Now that the wedding is over, Shaunae Miller, The Bahamas' fastest female, is focused on getting on with the rest of her life and her career.
The honeymoon is pushed aside for now, as she continues to train and prepare for the 2017 season. Miller will open her season at the Millrose Games in New York City, New York, this Saturday, running in the women's 300 meters (m). She is the current meet record holder in the event, posting a national record time of 36.10 seconds three years ago.
Miller married her college companion Maicel Uibo, of Estonia, this past Saturday in a lavish ceremony in the Imperial Ballroom of Atlantis. She said that they decided to push the honeymoon back to September or October so as to focus on early season training and competition. She's looking forward to another sensational year in 2017.
"I'm excited to get on with this season and the rest of my life," she said. "Me and Maicel were laughing because we were stressing ourselves out about it (wedding) for months, and it just went by so quickly. I'm so relieved that it's over. Everything went as well as it possibly could have gone, and we're really happy about it. I'm just looking forward to our life together and great things in the future."
Miller said that she is excited to be getting back on the track after being out of action for about three months. Also, she hasn't run the 300m event since posting that national record time three years ago. Her run on Saturday could set her up for an amazing year. Last year, Miller ran personal best times in all three sprints outdoors - the 100m, 200m and 400m. She culminated the year with the gold medal run in the women's 400m at the Rio de Janeiro Olympic Games.
"I feel confident that I could have another good year. Right now, the key is to have a healthy season," said Miller. "Once I'm healthy, I know that the times will continue to drop. Training has been going extremely well, way better than last year. I'm just eager to see how things are going to turn out. Everything is working out extremely well in practice right now."
After wanting to do the double, 200m and 400m at last year's Olympics, and not getting the opportunity to do so, Miller said that will be a major focus this season. She wants to run both events at the International Association of Athletics Federations' (IAAF) World Championships, set for August 4-13, in London, England.
"This year, I'm definitely going after the double. Hopefully, they could change up the schedule for me so that I could make an attempt at it," she said. "I feel that it's possible. I'm not worried about the workload at all. We've been training for it, and my body is ready to handle the load. I'm excited. The 200 is something I love to do, so to have the opportunity to do both the 200 and the 400 is going to be really exciting for me."
Miller finished 2016 as the number one runner in the world in the women's 400m, with her personal best time of 49.44 seconds for the gold at the Olympics, and was ranked number five in the women's 200m. However, her 200m national record time of 22.05 seconds in the latter at the JN Racers Grand Prix Meet in Kingston, Jamaica, last year, would have been good enough for the bronze medal at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics. She's looking forward to going even faster this year, and is thrilled to be starting the year off with the 300m on Saturday.
"It's been a few months, but I'm excited to get back out there and see exactly where I'm at," she said. Hopefully I could get a new PR (personal best), but the main goal is to just go out there and have some fun. I want to see where I'm at right now, and just go from there."
As far as the wedding is concerned, Miller said that she had a great time sharing that moment with family and friends, and is now looking forward to the future.
"It was very exciting - to have all of my family and friends there at home made it kind of special. Everyone seemed to have a good time, so I was happy about that," she said. "I'm just thankful for everyone who helped to make the entire day a great success. They all did a very good job. Maicel has been very supportive so far, and I expect that to continue. This life is kind of new to both of us, so we're just trying to get used of it, but he's such a great guy, and I'm just happy to have him in my life and by my side."
For now, the focus is on training and competition for Miller, though. She left for her training base in Clermont, Florida, yesterday, and will compete in New York this Saturday.

Click here to read more at The Nassau Guardian