THE COLLEGES : UC Irvine Notebook / Ann Killion : McLaughlin Runs Into Doubts, Then Overcomes Them at Invitational

It would have been so easy for Judy McLaughlin to have given up.

After all, it had been five years of battling injuries, personal tragedies, mental doubts. Why should this race be any different?

And before the Stanford Invitational 3,000-meter race last Friday night, McLaughlin, of UC Irvine, almost did give up.

“Oh, I felt awful,” McLaughlin said. “I thought about pulling out of the race. I didn’t want to get last. I’ve had trouble with cramping, and I thought I’d do real bad.”

McLaughlin was wrong. She finished second in the 3,000 meters with a time of 9 minutes 24 seconds. But her lack of confidence isn’t surprising. McLaughlin, now a 22-year-old redshirt senior, hasn’t exactly had an encouraging career at Irvine.

Five years ago, track coach Vince O’Boyle recruited McLaughlin out of University High School, where she was part of the school’s era of dominance in girls’ cross-country and track and field. McLaughlin ran with such stars as Polly Plumer and Teresa Barrios, and O’Boyle liked what he saw.

As a freshman, McLaughlin made the top seven on the cross-country team and turned in some encouraging performances in the spring on the track team.

But then the problems started. McLaughlin battled chronic tendinitis in her knees and one arch, and she fractured an ankle while training. She redshirted her sophomore year.

It was during that year that McLaughlin’s sister Heidi, just one year older, was battling bone cancer.

“We were very close,” McLaughlin said. “She was so supportive of my running, but it was very hard for me to try and concentrate.”

On the day McLaughlin was to return to competition, the first meet of her junior year, she was getting ready to leave for a cross-country meet in Riverside. At the last minute, she decided not to go.

That day, her sister died.

“It was hard for me to know why I was staying home,” McLaughlin said. “Was I staying home to be with Heidi or because I hadn’t raced in a year and was afraid to run?”

The kind of doubt that is so extreme it makes a person question her motives for staying home with her dying sister is hard to shake. And, though McLaughlin returned to competition, the doubt stayed with her for the next two years.

The tendinitis continued, along with hamstring problems, chronic bronchitis and other illnesses. McLaughlin, a psychology major, tried different training techniques, including mental imaging, in which she would imagine herself running and how it would feel.

“But all I could think of was the bad races,” she said. “I really started doubting myself. I knew people were talking, saying, ‘Oh, she’s lost it.’ There were so many times I wanted to quit.”

But she didn’t quit. Even though she didn’t make the top seven on the cross-country team her junior or senior year. Even though young stars such as Buffy Rabbitt were pushing McLaughlin further and further out of the spotlight.

Last spring, she started to perform well in some races. And during the summer she was training well and feeling fit. But in August, she came down with a viral infection, setting her back once again.

“I’m sure it was as frustrating for Vince as for me,” she said. “He saw potential in me when I was younger. But it wasn’t up to him; it had to come from me.”

Determined to make something of her final year, McLaughlin trained with her boyfriend before rejoining the team. She started the cross-country season in the eighth spot but moved into the top three and finished third in the conference meet. She went to the NCAA championships, finished 38th and just missed making All-American. The top 25 American finishers earn All-American status.

At the start of the track season, McLaughlin battled problems with cramping in her legs. But she finished third in the Cal State L.A. Relay 3,000 meters and was starting to feel more confident.

Then came last weekend’s Stanford Invitational, when McLaughlin’s fear of failure almost kept her from competing.

“But the minute I got on the track and put on my spikes, I felt like a new person,” she said. “When I was running, I was thinking, ‘Hey, I feel great. I can stay with these guys,’ instead of thinking, ‘Oh God, I feel terrible,’ like I usually do.”

The new-found confidence worked. McLaughlin finished three seconds behind winner Annette Hand of Oregon and just two seconds shy of the NCAA qualifying time of 9:22. Only 25 runners in the country qualified in the 3,000 meters last year.

The mark was McLaughlin’s personal best by 14 seconds, and the third-best time in Irvine history.

On Saturday, McLaughlin finished third in the 1,500 meters, with a personal best of 4:25.02.

“I knew I had it in me,” she said. “Things are finally coming together. I’m getting my confidence back.”

Now when McLaughlin tries mental imaging, she has something positive to think about. And she has a goal that also keeps her going.

McLaughlin was born in Guatemala and has never changed her citizenship. This May, she is planning to try out for the Guatemalan Olympic team, and there is a good chance that she will be running this summer in Seoul.

“I think she has a very good chance of making the team,” O’Boyle said. “When she gets rolling, she’s hard to beat. She’s on a streak now and she just needs to keep riding the wave.”

Today, the men’s and women’s track and field teams will host their first meet in more than a month, featuring the Cal State Long Beach and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo men’s and women’s teams and the University of Arizona women’s team.

According to O’Boyle, the Long Beach men and women are much improved over last year. And the Cal Poly SLO women, ranked 11th in the country by Track & Field News, will provide strong competition in distance events. UC Irvine women are ranked 20th and Arizona is ranked 21st.

Field events begin at 11:30 a.m. and running events begin at 1:15 p.m.

Former Irvine baseball player Brady Anderson is scheduled to start in center field for the Boston Red Sox when they open at Fenway Park Monday afternoon against the Detroit Tigers.

Anderson, 24, left Irvine in 1985, after his junior season, and last year moved from Class A to triple A. He is getting his chance because outfielder Ellis Burks had a bone chip removed from his right ankle and will be sidelined until later in April.

Anderson was featured in Sports Illustrated’s “The Class of ‘88,” a look at this year’s leading rookies (March 21). The article noted that Anderson had hired his own speed and conditioning coach to bulk up from 160 to 190 pounds, batted .320 over his last two seasons in the minors and led the Florida State League in 1986 with 107 walks in 417 at-bats.

Anteater Notes

The men’s tennis team won its Anteater/Marriott tennis tournament for the third straight time, and the sixth time in nine years, beating Duke, 5-1, Sunday. The Anteaters play host to fifth-ranked Pepperdine today at the Newport Beach Tennis Club. . . . The men’s volleyball team won its second match of the season Tuesday, defeating La Verne, 15-11, 15-11, 15-17, 15-10. . . . Three Irvine swimmers--Brian Judd, Matt Wright and Mauro Macchi--competed on the 400-meter freestyle relay team that finished eighth at the U.S. Swimming Indoor Championship at Orlando, Fla., last week. Joining the Irvine swimmers was Australian Mark Kerry. Irvine Coach Charlie Schober coached the team.