| There's a very defined baby there. | |
| We just decided that's more important because of our life down the road. | |
| That's what we truly want. | |
| Athletic career has to come to an end. | |
| Mine on the track has come to an end, but I'm still going to go out there and Train and be a healthy lifestyle. | |
| That eight-week appointment is a pretty big one. | |
| When it happened for us, it was also during the lockdowns, and they had the audacity to tell me that I couldn't go to any of the appointments beforehand. | |
| But then you go to that first one, really, where you can kind of hear the heartbeat, and you just realize, oh my goodness. | |
| And especially when you then get the ultrasound, if it's a 3D ultrasound, even more so, where you think, oh, This is a person. | |
| Even now, my little son, he's always got his hands. | |
| He looks like a little Irish boxer. | |
| You know, he looks like Gangs of New York style. | |
| His hands are always up by his face. | |
| And we never got a good ultrasound because he was always doing that in the womb as well. | |
| And you have this stunning realization. | |
| Oh yeah, the baby that's right, that was the same thing that was inside his mother 10 weeks ago, 20 weeks ago. | |
| Yes, we actually have that one, the anatomy scan of 3D on Friday. | |
| So I'm really excited because we haven't had one since eight weeks. | |
| So that'll be the next one. | |
| So what is the feeling now? | |
| You've come down from this incredible high, performing extraordinarily well at the Olympic trials. | |
| Now, that's it. | |
| That's the end of that career. | |
| Was there any moment? | |
| Was there any moment of kind of letdown, depression even, to say, now that phase of my life is over, or no, just right into the next thing? | |
| Right before the 800 when the cameras that were on me, I think it kind of hit me hard before the gun went off. | |
| I did almost start to tear up then, but it was so fast into the gun that that had finished. | |
| But ever since then, I've just been back to work. | |
| I coach athletes, both youth and adults. | |
| And so it's just been jumped right into that. | |
| And I think after the baby, it might hit me a little bit harder just for the fact of like, There's so much going on right now, being still sick a little bit, body changing, exhaustion. | |
| But when I actually can step back on the track, I think it'll hit me a little bit harder. | |
| Because there was one race that you did have to step off the track because basically it was so hot outside, you feared for your health and the health of your baby. | |
| Yeah, so in the 800, I only ran 100 meters of it and stepped off and that was the last event in the head. | |
| And the reason for that is it was Saturday after the 200. | |
| I actually did end up in the medical tent because it was so hot. | |
| We were trying to get me rehydrated. | |
| And so we just didn't want to take that chance, especially with Sunday being so much hotter than Saturday was. | |
| Right, right. | |
| And that's even at another level, this moment, okay, you're there, you're on the field, you're doing it, you're on the track, rather, and then, but no, I can't take this risk. | |
| There's something more important here, even than how well I run. | |
| Yes, and I am stubborn, and my husband and coach were in the stands, and they really didn't think I would walk off the track. | |
| They thought I would continue and finish it, so... | |
| What I feel is so inspiring about this whole story is, obviously, you're a top athlete, obviously, but that you've got all the priorities in order. | |
| And I know a lot of people these days think you've just got to pick. | |
| You've either got to pick your personal life or your professional life, or you've got to pick having a family or doing well in your career. | |
| You've got to pick this. | |
| And that really, in my experience, is not the case. | |
| These things kind of work differently. | |
| And if you flourish in one area of your life, you're going to flourish in all of the other areas. | |
| And I tell you, I look around at professional athletes and really people in other fields too, and I don't see that kind of a sensible attitude that you've demonstrated. | |
| Yes, and I think that's what a lot of people don't understand is they can do both. | |
| In any career, it doesn't have to just be athletics. | |
| They can be a mom, they can be pregnant, they can still continue their career. | |
| Yes, there will be different changes, but there's always obstacles that everyone has to go through in life, whether you're pregnant or not. | |
| Right, that's true. | |
| And there are some payoffs there as well, as you're going to find out. | |
| You've still got a bit of pregnancy to go through, I think. | |
| So, Lindsay, where can people find you? | |
| Unless right now you say, I'm done with that, no one should follow me at all, I'm going into private life. | |
| I'm on Instagram at lcschwartz22. | |
| You can find me there. | |
| I am going to continue to share my story from here on out. | |
| I've been kind of shy in the public eye. | |
| I didn't used to like pictures, but all the people that women, men, have shared their stories with me, I truly want to keep inspiring, and I will continue to share on that platform. | |
| That's great. | |
| That's really, really inspiring stuff. | |
| I still would not run against you, even at 20 weeks pregnant. | |
| Call me when you're about 37 weeks pregnant, and then I think I may... | |
| I'll say I was able... | |
| To run faster than one of the top athletes. | |
| But frankly, maybe not even then. | |
| Maybe not even then. | |
| Deal. | |
| Deal. | |
| Lindsay, great to be with you. | |
| Lindsay Flock, thank you so much for joining us. |