Ep. 40: She Never Stopped Believing: Andie Cozzarelli's OTQ Story

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Yeah, I would say, you know, because I when I dropped out in twenty sixteen and I didn't know if I'd ever get the opportunity to get back and finish and have a finish line, is that, you know, especially for those that if you qualify for Boston or you're running a race that's been your goal race for however long, to really embrace the opportunity, take out the expectations because you don't know if something's gonna prevent you from being able to experience that in the future. You don't know if, you know, you're not you never know, and you may, you may get a second shot at it, and you can always use that as a second opportunity. And so, you know, make sure that the race that you've been dreaming of, that you've been wanting to qualify for, or that you've been wanting to race forever, be present. Make sure that that's the most important thing that you're present and that you're able to enjoy it, because that's by far the most important part of all of them back to Through This Drive.

SPEAKER_02 1:02

I'm your host, Sam Sutton, and today I'm joined by Andy Kozarelli. Andy is an elite-level marathoner who's been running marathons since 2016 and just hit the Olympic trials qualifying time of two hours 36 minutes and 59 seconds at the Glass City Marathon in Toledo, Ohio. Um, she has been chasing this time for a long time and has had to go through multiple setbacks, ups and downs, twists and turns in her career, and has learned a lot about listening to your body, learning about what you can take on as a runner and in life and how they kind of balance together. And she's been able to use a lot of those lessons in her own coaching as well to help tons of marathoners hit their personal bests and become the runners that they want to be. This was one of my favorite conversations that I've had in a long time. Andy is such a genuine person. Her story is really interesting about how she was originally thinking life that she would pursue soccer and how she found running as something that just really spoke to her. So I'm super excited to share Andy's story with you. And without further ado, let's get into it. All right, welcome back to Through Their Stride. I'm your host, Sam Sutton, and today I'm joined by Andy Cosarelli. So, Andy, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_01 2:20

Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_02 2:21

Yeah, and congratulations on the uh OTQ and the Glass City Marathon victory. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 2:26

Yeah, thank you so much. That was huge. Um, been a big long journey to get back there. So um, such a special race and super happy to have the OTQ.

SPEAKER_02 2:36

Yeah, and then uh I don't think I caught where you live. So do you live in Ohio? Is that kind of your hometown race or how did you pick Glass City?

SPEAKER_01 2:44

Oh, I actually live in Chattanooga. I was born in Ohio, so uh I've had a family that lives up there still. Um, so I'm super used to going back to Ohio and it also was kind of driving distance. I mean, you know, it depends on what you call driving distance, but for me that felt reasonable to drive. It was about seven and a half hours. I thought it was shorter to get to my aunt's house, and actually technically it was more than seven and a half because I drove to my aunt's house and then we drove up together. And so I stayed overnight there, which broke up the drive a bit, and she lived about two hours from Toledo. So that was really kind of, but the big reason that I chose it was the course looked favorable, uh, pretty flat, and then timing worked out really well for me. I was looking for something around April time frame. I had run actually Columbus Marathon, which is also in Ohio. You know, that just more coincidental, I'd say, um, that it worked out that way. But uh I'd run that in October and then was looking for the right race with enough time for me to get some recovery in and then rebuild. And I actually had been thinking about running Houston Marathon because the weather in Columbus had been really bad. And I just wanted to see if I could, you know, I had a really good training block. I just wanted to see if I could put it towards something and see if I could qualify there. And my body just wasn't responding. I wasn't recovering as well as I would have liked following Columbus. And so the months between Columbus and Houston was kind of a little bit rocky. A little roller coaster trying to do a workout, and then I wouldn't feel like I was recovering well enough. And so I was kind of in this weird phase. And so I those months I kind of didn't get a lot out of the training that I was doing because it was constantly chasing recovery. So it kind of set me back. And then that kind of pushed my timeline out a little bit. So from there, I wanted to make sure I gave myself enough space to after Houston recover and then rebuild back into training uh a little bit more favorably. And that was what my body needed, and that's what worked. So I was glad that I waited until you know, more like late April to race. And so that was one of the considerations. And then when I was looking for, you know, what's a good springtime race? What are some flat ones? What are some fast ones and weather? So I tend to do have struggled more in the heat, uh, a really salty sweater. So I've which I found out recently that that's the case. And so I was really like, I need to make sure that it's gonna be a little bit on the cooler side to make this possible. I trained in the heat, so I'm used to it, but it just helps for me to I'll feel a lot better if it's cool. And so looking north and trying to figure out where what fit that mold. And so I actually was deciding between Glass City and Carmel, which I'm glad I went with Glass City because Carmel had gotten canceled. Um, and so that worked out great. Weather was really nice. It was uh there it was overcast, which was also great. And uh what's funny about that is my dad said that the reason he didn't like living in Ohio was because it was gray all the time, which I'm I mean, honestly worked out in my favor. Did not have sun. So um, so that was one of the considerations as well. And then as I was looking at uh what they offered for the elite field, Glass City just seemed like they were really taking care of the athletes that went there. So that was another thing. And then once I signed up, I was like, yeah, they're they were very communicative, they had everything organized. So very much recommended that race now, now that I've done it. It was it was a great experience and yeah, super, super enjoyable. And it was pretty flat in my from my perspective. It didn't any hills felt like they were uh either little tiny rollers that you wouldn't have really noticed that much otherwise, or some more gradual stuff, which you know, living in Chattanooga, I get most of the hills here are pretty steep.

SPEAKER_02 6:25

So yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 6:27

Yeah, it's either you get a flat run by the by the river or you're kind of doing this real steep up and down game. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:34

Yeah, awesome. Yeah, I saw uh a lot of finish line photos of yours, and then of course Vinny Maury's who had a record day that day. And um, I was like, man, first off, the finish line looks super cool because you're finishing out a football stadium. So I was like, that's really neat.

SPEAKER_01 6:49

Yeah, honestly, I wish more races did that. It was great for it was great for the finish line. It was fun to more exhilarating to run into, but also I had my aunt and my cousin up there with me. And so it made it easier for them to just, you know, hang out more in the uh in the in there watching and waiting to see what was happening. And they had a live broadcast of the elite or the lead woman in the marathon and lead man in the marathon. So you kind of got the play by play as you're sitting there to watch kind of what's going on. And so I thought that was pretty cool and definitely a nice touch. So yeah, more races should do that.

SPEAKER_02 7:21

Yeah, yeah. I uh I'll see that one. And then of course, like Eugene finishes on that on the track. And I'm like, man, like I love a stadium finish. There's nothing better than a stadium finish.

SPEAKER_01 7:31

Yeah, I that's one of the reasons why I've been wanting to run Eugene. It's just it's so hard to get out there from the East Coast. So that tends to be like I think the hardest thing. But at some point I would love to do that race because I I ran collegiately at NC State, but we the two years that I went to nationals, it was at Drake. It wasn't at um the the iconic stadium there in Eugene. And so I haven't ever gotten to run in it. So there's I there's part of me that really wants to experience that because they actually get to do the lap on the field, which is so like on the track, which is very cool at Eugene. So maybe one day we'll see. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:08

There you go. Well, cool. So and obviously I'm gonna want to talk about your uh your OTQ and your journey to get there. But before all of that, just asking you kind of like as a runner in general, how did you get started with running? What drew you to the sport? And uh how did that lead you to becoming a professional?

SPEAKER_01 8:27

Yeah. So I started running more officially in middle school, but most of it was because so my sister and I growing up were very, very competitive, and we both grew up playing soccer. And we were about we were about 18 months apart. So in school, we were a year apart. So um there was always this sort of competitiveness against us. And, you know, I was the younger sibling, so always wanting to beat my older sister. That felt like the epitome of like, you know, thriving in life, as if you could be just as good as your older sister. And so uh kind of looked up to her in that regard. And so she started running in middle school, and I used to love the mile when they did the fitness testing in elementary school and in middle school. And so when she was her first year on the team, I was like, I'm gonna beat you next year. And she was trying to break six in the mile, I believe. And which is like, you know, really good for a middle school athlete at the time, especially super, super fast. And I was like, I'm gonna beat, I'm gonna try to beat that. And so um, that next year when I joined the team and we both were competing against each other. I might have ruined her love of running a little bit from that. Um, but I I did end up beating her, I think, in that first race. Um, and it just kind of like took hold there. I was always a very competitive person, and so I hated losing board games and you know, you name it, did not like to lose, not the best at, you know, handling all of that when I was younger. And so, uh, but running was a good outlet for that competitiveness, and uh it was very much under my control. So I it was me and what I was doing. And so that was kind of how it started. I ended up doing middle school uh track and cross country. We didn't have a track, not cross-country, we didn't have that um track. We didn't have a track in my school. So the training for it was really kind of, you know, not much, um, but that was where I got started in it. Uh and then I did some summer track stuff coming off of that. And no one in my family had really been big runners. So it was sort of a new experience to all of us that I was kind of getting involved in that. Um, as I got older, I still kept playing soccer. Soccer was really what I thought was gonna be the thing that I was going to do. Um, collegially, you know, I remember watching the US women's national team growing up, and like that was what I aspired to. And uh so all through actually, my before I went to my freshman year in high school, I told my cross-country coach that I was gonna focus on soccer so I wasn't gonna run cross-country. And he was like, All right, okay. And so I think it was like two weeks into school, he came and found me and he was like, Are you sure? He's like, We will be kid, we will make it work. We'll work around your schedule. And so that kind of I was like, okay, I'll go try it out, see how I like it. And I had a great group of women that I trained with at that point. They were awesome. They were really showed me the ropes and um really made it enjoyable. So I was running part-time and playing soccer part-time all the way until my my senior year in high school. And that was when I started to, that was when I had signed with NC State and had made it the the decision to go to run instead of play soccer. And so that was really where my sister and I paths diverged. My sister did end up going to play soccer collegiately at D1 School Waffert in South Carolina, and I ended up kind of going the path of running. So we both kind of had our had our ways forward from there. But um, yeah, so it was just sort of this slow transition of, you know, soccer kind of, you know, becoming less and less of the priority and me just really starting to enjoy running more and more and having success in it. And I just knew, you know, going into college that it would be the first time that I was gonna be really focusing on running. And so I was looking forward to seeing what I could do with that being my singular focus. So um, so yeah, that was kind of the progression through things. And then at NC State, uh I was ended up becoming a 10K athlete. That was my my kind of the race that I uh went towards. I didn't ever think that I would be. That was kind of the you know, a joke going in. But there was one year where I was injured and uh with an IT band thing. So I was doing all kinds of the cross training to try to keep things going. So my coach at the end of that was like, you probably don't have much speed right now, but probably have some endurance. And so I ran the 10K for the first time that my freshman year at ECC's, it was fine. It didn't, it didn't like wasn't great. It wasn't, I I feel like it was all a blur. I don't even remember what I was I didn't couldn't keep a track of the laps, it was a whole thing. Um, but you know, after that it kind of took hold and um ended up a 10K All-American twice in um two times or second team all American. I was 13th and 11th in the 10K at Nationals. Um my I think my sophomore and junior year of uh college. And then my my senior year, I had a rough, I ran really well at ACCs, but then I don't know if it was the anxiety or the stress of, you know, this is my last race. If I don't qualify for nationals, it kind of took over a little bit. And there was a point where I I almost I tried to throw my shoes away and my mom was like, stop it, stop it. Um, so I definitely had a little bit of a volatile relationship with running through periods of my career. And so it made, you know, it made things a little bit more challenging to work through. But I think it all ended up helping me in the process. It just, you know, could have taken took longer because I I didn't really have a whole lot of the investment on the mental side of things at that time and um big learning curve for that on that side for me. Um, but yeah, so I I continued to train um afterwards. I didn't give up. I I almost did. And my coach at NC State actually convinced me to continue to train with the team, told me I could run with them, and so I did that. First year was didn't I didn't run well. I was partially just, you know, getting used to not having your entourage when you're going to races, yeah, um, that adjustment. And then also I was working full-time as a um civil engineer at the Department of Transportation. So it was getting used to like a way different lifestyle. And so that first year was rough. And uh, you know, I over time, I think it was actually my grandfather died in 2014. So coming out of my first year out of college and meet when we were, he was a football coach and really had a lot of investment in his athletes. And um, just kind of hearing what how people talked about him, it really changed my perspective on what I was doing with running in general, was to kind of separate from the outcome goals and all of that stuff, and uh to also kind of share in the process of what I was doing so that it's not just a singular focus on me, me, me. So that actually changed and I ran a lot better that next year coming out of that. And and that was also when I joined the volley. Wazel had a volley team at the time. I wasn't sponsored through any of this period. Uh I didn't really find that until later. But um, yeah, so I f I was on Wazelle's volley team, which is more of the community-based team. We had women of all different ages and skill sets, and it was a very supportive community. So that really helped me kind of find my place and things kind of took off from there. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:29

Awesome. No, I I like what you said about the uh kind of taking taking a step back and kind of seeing like, okay, like this is not all just about chasing PRs. Like, if it is gonna just be about that and chasing victories and and chasing the next thing, this is not going to be feasible. Like it that can lead to a lot of burnout, as I've also experienced. And and my it was my wife actually who encouraged me to start coaching track for her school that she teaches at, her uh their track team. At first I was like, no, I don't I don't I don't want to do that. Like I I, you know, do my want to do my own thing. But these last two years coaching has been like so great because you you get to share it. You get to share your wisdom. And like, yeah, you know, when you go into each build, you're learning something and you're like, oh, I'm so excited to kind of teach them this. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:19

Yeah. I started coaching in 2018. So it was still a bit after I graduated before I actually started coaching. And that was when it was after I'd run my first marathon, and I was trying to find a more flexible schedule so I could see if I could put more time into this uh to running because I had it had been going well, but I was kind of, you know, when you're 20 something, some of the things that I was doing was maybe like running at four, 430 around and not getting enough sleep pretty much ever. It was uh, you know, that's something I could get away with then. But I knew like it was just, you know, the way that I was doing it was probably a means to an end at some point as I got older with not getting enough recovery. And so I really wanted to see if I can invest more time into my training. And so I actually started working for my dad doing appraisal work. So I left engineering and while I was working in appraisals, started to uh coach on the side and just sort of get, you know, get accustomed to it and and start working in that field and slowly build some confidence as a coach. And um, so that was that was where I got started. But I do think in the last, just in the last few years, I started coaching myself in uh I had hip surgery in 2024, um, in May of 2024. And so I actually started coaching myself after that hip surgery. And I do think that I've learned a lot. I started like using myself as almost a test subject for the athletes that I work with, and it has really helped. And I will say that, you know, even before I start coaching myself though, just working with the athletes that I work with in general, you reflect more on sort of things that you've done in your journey that kind of, you know, say is you know, you start to kind of think about your mistakes that you don't want that your athletes to make. And so it taught me a lot. And it's also, you know, that my athletes have taught me a lot. So it's definitely been like a mutually beneficial relationship to be a coach and work with runners, um, while also kind of, you know, working through my own running journey.

SPEAKER_00 18:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:12

Yeah, it's such a blessing. And also, like if you're in the coaching realm, there's a lot of like you almost like seeing them succeed more than you succeeding yourself. It's like probably something it gives you gives you more as a coach than what you could ever achieve as an athlete.

SPEAKER_01 18:30

Yeah, and honestly, actually, because Boston was the Monday before my race, and that was such a yeah, and that this year was the perfect year. I mean, it was one of those um, you know, Boston, some people talk about like 2011 Boston, I think, as being a very similar perspective where it was just, you know, weather was perfect, you got that tailwind, it was perfect conditions for PRs and fast races. And so it was it was awesome just see I had definitely most of my athletes had really great races, and that was really fun to see. Saw a couple of PRs. Um, so it was a very exciting sort of atmosphere to go into my race with to just be so excited for the people I work with to do so well. And so that was that was definitely good energy to see that going into my race. I was like, all right, you know, I can do this.

SPEAKER_02 19:18

I uh I have yeah, I have a very similar story. So um I had regional track um two or a week before my most recent race, which was just a 5k. I was trying to break 20 minutes in it, and uh they you know, they all lined up to run their to run their races, and each each of my kids got personal best in like one of their two races, and then one of them qualified for state, and so I was like just like ready to go, and like came out like you know, on fire and ended up running in 1949. So I was like, it's that energy that it gives you.

SPEAKER_01 19:56

So that's awesome. That's such a good feeling when you're just able to watch it come together and yeah, and then you're like, I can do that. I can do it.

SPEAKER_02 20:05

So how many athletes did you have at Boston?

SPEAKER_01 20:07

Um, not I only had a smaller number. I'm trying to think exactly. I had five, maybe. Uh I think it was five. Um, one of one there, yeah. So it was it was there was one guy that I was just starting back starting up with, and so we chatted before the race just to kind of go over like a race plan of sorts because he was been dealing with an injury. So that was, but it was still great to kind of just like you know, be able to talk to him beforehand about about Boston and go through all the the hoops. But yeah, so I had uh I think it was four others, I think, if I'm doing my math correctly.

SPEAKER_00 20:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:44

Um, so yeah, but it was it was fun to be able to kind of travel that. And then what I mean, the wild thing was that like Boston was such a great race weekend, and then on my race weekend, just the stuff that was happening during that I had no idea was happening because well, the London was ongoing, I think during my race. So I had no idea uh that there was two guys that broke two hours, and I was it was just like this like up, and then I also didn't know that Vinny had run so fast. And so I finished and I'm just like on cloud nine. Actually, it was funny when I when Vinny, they're taking photos with both of us, and I was like, Oh, did you get the standard? And I didn't I didn't know how fast he had run at that point. And so he gave me, he kind of he was like, Yeah, and then I and then I realized how fast he ran, and I was like, wow, now it sounds like a dumb question. But it's insane though. Yeah, so crazy.

SPEAKER_02 21:36

Yeah, uh, I was it was funny that morning, like I woke up in the morning and I like checked my phone and I saw the su first sub two in London, and I was like, oh wow, like sub two is like really official now, and then like five seconds later, I saw the second sub two, and I was like in the other room, and I was like, whoa. And then like I saw Vinny Mari's race, and I was Just like what the heck's going on? And like Monica's like, what? And I was like, everyone's like running like all these records. And she was like, Oh, it's just about running. I was like, I was like, this is one crazy day.

SPEAKER_01 22:11

Yeah, it was like a such a like wild weekend to just kind of be like, just there's so much happening. Yeah. And yeah, it was pretty fun. It was fun. It was just kind of crazy. I know my family group chat was going crazy. Then my cousin was like, What about the guy who broke two? And I was like, What are you talking about? I had no idea what he was talking about at that point. And I was like, that could not have happened today. Yeah. And then to see like three guys that were under the previous world record. And I mean, to and I mean, it's just also crazy to have a guy that got second and was under two. It's just wild.

SPEAKER_02 22:42

Insane. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 22:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:44

Yeah. But all right, well, back to you. Obviously, you know, this podcast is about you. So um uh wanted to ask a little bit about um, you know, obviously, as a coach, you've got a lot of experience. You're able to give um give your athletes a lot of a lot of tips and a lot of good wisdom, but that comes from a lot of setbacks, a lot of highs, lows in your racing. So in the marathon, can you talk a little bit about your journey? Because I saw you ran your first marathon back in 2016, had a little bit of a setback in your first race, and then it was just kind of highs and lows ever since coming up to the OTQ that you hit just now. So, can you talk a little bit about that that journey?

SPEAKER_01 23:27

Yeah, and what's crazy is I I like when I went through that, I posted this recently. There's the kind of the breakdown, which is probably what is what you saw. Um, I hadn't actually like gone back and really went and wrote down the times and figured out exactly what that progression looked like. It was because I had been in this period where I was struggling, it just it was just like all bad. Everything was bad. It was just, you know, that was how I had perceived it from that time frame because there was just so much going on. But yeah, my first I dropped out of my first marathon, which I was supposed to do at the Olympic trials in 2016. So that was supposed to be my first race. Uh, I qualified with a half. And so going forward, I was like, uh, which was it was hard. I I think I I had run really fast in the half going into that, ran a 112. And this was pre-super shoes. So I feel like that was, you know, I have to bring that up because I feel like everyone's running faster than that now. But um, so it was pre-super shoes. And I didn't, I don't think I realized kind of I didn't have a lot of self-confidence, I don't think, in that moment. And I didn't realize how good that was. It just kind of like I did, you know, I it was, you know, raced. And right, I always was thinking about like, I just need to do more. I don't, I don't, I'm not still not good enough. Uh, and so going into that, the trials, I was like, I really have to prove myself. And I just I was sick on race week. I overtrained going into it. It was just like you name it.

SPEAKER_00 24:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:47

And I just didn't adjust my plan for what was happening. I just was like, I have to do this because, you know, otherwise, like no one's gonna take me seriously. And so I think that was the mindset going in. So after that, I was uh kind of took some downtime, took a month off to to reset and all that, and that helped a lot. Uh, and so then I ran Indy Monumental as my first marathon later that year and ran 238, which was like a great race. I won and it was like such a good experience. Uh, I that race wasn't seamless though. It was it was fast, but I had I think gone out a little quick for the the goal was actually 234, and I'd gone out right at that pace, which nowadays I don't like to go out right at pace. I kind of want to make sure that we are holding back a little bit at the start. And so I actually had held back. So I'd made up that difference at some point along the way. So it definitely had gotten a little quick at points. Uh, but then I also the fueling on that one was I had bottles I'd never used before on course because they gave us elite fluids, and one of the bottles was frozen because it had a little ice pack in the center and it was 30 degrees. I don't know why I was like, you need the ice pack. Like I did not need the ice pack in there. So one of the the first bottle I had on the course froze. So I didn't get that. And then I only had like a half of and I had the fuel in the bottles. I was using UCAN at the time. So I'd split a packet of UCAN between the two bottles, and uh, which was not enough in general. I definitely needed more than that. And that's what I know now. I didn't know that then. I really didn't know a whole lot about fueling and all the things that I know now when I first started. Um, I think mostly because I was working between my college coach and a coach that coached at Zap. And um, so I wasn't getting a whole lot of like specific guidance. My coach hadn't high in college, Lori had never run a marathon. So and I was kind of just I didn't know the questions asked. So it was it was just this little piecemeal together training plan going into the trials. And I didn't start coaching, getting a coach until I worked with Steph Bruce for the last, I think, six to eight weeks before that indie marathon. So that was the only real focus of marathon specific that I had gotten. Not a lot of time to practice a lot of the fueling. So I was kind of winging it and I didn't, I don't think I asked her either for advice, which was also problematic because you know, she doesn't know what I don't know. Yeah, yeah. So I definitely underfueled a bit. The last 10K was just it didn't, I didn't bonk. It was just that like classic getting a little slower every mile till you finish sort of experience. And so that was my first. And then after that, I ran CIM that next year. And that one was a definite like I overtrained for that one as well. Uh, part of that I think there was some like emotional stuff going on. I had a cousin who uh had been diagnosed with brain cancer, and he had been dealing with that for a while, but then he um was having, I think he went into hospice and we we did this drive to go see him one weekend, and it was driving to and from Ohio to go see him, which was great, but um, that was very emotionally exhausting, and I don't think I did enough to uh kind of, you know, offload that a little bit because that emotional stress, as I know now, falls in that same bucket as the physical. So I didn't give myself enough space to really be grieving what was happening there. And then he ended up passing away, I think a month after that, or some something in that regard. So it was definitely like a rough, hard time to navigate. And I think I'd and I'd been underfueling for a long time. Uh, and so that just puts you at higher risk of overtraining to begin with. So it was a lot happening at once. Um, and I what I also didn't mention was like through that time, I was trying to overcome some underfueling stuff. So that entire year was also me trying to fight this mental battle of like you don't need to be smaller to run faster. So trying to eat more while also navigating this like bigger body, which was what I was so fearful of, was that part of it. And so it was this constant battle of trying to feel confident when I didn't feel confident, and then you know, all the other stuff filling in the gap. So it was a tough year. And I think a lot of the races I did that year also were hot. So all my race, I didn't have a lot of times that were proving to me that I was still fine. Uh and so that does like certainly did not help. And so I just kept forcing it and forcing it and forcing it. So yeah, by the time I got to CIM, it was uh, I was not in a great place. And then I had to stop for the bathroom, and then I wore, I mean, I made rookie mistakes in that one too. Like I wore shoes, I'd had they were shoes I'd run in, but they were a new brand new pair. I didn't untie, I didn't retie them or do any of that stuff. I just put them on and tied them up and they were too tight. So then my feet were bothering me. It was just like, so I stopped the med tent and they're like, why don't you just tie on like why don't you just try untying your shoes? And I was like, good point. So I did that, it felt much better, but it was like at mile 20, which stop at mile 20.

SPEAKER_02 29:43

The the momentum's gone.

SPEAKER_01 29:44

Oh my gosh, it's like so hard to keep going. So yeah, that was a rough, that was a rough kind of drop to the finish line. Uh, was able to kind of bounce back a little bit from that going into the next year when I raised grandma's, and I was having some gut issues, um, which I found out was a parasite thing, and I got medication for it. And it was we had been in Italy shortly there before my husband or my then boyfriend at the time, we'd gone on a like a little trip. And I think I picked it up from there potentially, but I didn't I finally got medication for it like close to the race. So my training was really disjointed. Um, and I feel like the only reason that one went as well as it did, I ran 248, I think I wrote, um, or that I looked back on, uh, was that there was this big old group of ladies that was going for the standard, and everyone was working together. They were passing bottles around, everyone was really positive, just the best atmosphere you could ask for in a race. And I swear that was the only reason that I was able to run as fast as I did that day was because of that group of ladies. So uh that was a really good experience in Marathon, even if I didn't, you know, get the standard that I was hoping for that day. It was just, you know, just the positive environment was, you know, all you can ask for. So, and then coming out of that, it was just a constant battle of like, let's try to get the standard again. So, again, just like up and down races. And I think part of it was the fueling. I don't think I was getting enough in. Uh and I didn't know that. So I was trying different things, but like nothing was working. And that's a big change I've made more recently is aiming for way more carbs. So I get 75 grams of carbohydrate an hour right now. That's what I've been doing. And then I started increasing my sodium because I didn't know that was also a big part of my problem was, you know, not I'm I'm losing 79 milligrams of sodium per ounce of sweat, which is pretty high. And um, I was never replacing that much uh in the past. And you don't need to exact replace, I think it's like stay within 2%. But I was, you know, nothing, nowhere close to that. So um, so big learning curve on that stuff. Um, but also during the time frame between 2018 and I guess to actually 2017. So when I ran CIM, we were starting a team locally in Raleigh. Uh, and most of it was built on, and I had been wanting, this was like my dream to start something like this. Uh, so much of my early part of my story was that I was missing support for that first year, and I must be able to find a really good community. And it gave me the boost that I needed to start start performing well. And so, and I gave me opportunity, and I I didn't think that I was good enough for that opportunity when I first graduated. So, my intention was that I really wanted to create an atmosphere where we are picking up those women who are maybe didn't feel like or weren't given the opportunities right out of college. I really wanted to have a place for them to fall so that they could feel like they could keep pursuing something and put investment and time and energy to do it. And, you know, that way they can, you know, really explore that potential. So that was really what I was hoping for was to be able to give those runners what I was lucky enough to have at the end of the day. And uh it was started out great. Um, I think the the intentions were good. Uh, I personally, like it was a big thing that a lot of the what I wanted from it and what I wanted to give people was uh one thing. And I think the team started to have a little bit of a divergence from what that actually was supposed to look like. And for me, like that being the motivation behind it um was super important to me. And um, that was what I was using when I was, you know, trying to find sponsors for it. So I started to feel like we were lying about what we were doing, and so that was causing me stress. I also was already battling some of this um, you know, these these emotions of not feeling good enough. And I was scared of it failing and not helping these women and failing them in the process. So I took on a lot of stress with situations or or uh decisions that I thought were really negative or weren't weren't in that vein of helping these women. So um, you know, the more that that became more contentious in our group, because there was two other, it was mostly just two other women who were leading with me that were uh that was causing a lot of this kind of butting heads. And so I was taking a lot of that on. Um, so my anxiety was getting worse and the stress was getting worse. And I uh and then I started going to therapy where I she told me I was dealing with depression and some disordered eating stuff that had been so long standing. So there was a lot of stuff just compounding at once. And so that was definitely part of, I think the decline in performance was partially that. Like I was having to um, I had like one of my teammates, one of these women who was in that group, um, basically had made a comment that I wouldn't be so that I wouldn't be so depressed if I did stuff for other people. So it was like a very just hard environment to thrive. And so I ended up quitting in 2020, um, which was what I needed. And um that helped me to kind of dig my way out of that. But it was, I was in a pretty like deep hole from that um emotionally. It also I had re-triggered Epstein Barr virus, so the virus that causes bono. I had a re-like a triggering of that in 2020. So it really kind of reached so 2020 was kind of like we're in a pandemic and everything is like just collapsing. So I, yeah, in 2019 was the last race that I tried to qualify for the trials with. And after that, I started having trouble recovering and I um was like I ran a 10K and I was sore for like an entire week. And the fatigue started building up, and I was just really having trouble just putting things together. And then I got a stress fracture in April of 2020. Um, I think it was April, end of April, beginning of May, um, sacral stress fracture. So I had to take some time off from that. And then as I was building back up from that, that was when the fatigue and the coughing and all these other symptoms got way worse. And so I couldn't even run like four miles without needing to take a nap afterwards. So I that I quit the team shortly thereafter, started to found a doctor that could help me and we I was able to work myself out of it, but I had to take three full months off from training just to recover from all the stress and the sickness and all the stuff that had been happening. And so um, so yeah, so then, you know, it was almost like the entire year of 2020 I lost because so much of the training was real up and down. I couldn't really put stack anything together and then the stress fracture and then the, you know, taking three months off for the autoimmune stuff, it just kind of, you know, put me in a spot where I was like, okay, we're starting back over here, which was good. Um, you know, I think sometimes starting over can just bring you a lot of confidence in the rebuild. So as soon as I started to rebuild back up, it was just kind of setting some soft targets for myself to hit along the way. And I was able to see that progress finally coming back together. So for those years between 2016 and 2020, it was just every time I raced, it was just either I didn't know how it was going to go or I expected it to go bad at some point. It was, and you I just never trusted or felt like I had any control over what was happening with my training or performance. And so that was really a tough thing for me to work through. And once I kind of got out of that and was rebuilding, I was actually seeing that progress come back and actually being able to see myself do a workout and have it benefit me. And so that was such a good time frame to kind of work through. Um, it also gave me a really good timeline for improving getting getting rid of this long standing disordered eating thoughts and behaviors and underfueling. It just helped me to clear all of that up and start fresh and do things healthy. And now it's not something I have to worry about as much because it was at that point when you're underfueling, it can cause so many other issues, and your body doesn't know what to do and your metabolism slows down, and it just, you know, it it is it is stressful, it's hard. So, you know, working through that. So, yeah, coming out of that time frame, I think my first 5k race that I did, I was just my goal was to try to break 19. Um, and my PR is on the track 1603. So it was a very big sort of change in in the goals, the goals that I was setting for myself. And so that was good to be able to, you know, accomplish that and then keep moving forward slightly over time. And so I think that, you know, it was 2021 when I ran my first race again. And then by 2022, I was back and I ran a half in 116, which is the fastest half I had run since I had run and qualified for the trials. So that was a big jump. And then the then I had the injury pop up. So I um going into the fall of 2020, uh, I was in the taper for Indy Monumental, and I felt this glute pain kind of suddenly on the track. I didn't know what it was at the time. Um, and we thought it was maybe some pelvic floor stuff. So I was treating it that way, tried to race, made it four miles, and I was limping and I was like, it's not worth it. So I dropped. Um, the pain kind of gradually went away, and then so I trained for grandma's marathon, and then it came right back in the taper about the same time. Yeah, it was super frustrating. And at that point, I was doing everything I could to try to work it out, get rid of it, and it just nothing worked. So got the MRI and found out I had a torn labrum and a high hamstring partial tear. So, you know, I it was just kind of like, oh, I just rebuilt. I was feeling so confident, I was feeling like myself again. Everything was coming together, and then this happens. And so that was that was that was tough. Um, but I had signed up for Philly. So I was like, well, maybe I just go ahead and and see what we can do. So actually, Philly, I so I worked with the ortho. The ortho was like, it sounds like most of your symptoms are coming from this partial tear on your hamstring. We can try PRP and see if that helps to help that recover. Cause he he didn't think I was having symptoms from the tear. People can have labral tears and not even know it for, you know, however long. It's you know, it's one of those things. Um, and so I did the PRP and actually was not having pain in the hamstring. So ran Philly off of 11 weeks of training, uh, which was a very quick sort of turnaround. I only that first month after the PRP wasn't allowed to do workouts. So um I was mostly base building for those first few weeks of the 11 weeks, and then it was, you know, like a month of actual training in the taper. So not a ton going into it, but was able to run 252, which was the first marathon I had run since 2019. And it was only, I think, like three minutes slower than I ran in in Indian at the end of 2019. So that was a really actually big positive step to finish, to feel good doing it, to have a race, to just know that I was able to do it and not off of a lot of training. So that was huge, actually. And then the pain slowly came back in the beginning of 2024. So that was when we re-MRI'd and there hadn't been much improvement in the high hamstrings. So the doctor said, you know, he first he was like, you should get surgery on both. And I was like, What? Because the surgeries are like the the recovery is opposite. So for the labrum, they want you to start, you know, getting them mobilizing the hip as fast as you can. With the hamstring, you have to have it, you're not like not allowed to move it for some range of motion for a long time. So it was gonna be do the hip surgery, go through the rehab process, and then do the hamstring surgery. So he was like, You're looking at about a year. And I was like, Oh gosh. Um and so I asked him, I was like, Well, did the PRP do anything? And he was like, Let me check. So he looks back and he's like, Yeah, there actually was an improvement between the two. So maybe we just do the labral surgery because you know, that might have been why the hip, the hamstring wasn't able to recover, was that I was never fuel getting full functionality of my glute because of label tear. So we did that, and then I got PRP while I was under. And so knock on wood that, you know, that's been holding pretty well. So that's been good. Um, but yeah, that was in May of 2024. So I took the you know, entire year just to kind of build things up, didn't want to do a marathon until I felt ready. Um, and so that was my first marathon after that was in Columbus this last fall, and finally got back under the 245 that I had been trying so hard to get before the 2020 trials. And so I finally was able to get back in that in bad weather. And I executed the best race that I ever have because all those other races, it was in, you know, either the last 5k or the last 10k. I just had no, you know, the way I describe it now when I talk to my athletes too is you want to have control of your pace for the most part marathon. You gotta have control. And when you know you don't, you know you don't have control when like when you get to that final 10k or 5k, and people can pass you, and there's you don't have the ability to speed up or do anything. People try to motivate you. If you've been in that place, you know what I'm talking about. Where it's like you're running and you're just like someone passes you, and you're just like, I just don't even have the physical capability to go with them. Like that's just not happening.

SPEAKER_02 43:20

No, it's like this is just it.

SPEAKER_01 43:22

This is all I have. Like I'm running as fast as I can right now.

SPEAKER_00 43:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:26

So that was kind of the like in Columbus, it was the exact opposite. And I was finally like, I'm still in this, I'm still running fast. I if if I needed to, I could speed up at any point, which is you know what you're going for in the marathon. You want to get to those in miles with that ability to control the outcome. And so I then that was how I raced that day was to kind of separate from you know what I wanted to do that day, which was try and qualify for the trials. Uh, I instead was approaching that day as the weather's not ideal. So Let me use this to figure out like race this, find the effort that's appropriate in these conditions, really, really dig into that and execute the best race that I have for this day, uh, which was a really, really good learning opportunity for me. And I and I ended up second in the race. So it ended up being very valuable in the long run. So um, so that was that. And then yeah, and then Glass City was just sort of stacking on top of that brick that I built going into Columbus. And the goal was still uh run the right, run the smart race, run the execute the right race, and you know, hope that that correlates with an OTQ. And it did.

SPEAKER_02 44:38

So that's awesome. Yeah. I think um listening to to all of that, you know, the one of the main things I keep hearing is like you learned to listen to your body from like the top down. Like, you know, it's not just the physical, it's not just the you know, injuries, which obviously had played a factor, but it was the mindset and and the put not pushing through emotional stress that suddenly came your way, you know, and then learning how to listen to your body and not the external pressures that you know everyone puts on you. And it that those were kind of the things that it sounds like led all the way up to where you are now. So it's almost like you had to get through all of that to get to where you are now, which sucks, but it's it's cool that you're there though.

SPEAKER_01 45:27

Yeah, I always tell people that it's just like don't let it, you I didn't have to let it take as long as it did. I could have nipped this in the butt, you know, in the bud so early. Like it could have happened. I could have, you know, paused. There was a part of me, like I know I should have paused in that journey and that fight to try to get the OTQ. Uh one of the, I think the team manager at the time, uh Sarah Lesco, um, she had she, I think she'd even said to me at some point, like, maybe you just need to take like a few months off. And I, and I still think about that because it was one of those things that I was like, I kind of wish I had just done that. But you I just had this like external pressure because I dropped out of the 2016 trials that I needed to re-qualify. Uh, and so it was just like, I don't have time to do that. Like I keep failing. I just have to keep taking a shot at it, or you know, it's gonna slip away. Whereas if I had just been like, let's just take, I mean, I went for it. I ran the same races back and forth too, which now I I've been on a journey of like, don't, don't like run races that you haven't done before, make it fun. Don't make it about always having to run fast, you know, run, run other things. You you're you're out here to enjoy it as well. So, you know, that's just do ones that look like they'd be enjoyable to you. So yeah, that was a learning experience. And yeah, if I had just stopped being so headstrong about it, I could have turned this around so much sooner than it than it ended up being. Because it was, you know, most of mostly 2017 wasn't bad. I raced fine. I had some good outcomes, but my times weren't that fast because of the you most races were in the heat. Uh, and then it was just that one race at the end of the year that it didn't go as well. And I just was like, you know, my life is over. So um, those next two years, I could have just used them more effectively and not been so worried about the times, and that kind of helped me too. So it's been a lot of that therapy has helped so, so, so much. And I wish I had done that sooner. I I definitely should have done it before I tried to tackle the uh, you know, trying to figure out the the fueling issues. I should have gone that route because it's very much correlated when you're in that space. That like, what are we fearful of? What's the problem here? And being able to rework some of those things that you've got in your head to be able to deal with what's gonna happen when you know things change. So that was, you know, there's a lot of things that I would change going back, but mostly I just use that to help uh inform people that I work with if they're going through those kind of struggles, to just like how do we work through this more effectively? And how do we change our mindset about how we're we're approaching things? Because you know, we don't always have control over outcomes either. So that's the thing that I've been stressing more um with where people I work with is just like what what can we do to feel successful if this race is not gonna be the day for a PR? Because it can't, they're not always going to be.

SPEAKER_02 48:21

No, yeah, yeah. Um I think that's this is all awesome. I think um, you know, that's probably all of these setbacks and all these things that you had to learn and go through probably it was makes you a great coach. Like, are you able to kind of take a lot of that and give that to your athletes and kind of stop them before when you see the same patterns going on in them? How was that process like as a coach?

SPEAKER_01 48:48

Yeah, for sure. I think that has been there's a lot of things like I used to run my easy runs too fast, and that's a big thing that I'm like, you know, the the I had the I basically will use myself and be like, you know, this is my experience when I did this, and you know, we don't have to do it that way. Um, and so fighting some of these things that are sort of like very common amongst amongst a lot of runners, um, also kind of the overfixation on data, which I think is really, really present right now is uh and so like being able to like work through some of that with the athletes I work with, because I also trained, you know, from my high school days, and I'm sure the same that there wasn't we didn't have all the data that that we have now. And so you had to learn to be able to dig into your effort and you know train more by feel than we do now because we have every everything is tracked. And so I, you know, in some ways, and I I will tell people to take take care of your data on race week, like don't wear your fitness trackers or your sleep trackers, or don't look at it at least until after the fact. You can always interpret your data later, but don't look at it in the moment. And that's even how I race on race day is that I'll check my pace to make sure I don't start too quick, but then I will be like, all right, let me um I'll and then once I get to a certain point, it's just racing by the feel. Um and that's the best way to get the most out of yourself. So yeah, there's a lot of things that I have done wrong that I help that helps inform my, you know, my work with my athletes. And then a lot of it's also a lot of it's mental though. I think a ton of the stuff that uh we work through, I work through with athletes is also just like the mental hurdles that they face. Um, with training, you know, not every day is gonna be a good day. And how do we make sure that we get through each, you know, each cycle with confidence? And so I I mostly want my athletes to come out of any any training cycle feeling more confident in in themselves in general and in the process and all of that stuff, you know, because I think that helps long term and just helps in life to be more confident in yourself. So um that's kind of my ultimate goal is to like let's let's chat about those things first. And then the more belief that they have in themselves and all of that, the more that the training works for them. And it also helps them and me to figure out what's the most, what do we need? What's the thing that we need right now to get better? Like what's the piece? And when you can, when they can look at that more from a um like a you know, outside perspective and not about the data and all that other stuff, and they can see it and feel it, um, it's easier for us to work together and for me to help them and for them to help me.

SPEAKER_02 51:27

So Yeah. Yeah. That's yeah, that's great. I think, you know, like as runners, the reason we got into this sport was because we like what it gave us and we like the way that it made us feel and the confidence that it gave us. And so much of today in the 21st, late, you know, mid-21st century, um, we get all this data of like, you know, oh, your VO2 max is decreasing on your Garmin watch. Uh, you're, you know, you're unproductive, you're, you know, and then of course, with Strava, you see everyone running their their easy runs at like a pace that's way quicker than yours, and you're just like, you know, oh, I need to be getting faster, I need to be doing more, I need to be like running my easy runs faster, and it's so easy to get into that headspace. But if we just think about like we're doing this to make ourselves better, that's all it is. We're trying to get better in not just running, but in life in general. Yeah. And if we can run based on feel, and our easy runs should we just feel easy, then our hard runs can feel, you know, strong.

SPEAKER_00 52:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 52:35

Like that's exactly what this is about because we're learning how our body works. We're we're not right having, you know, we've lived on this earth in our bodies for however many years, 30 years, 20 years, whatever. We know how our body works more than the garment we've had for the last three years.

SPEAKER_01 52:50

Right. Exactly. And I the funny thing is actually through this process, so I um for Columbus, I I mean, I had my watch. I had my what my heart rate data was based on my watch. Um, and then like right after Columbus, my jeep my watch told me that my VO2 max dropped like three points or something. Like, I mean, within like a few weeks, like it doesn't you don't lose fitness that fast. I knew that. And then and then it was driving me nuts after Columbus because it was giving me the weirdest heart rate data where it'd be like, and I had that during the Columbus build, but I also was like just I didn't really pay attention to it. But then after going into Houston where I was really up and down, I kept being like, I don't like I know this isn't right, but it was starting to get in my head because I was on this roller coaster.

SPEAKER_00 53:35

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 53:36

But I knew I was like, the moment it doesn't make sense that my heart rate's not gonna be at 160 the first mile and then 130 the last. Like that doesn't actually core that doesn't that's not how things work. Like it doesn't do that. That's not right. So then um, and I kept complaining about it in my Strava post, and one of my athletes sent me a heart rate monitor as a gift, and I was like, oh, this is and I so I I started using it and like the I'm when I tell you the the VO2 Max instantly jumped, and then every day after that point I was productive. So it just goes to show you're like like you have to have accurate data for it to even be right, but like any any piece of equipment can be wrong.

SPEAKER_00 54:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 54:16

Anything, anything can have malfunction. Yeah, but what can't malfunction is how well you're able to attribute your effort to what you're doing and know if you you can feel that part. Um and that's really what matters at the end of the day. So yeah, I it was just funny to kind of like actually like see that at real-time feedback of like, oh, my heart, my wrist-based heart rate monitor has been pulling like 15 to 20 beats higher on easy runs than actual is kind of you know alarming when you think about how many people rely on the risk-based heart rate data for kind of trading guidance. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 54:52

Yeah, I uh I listened to uh, I don't know if you've ever uh listened to the marathon podcast, but he had uh Eric Floberg on last week, and Eric had I think quoted Peter Bromka uh in saying, you know, your body doesn't know pace, your body knows stimulus. Yeah and like I was like, gosh, that's so true. And like I took that and immediately said that to my track, uh my state track runner, because I was listening to that all the way up to the meet, and I was like, I'm gonna tell him that. And like he really took something from it, and it's it's it's so true. Like your body will respond in the like in the way that it needs to respond on the day. Like, yeah, however your body's feeling, that's how it's going to respond to whatever you get it. It doesn't an 830 pace one day could feel like a breeze, and the next day could feel really hard based on your sleep, you know, your fueling, your mental stress, and everything.

SPEAKER_01 55:48

So yeah, yeah. Yeah, and there's so much variability in this in all of it in general. Cause I remember I saw something from Steve Magnus recently that he was talking about uh the like the overfixation on what zone you're training in. And he's like, your zones aren't also just they're not structured to be like concrete, like they move, they can move day to day. Like your heart, your heart rate, the like where you're what zone you're in could be like higher one day, but you know, it's like just not it's not so specific. And your threshold moves, like it's not gonna be in the same place every day. And so like there's so much variability to training that if we're treating so much as absolute, then we we're missing sort of the spectrum of effort of learning like where what does this feel like? And you know, being able to also find where our ceiling is. We need to be able to feel the effort if we want to really know if we're getting the most out of ourselves, you know. So it gets harder as you get closer to that, but that doesn't mean that you're losing fitness. It just means that we're you're you're learning kind of how to how to get that extra little bit out of you, and it gets harder. And that was how I felt going into this race because I was like, I know that it's gonna be it's gonna be close. Like if I'm gonna get this standard, it's not, it's gonna be based on my training and my the way I felt in it. I was like, I know that I'm gonna have to work and it's not gonna be this, like, I have a barrier, which when I last qualified, I was, I think I ran 113 to qualify. And so I I that had way more buffer, and I was surprised by how fast I ran that day. I didn't think I was gonna run that fast. But I knew based on my training and based on how things have been going, and based on you know the experience that I have now with interpreting my workouts and the paces that I have run and things like that, and I've gotten really good at feeling efforts out that I knew what I was going to be. Like it was gonna be close and I knew I could do it, but I was I knew that it was gonna be that kind of like finish line sprint that it ended up. But one piece that one thing that I've kept that Steph Bruce told me when I first worked with her was that you don't pick your marathon pace, your body does. Yes. So I have I kept reminding myself in this last process to not force it to let the pace come to me, to feel the effort out, to have that composure and that control through workouts, with certain workouts where the goal was to try to push the limit a little bit and see where we where we can end and where we end up. So um, you know, finding that spectrum of where you fall is is so important and helpful if you want to get somewhere.

SPEAKER_02 58:24

Definitely.

unknown 58:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 58:26

Yeah, awesome. Well, uh the one of the things uh we've already been talking for about 56 minutes, but before I uh we let you go, I also wanted to ask you about your support system. So the um one of the things you posted in in your most recent post about your your OTQ time was you had a great support system and you know, a crew that was you know, loving you and supporting you the whole way. So can you talk a little bit about that and who who's in your crew and how that helps you?

SPEAKER_01 58:53

Yeah. So it yeah, this most recent race, it was especially kind of thinking about the dichotomy of what it was like, those those years when I was in Raleigh and going through some of the turmoil with the team that I was on and sort of being in like in the place that I was there when I was really struggling. I didn't have uh people on my team where I'm like reaching out to, you know, I didn't I didn't feel like that was what was happening. And maybe it was, and I was just in such a deep, isolated space that it wasn't, it didn't feel present, but I felt very alone through that period and it really reflected in how I was training and how I was doing. And um, so that was really tough. Um, and then you know, trying to find my place after that and still being in the Raleigh area. Uh, and so there was just some like it was just like a there was a tough time frame, and I was kind of finding my footing. And then uh we decided to move to Chattanooga in 2024. Um, and so moving here, I was like I we didn't know anybody. And uh, but the I went started going to this gym that's just down the street from me. And um, they had said, like, I talked to the owner, I was mostly trying to look for like the right type of gym where I could like do my own thing and it wouldn't be crazy crowded. And this is like the perfect gym. Everyone is it feels like a family a little bit. So um, so yeah, the owners there at Sweat Club were were part of the support system. And they, I mean, when we first moved here, they invited us to do like a friends giving at their house, and they invited people who yeah, who get into the gym or around the area who didn't have family and were kind of like the you know, the lone wolves that lived that were in the area. They just invited them to come. So we did that, and they also connected me to a lot of people. So they are such a great group of people that that was super helpful. Um, and they've been really big supporters and cheerleaders through the process. They um gave me an opportunity to kind of do a little coaching seminar when we first moved here. Uh, they introduced me to people. So they told me about this run club that I started going to, the Chat River Runners. Um, it's a Wednesday night. I'm actually going into it tonight because we're recording on a Wednesday. Um, and so uh that they were they've been so great. And it's just been a really fun sport of in uh you know atmosphere there. And then the local running store that I've kind of, you know, just started going to and they put on some of the races here at Fast Break. Uh, they've just been just awesome. All of everybody I got text messages from people and all of those crews, they were watching the race. They posted stuff to their own socials. There was, they made a big poster and they had it at the gym and they and so people could see it. And then uh they ended up doing a uh little party for me this past Wednesday. So it does, it feels like you know, there's just been everyone here is so nice, and that has been really helpful. But then, you know, aside from that, all of my friends back in Raleigh, the the people, you know, that I, you know, I we go still go back there pretty often to see them all and got so many text messages, and that was really great. And then my family, the family group chat. My sister was gonna, she, she actually, so my sister was at my when I ran my first marathon in Indy, she surprised me. There's actually a really cool photo where you can see her kind of fuzzy in the background, but I can you can tell that it's her. Uh, so that was actually cool. I didn't know she was there in that picture. I was coming into the finish line. So that was a really sweet moment. I'm glad I have that commemorated. She was gonna try to fly out, but she was like, couldn't make it work with uh, you know, like I think she had to meet uh a doctor's appointment or something for my niece. And so if you that made it challenging, but um, you know, I had my aunt and my cousin there, uh, which worked was so great. It was just made such a big difference. Um, and then my entire family, actually uh Columbus, like the entire, I had so much, my dad's side of the family and my mom's side of the family, like a bunch of people there. And so I had really hoped that would have been the kind of like the moment where I was able to bring it together. But it was great to have my cousin and my aunt in my corner there and they helped a ton. And yeah, my parents and the family group chat afterwards was just and my uh my husband. Husband's been, you know, he helps around the house a lot. And I feel like he helps balance everything out when my training is crazy. Um, because I was doing, you know, up to 90 miles a week and I strength train twice a week. That takes like 90 minutes, I feel like both sessions, um, and then PT stuff. So uh he and we have three dogs. So, you know, balancing all the things, and you know, he's always kind of been super supportive and helpful through it all. And um yeah, it he was he was it was funny because in the group chat afterwards he's like, I'm just gonna go tell random strangers about my wife.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:25

That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:26

So it was, yeah, it was awesome. And um, they're all excited about the prospects of being able to go to wherever the trials is in 2028. So um yeah, I'm really excited. I'm really excited for this time around because it feels like I'm going into it with a greater appreciation of it. And I I feel like I, you know, I know my bearings and um I just feel like so much more excited to race it and less pressure filled, if that makes sense. So yeah, it'll and uh and I'm excited because you know, yeah, my family will get to be out there. Um my niece is gonna be what, like eight or something. I can't remember how old she is, maybe seven. So she'll be able to kind of like take it in, which I'm really excited about. And um, so that will be that'll be pretty cool. So we're we're we're excited.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:14

Awesome. Cool. And so from now up until 2028, so that's like about a year and a half, I I would say. Um, so what is your plan as far as racing, as far as marathons? Do you plan to race in any more races before then or just kind of what's what's your what's your outlook?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:31

I, you know, I haven't decided 100% yet. I am gonna do like I have a 5k. That's kind of all I've signed up for at the moment. Yeah. Um, and then like Virginia 10 Mile is a race that I've really, really enjoyed going to uh over the past several years. They've got a great elite field and the lead coordinator is awesome. And so he already had sent me an invite today, actually, about racing that. So that's on my radar. I'm thinking I won't do a marathon in the fall just because I you know the high there's higher risk for injury when we're marathon training. And so, and I also think it could be valuable for me to try to see if I can run a fast half or run some faster races and you know, shorter distances and stuff like that. So I really want to work on some of the speed for just a little bit. Um definitely and then kind of see what else we can do from there. But I uh like I said, I've done the same. If you look at my list of races that I've done, it was indie grandmas, indie grandmas. And I want to do some races I haven't done. I haven't done any of the majors. Yeah. So I do really want to run Boston at some point. And now that I have sort of a standard to hopefully get into the pro field, like that would be on my radar for sure. Heck yeah. Um, so yeah, I don't know. But I almost feel like running Boston next year is probably, you know, we had they had such good weather this year that like the outlook for next year, like can they repeat that?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:46

I don't Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:47

That feels like not a sure thing. So I don't know. Yeah. So we'll see. I haven't decided. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:52

I was thinking about that because like, you know, they uh like you had a lot of people run under the Americ or a couple of people run under the under the American record for the men. And then you saw uh I think didn't um uh Jess McLean run under the American record? Um or she ran close at least. Now I can't remember.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:11

She didn't well, because I think Emily Sisson ran 218 at college.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:14

Oh that's right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:16

So I think she was like 220. She won the she ran the fastest American time in Boston. So Boston. Boston record, I believe. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:24

Yeah. And then you had you had 201 for the winner, and I was just like, I don't want people to think now that Boston is an easy, like raceable marathon, because it's not. It was just like a golden day.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:38

Yeah, you get you got the weather to kind of add to it. It's definitely, it can't what I the way I tell people is that I think it can be a fast race, but you have to know how to race it tactically. It's not a race that you just sort of you know go out at goal pace and stick to it until the finish line. No, you have to know where to go, where to hold back, how to run the hills, and then how to attack that last portion. You you have to get to the hills feeling pretty decent. Like you have to be able to feel good when you get to them and then be able to have that energy to work. The rate, the athletes that I ran the best were got to the hills and actually didn't have as much variability in their pace going up and down. Um, that was what I noticed the most was that the ones that ran the best had way less of like a, you know, way slower on heartbreak or, you know, but it's not even that big of a deal. I'd rather someone run slower up and take their time on that to be able to get the downhills to balance things out. But yeah, um, yeah, that was this year was definitely when you get when you get the tailwind in Boston, I think it it it really gives that extra little boost that you're looking for to really help it come together. But yeah, it was the this year was probably like a good highlight year, and you know, don't expect that every year.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:55

No.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:57

So we'll see. We'll see how see how it goes forward. So yeah, I don't know. I don't know what's next. Awesome.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:02

Well, cool. Well, uh, before I let you go, is there uh as a coach and as a runner, with all of your experience and going into the uh Olympic trials, what is a a piece of one piece of advice that you would like to leave a runner with today before you go?

SPEAKER_01 1:08:17

Yeah, I would say, you know, because I when I dropped out in 2016 and I didn't know if I'd ever get the opportunity to get back and finish and have a finish line, is that, you know, especially for those that if you qualify for Boston or you're running a race that's been your goal race for however long, to really embrace the opportunity, take out the expectations because you don't know if something's gonna prevent you from being able to experience that in the future. You don't know if, you know, you're not, you never know. And you may, you may get a second shot at it, and you can always use that as a second opportunity. And so, you know, make sure that the the race that you've been dreaming of, that you've been wanting to qualify for or that you've been wanting to raise forever, be present. Make sure that that's the most important thing that you're present and that you're able to enjoy it, because that's by far the most important part of all of this. And, you know, for anything, I wish I had gone into 2016 thinking like this is experience. This is an opportunity that I get to have. There's nothing that I have to do here. I just get to be here because I worked hard for it. So allow yourself to celebrate the accomplishment of being at the race you've dreamed of. And, you know, let anything else be icing on the cake, not the expectation.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:37

Yeah. Love that. Awesome. Well, thank you so much again, uh, Andy, for coming on and for sharing your story. Um, this is super exciting just to hear about your journey and very inspiring for me too. And uh, I hope uh other runners can take something from this. So thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:55

Yeah, thanks for having me on and letting me share. It's been super important to me to be open about that and make sure other runners feel like they there's still opportunity, even if they've you know had some ups and downs.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:07

Definitely awesome. Well, hold on one second before uh uh before jump jumping off. Uh let me stop recording real quick.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:15

Okay.