Catching Up With Liam Bellamy '20

4/1/2022

There will always be rocks in the road ahead of us. They will be stumbling blocks or stepping stones. It all depends on how you use them.

~ Friedrich Nietzsche

Life’s journey, even for the most charmed, is a series of twists and turns, peaks and valleys, and, as the esteemed German philosopher states, impediments that test our resilience and resolve. It’s not so much what happens, then, as how one responds to those events, both positive and negative.

Liam Bellamy is a 2020 Collegiate School graduate, a runner par excellence, and a track and field athlete at the University of Virginia. As successful as he’s been, he might never have found his passion had he made the JV baseball team as an 8^th grader.

“The reason I was good at sports was because I was fast,” said Liam, who also played soccer and basketball along the way. “I’d always wanted to try track, so I went ahead and did it when I didn’t make the team I wanted to make. It was a sacrifice to skip a year of baseball, but pretty much as soon as I started running track, I fell in love with it.”

He played JV baseball as a freshman, then returned to track. The results speak volumes.

As a junior, he set the school record in the 800 (1:52.87) and anchored the Prep League and VISAA championship 4x800 relay team (with Sam Hart, Johnny White, and Will Neuner). Their state meet time, 8:03.73, was the second fastest in program history.

Liam’s personal bests in the 500 (1:06.14), 1000 (2:32.74), 1600 (4:29.62), and 400 (49.81) placed him among the crème de la crème of middle distance runners in Virginia

He earned multiple All-Prep, All-VISAA, and All-Metro honors. His monster triple – first place in the 500 (1:06.70), second in the 1600 (4:30.26), and third in the 1000 (2:35.86) in a two-hour period – generated 24 team points and sparked the Cougars to their first-ever state indoor title in February 2020.

He also switched from soccer to cross country as a senior and placed second in both the league and state championship meets. His personal best 5K was 16:27.90 at Pole Green Park in the final race of his career.

After Covid took his senior spring track season, he headed off to Charlottesville with his typical competitive zeal but the realization that everyone with whom he would train and against whom he would compete had been a high school standout and that the expectations as well as the stakes were higher.

He’s now s sophomore who will enter UVA’s McIntyre School of Commerce in the fall. Because of injuries, he redshirted last year, so he’s in his first year of athletic eligibility.

This past winter, he lowered his 800 lifetime best to 1:50.74 and ran legs of the Cavaliers’ distance medley and 4x400 relay teams that placed fifth and sixth, respectively, in the Atlantic Coast Conference Indoor Championship Meet.

One morning recently, as he was waiting to run a 400/800 double in the prestigious Raleigh Relays, he offered thoughts, reflections, and insights about his journey.

When did you determine that you could run at the college level?

One day in 8^th grade, I ran 2:12 (in the 800) which was my PR. I did the math and figured out how much time I needed to get the school record (1:55.87 at the time). I had a four-year goal. I knew if I could do that, I could run in college, so I’d had the idea in my head for a while.

Speak about your academic preparation.

Collegiate gave me an advantage. My writing is pretty good thanks to the English department. Collegiate students really have a head start because they’ve learned to organize their studies. At UVA, some days we have three-and-a-half hour practices, then school, then homework. It can be hard. At Collegiate. you got there at 8 a.m. Some days you didn’t get home until 6 or 7. Collegiate’s daily routine and structure has really helped me.

Speak about the transition from high school star to the college level, especially after missing your senior spring and redshirting as a freshman.

I love it. With Covid, a lot of people have gotten an extra year. Some of the guys I’m racing are 24 years old. It’s humbling, but I never lost my hunger. It keeps me going every day. And you have to be patient. Every PR is baby steps. Every PR matters. Every day training matters. There’s a long-term goal, and it’s going to take years.

Speak about preparation for the increased intensity at the Division I level.

I had some difficulties last year just because I was unsure about the difference between overpushing myself and just being more intense. There’s a fine line between intense practice at the DI level and overdoing it yourself. I dealt with injury problems and ended up getting a femoral stress fracture in March, but I learned a lot. It can be hard, but it’s definitely do-able. You just have to be smart and patient.

What’s the best lesson you’ve learned as a runner?

Two things. One of the short term things is something (Collegiate) Coach (Matthew) Richardson said one day during my junior year. We’d had a terrible workout. He sat us all down and said something along the lines of, It’s not how well you run on your best day. It’s how hard you try and how well you run on the days you’re feeling down, feeling tired, and don’t want to go to practice. Those days really define who you are as an athlete, as a runner, and as a person.

The other thing is that with injuries and missing my senior year then the spring last year, you have to take every opportunity you have to run even if you’re not 100 percent. That’s why I’m in Raleigh: to see where I am. I haven’t run an outdoor track meet since 2019. I said to myself, I’d better get out there while I can. (Note: In Raleigh, he ran 50.22 in the 400 and 1:52.42, good for 22^nd out of 145 finishers, in the 800.)

What makes track and field fun? You know as well as anyone that it can be a grind.

A lot of it is Type 2 fun. You’re not having the most fun in the moment, but looking back, it’s awesome. The first thing is having a routine and being active every day. Working out with a bunch of my friends is the best thing ever. Then also…racing. I’ve always loved racing. And winning. I get such a great feeling of purpose from racing. When you win, obviously that feels great. but even if you don’t win, it’s being able to go out there with my team and show what I’ve been working on for the season.

In high school, you were as competitive as anyone. You always ran to win and usually did. It sounds as if you’ve reconciled the fact that everyone is good and you might not win with the regularity you did back then.

Don’t get me wrong…I’m still obsessed with winning. Yeah, it’s a different level. You can’t expect to win every single race, but as long as you go out and leave every ounce of strength and energy and heart on the track and don’t happen to win, what else can you do?

Speak about the intersection of the physical and mental aspects of training and racing.

It’s certainly physical because it hurts. Running the 800 doesn’t feel great, and you’re sore after practice, but I’d definitely say the mental side is more powerful, which is ironic. I put a lot of stress on myself going into races because I get nervous and anxious. And also, as injuries come and you get out of your routine, it’s easy to stress.

Have you learned to manage the stress?

Managing it is one of the bigger things I have to work on. As I’ve had injuries, I’ve talked to (mindfulness guru and counselor) Alex Peavey a lot. Nobody knows how to deal with that better than he does. He’s been a great support. He’s helped me a ton with strategies. There’s not a line from where you are now to where you want to be. There’re going to be ups, and there’s going to be downs. It’s more about the journey than the end goal. You have to be patient, stay composed, and keep in mind that achieving your end goal will take time.

You mention goals. What are your goals?

Right now, it’s (breaking) 1:50. I really don’t have a long-term number. It’s more that I’m focused on trying to quality for regionals. This one of the most competitive years we’ve had in the 800. I’d love to make the finals in the 800 in the ACC (championship meet). I missed out on that by a couple of tenths in indoor.

What would you tell an up-and-comer interested in competing at the next level?

The biggest thing, and it sounds cliché, is that it really doesn’t matter where other people think you’ll end up. If I’d told people in 8^th or 10^th grade, Hey, I’m going to run in college, D1, I think people would have laughed at me. So…have confidence in yourself and know what your end goal is. If you don’t believe in yourself, nobody will.

~Weldon Bradshaw

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