“I had an ex-girlfriend … I’m still thinking about what she told me. She told me this: She said, ‘Fernando, 30 years from now, nobody is going to remember you.’ I remember, we were in an ice cream shop and I walked out of that ice cream shop. I was mad and I didn’t know what to say. … Parts of me want to keep in it [running] just to prove her wrong …”

“I’m kind of disappointed and not as enthusiastic about my future as I should be. I just think over the years of being injured and having disappointments, have humbled me to not think too crazy about it. Dreams are good, I guess. Dreams are free and they keep me going, but I’m just really in tune right now with what I think I can do. I just don’t know if it’s good enough to last the 30 years. I don’t believe if I run 2:09, that that is going to last 30 years.”

“I can work hard all I want, but maybe I’ll never achieve that. If that helps me to keep going then I guess it was a success. I guess whatever it takes, right? Whether or not we are trying to prove a phantom wrong or something like that. … I think it doesn’t matter who you are trying to prove wrong – whether it’s real or not, if that’s what it takes. … I think a lot of us think that way. We want to prove somebody wrong, but we don’t even know who that person is.”