Interview: Scott Fauble After Running 2:08, Finishing Top American At The Boston Marathon

On the latest episode of The CITIUS MAG Podcast, we welcome back Scott Fauble to the show. He’s a good friend of the podcast and has his own show within the CITIUS MAG Podcast Network, which will hopefully make a comeback soon. Scott makes his return after taking seventh at the Boston Marathon in a personal best of 2:08:52, which moves him to No. 10 on the all-time U.S. list. This was a big performance for Scott since he shook things up a bit toward the end of 2021 by leaving his sponsor HOKA and parting ways with coach Ben Rosario and Northern Arizona Elite. He eventually teamed up with coach Joe Bosshard and spent the past few months in Colorado to prepare for Boston. It all paid off.

We catch up on the decision-making process behind that, his brilliant race tactics in Boston, how he’s shifted his thinking after a big performance and what’s got him excited about the future. We also go through a bunch of the listener questions that were submitted on Instagram. Enjoy!

You can now listen to our conversation on The CITIUS MAG Podcast. Catch the latest episode of the podcast on Apple Podcasts. We are also on Stitcher, Google Play and Spotify.

I’ve transcribed a few parts of the interview below, which have been edited lightly for clarity.

Did it feel different to come into Boston with less pressure?

“One thing I did really badly was putting very concrete definitions of success for myself. Going into the Trials, I was like, 'I have to win this race.' Going into Boston, I was like, 'Winning is my goal.' Sometimes you run really well and you're not going to win. That's the nature of the sport. Only one person in the world is good enough to always run his best race and win – and that's Eliud Kipchoge. Everyone else can have days where they can run races and get beat. We were much more cognizant of that and not really putting a hard definition of success. Some of that comes from Joe working with people like Emma Coburn who has run awesome on a world stage a bunch of times. One time she won and other times she's run as well as she could've done and gotten third. She's run really well a bunch of times but the results have only come through in the biggest way once. Accepting that we can only control what we can control has been a big change for me. I got away from that a little bit."

"It was a lesson I knew. I knew that you should not leave yourself one avenue for success. I knew I shouldn't put that much pressure on myself but I did for two years."

Was it an easy decision to not go with the lead pack early

"Having been to Boston a number of times, a lot of the times – in both the previous years – there were times when the lead group picked it up and then slowed down. At 8K, when we were under 24 minutes and the pack picked up, I was like, 'They might slow down. They're probably going to settle. We're probably gonna get back into this. If they don't settle, then they're going to run 2:06/2:07.' Like I said a bunch of times, I'm a confident guy but you do have to know the math of what you can do and can't. I knew we were on a good pace. I felt confident that a number of guys made the decision to hang back. I still came through in 1:04:26. That's the fastest I've ever gone through halfway. It was just going to take so much energy to go through what like a minute faster? 50 seconds faster? I thought the pack might settle but if they didn't, there would be a lot of carnage and I was going to be able to come back. It really wasn’t a hard decision. I felt good about it immediately…It didn’t feel like I was thinking out there. It felt like everything I was doing felt right.”

“The same thing happened in that part of the race in 2019 where there’s this big surge between 10 and 15K. It settled and it slowed. There’s fartleking upfront. Especially when we had a little bit of a headwind, they’re going to push and slow down and push and slow down. I thought there was a pretty good chance we were going to catch up in a mile or two if we just kept running 4:55s and if they ran like 4:45s and like a 5:10 or something like that.”

What is the value of experience on the Boston Marathon course?

“Running Boston is a skill in and of itself – knowing how the race goes, knowing what you can do in the second half, knowing where the hills are coming – I felt like I had an advantage. Knowing the tangents a little bit too. Once we got separated, it’s hard to run the tangents when the whole group is together. In part, it’s because the African runners don’t really. Maybe it’s because they don't know the course or maybe it’s because they’re not worried about it. They kind of just run in the middle of the road and they’ll crash to the inside right at the last second. Once we got separated, it was much easier to run the tangents. I found myself telling the other guys in the group, if I wasn’t in the front, like ‘Hey we’re angling left here’ or ‘Hey we’re angling right.’ I didn’t want to lead the group. I wanted to sit back but I also wanted to run the tangents so if I could get whoever was doing the leading to run the tangent, that would be great.”

When did the breakaway move happen?

“Once we got through halfway, I was like, ‘OK. I’m going to use that big downhill in the Newton Falls. That’s at about 15.5. I’m just going to commit to it and hammer that downhill. Then it’s the hills and you’re just racing. I pushed that big downhill and all of a sudden, I was alone. I didn’t expect to have dropped everyone. That makes your decision-making very easy. When you’re alone, you’re just time trialing those last 10 miles. Also having run those hills a number of times is a big help as well. I know I can push on the second one when you make the turn at the firehouse because it’s short and you get a big stretch in between before you have your next hill. I know you can push Heartbreak pretty hard because it’s steep and short but afterward Miles 21 & 22 are some of the fastest miles on the whole course. Knowing where you can push and where you have to respect the course was a big help. It helped too that once I broke away from the second group, people were already starting to come off that first group. Every couple of minutes, I had someone to catch. That keeps you really engaged. There’s no feeling sorry for yourself when you’re closing someone down.”

When did he know it was going to be a good day?

“I knew time-wise we had a shot to run pretty good at 10K. I knew those middle miles from 6 to 13 were going to be pretty important. We had gotten out fast enough and I felt comfortable enough. The wind was light enough that I felt like we could rip. I absolutely knew I was going to have a good day at Mile 16 or 17 because I was so locked in. I was making up so much ground on people so quickly and catching pretty good people. I caught Lelisa Desisa pretty early. That’s big. He’s won that race so if he’s falling off then more people are going to be falling off too. I knew pretty early. I told myself, ‘Don’t put a limit on it. Don’t say 2:09.’ It was, ‘This next mile. This next mile. Get that next guy.’ I got pretty goal-oriented and task-oriented.”

Do you say anything to the people you pass?

“No. When I pass someone, I think: Poker face and pass them with authority. You don’t want to give someone hope. There are a lot of opportunities to feel sorry for yourself in a marathon. I don’t want someone that I’m going by to have a little something to fight for. I want to put them away immediately.”

How do you feel about the coaching, and training changes now?

“I’m proud of the work we’ve done. I feel like we’ve got a lot of things we can still do and still do better. I’m excited about it. It would be really tough to not be excited after two good races and eight really good weeks together. It feels a little validating but I was going to feel good about that partnership whether the race went good or bad. I really enjoyed the last eight weeks. I really had a lot of fun working with Joe. I had a lot of fun being around The Boss team. I feel good about it.”

“It’s important to me that I feel like anytime I say something nice about Joe or something about how I’m enjoying my current set-up, people could take that as kind of a slight at Ben and NAZ Elite. I want to make it clear. I have no bad blood. Ben and I are good. We had a professional split. We are still friends. When I go back to Flagstaff, I’m going back to trivia and our trivia group. We’re good. I’m so grateful for everything I had and everything we accomplished at NAZ Elite. I had a really good time with Joe and I’m working with him now but I still have a good relationship with Ben. I have a good base of my whole professional career with no big injuries, no major time off – it’s a lot of consistency. With a few changes here and there, we got some results.”

What are you looking for in your next contract?

“I have made it clear to Josh (Cox) and he’s not pushing me to do this but I’m sure that I would’ve had a deal already if I was down to take deal first and then go to their coach second. I want to hire my coach. I don’t want a shoe company deciding who I’m working with. That’s absurd. I will be staying with Joe. If a shoe company is willing to sponsor me, they’re willing to sponsor me in this set-up. In terms of what I would like in a contract? I would like a million dollars. A million dollars a year and I’ll figure out the rest of it. (Laughs) No, I’m leaving that up to Josh. I probably made his job a little easier after Boston.”

What about this potential Chipotle sponsorship that Darren Rovell was tweeting about? But haven’t you said stuff in the past about them?

“That’s not true. I have always said that all burritos are perfect. Chipotle is a corporate burrito. I don’t think Chipotle people would say that they’re a mom-and-pop, red tray, pictures-on-the-menu sort of place. They know that they’re not. They’re still perfect. They’re not quite as perfect as a Tacos Los Altos. All my tweets are pretty public. If they look at it and say, ‘Hey, we’d love to invest some money in there.’ Then, I’m eating a lot more at Chipotle. It will be fine. They actually DM’ed me and were like, ‘Hey! Here are seven free burrito codes since I got seventh. I was like. ‘Really, you should be giving me a code for all the people I beat not all the people who beat me.”

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That’s it from me today. As always, thank you for reading! If you enjoyed this, learned something new, or have any questions or commentary on anything featured in this issue, feel free to hit my inbox by replying or writing to [email protected]

Chris Chavez |Twitter |Instagram |Strava