Latest / Hurdle with Emily Abbate / SPECIAL EPISODE: The Undeniable Power of Sport

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SPECIAL EPISODE: The Undeniable Power of Sport · Hurdle with Emily Abbate

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Speaker 1: I never thought I could run a marathon. I never
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Speaker 1: thought I could run a half marathon. I never thought
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Speaker 1: I could run a ten k. And it's like, you
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Speaker 1: do these things and you're like, who is this girl?
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Speaker 1: Like I look back and I'm like, I knew she
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Speaker 1: was always there. But it's so cool because you're always
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Speaker 1: becoming and to see your self evolved, this is so awesome.
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Speaker 2: Hey, everyone, Emily A Body bringing you a special installment
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Speaker 2: of Hurdle, a wellness focused podcast where I sit down
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Speaker 2: with inspiring individuals to talk about everything from their big
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Speaker 2: wins to how they've gotten through life's toughest moments. On
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Speaker 2: the show, what you can expect vulnerability, motivation, and candid
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Speaker 2: discussions with everyone from top athletes to aspiring entrepreneurs, and
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Speaker 2: what it really takes to follow your passions. My mission
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Speaker 2: is simple to inspire you to be your best self,
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Speaker 2: move with intention, and have fun along the way. For
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Speaker 2: today's special episode, I am bringing you my conversation from
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Speaker 2: last weekend at the New York road Runners Run Center
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Speaker 2: featuring the New Balance Run Hub.
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Speaker 3: I chatted with Samia Akbar. She's the marketing manager for
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Speaker 3: New Balance.
1:15
Speaker 2: Mollie Ridderbeck, she is the fitness, training and health director
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Speaker 2: for Runners World Magazine and Bicycling, as well as Lindsay
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Speaker 2: Clayton of Barrie's Booth Camp, senior instructor, run coach and
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Speaker 2: co founder of Brave Body Project, and the four of
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Speaker 2: Us gals caught up in honor of International Woman's Day
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Speaker 2: and talked about how sport has made us who we
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Speaker 2: are today. I love what Lindsay said about our discussion
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Speaker 2: on her Instagram. She said, the more we as women
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Speaker 2: tell our stories, the tales of our successes, are failures
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Speaker 2: and everything in between, the more we can learn from
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Speaker 2: each other and intern lift each other up. Couldn't have
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Speaker 2: summed it up better myself. If you like what you
1:55
Speaker 2: hear today, tag me over on Instagram and Twitter. It's
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Speaker 2: at Herdle podcast at a Body and a huge thanks
2:02
Speaker 2: to my friends at New Balance for having us. They're
2:04
Speaker 2: offering Hurdle listeners a really awesome deal. It's twenty percent
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Speaker 2: off purchases of over one hundred dollars at new balance
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2:15
Speaker 3: At checkout again for twenty.
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Speaker 2: Percent off your purchase over one hundred dollars, use Hurdle
2:20
Speaker 2: twenty two zero at checkout at new Balance dot com.
2:24
Speaker 2: I know the next logical question, what's your favorite New
2:27
Speaker 2: Balance sneaker? Well, my go too lately. It's the New
2:31
Speaker 2: Balance eight ninety seven. It is perfect for picking up
2:35
Speaker 2: the pace. I love it for both treadmill and outdoor work.
2:38
Speaker 2: Another favorite of mine for running long the New Balance
2:41
Speaker 2: ten eighty v ten.
2:43
Speaker 3: It's a super plush.
2:44
Speaker 2: Cushioned ride that makes me feel like I can go
2:47
Speaker 2: for miles and miles. Head on over to New Balance
2:50
Speaker 2: dot com and check it out for yourself. If you
2:53
Speaker 2: have a hurdle moment of your own to share, or
2:54
Speaker 2: you just want to say hi, you can always reach
2:57
Speaker 2: me over at Emily at Hurdle dot us. And one
3:00
Speaker 2: last note, it's crazy out there, guys. I feel it.
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Speaker 2: I know you feel it. So stay safe, wash your hands,
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Speaker 2: and be kind to people. Okay with that, let's get
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Speaker 2: to hurdling. Let's introduce the ladies to my left, I'll
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Speaker 2: hand it over to you. No one introduces anyone better
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Speaker 2: than themselves, so lindsay kick me off.
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Speaker 3: Hi, guys, I'm Lindsay.
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Speaker 1: I am a run coach, I am a senior instructor
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Speaker 1: at Berry's boot Camp and I'm the co founder of
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Speaker 1: Brave Body Project.
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Speaker 4: Hello everyone, good to see your smiling faces. My name
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Speaker 4: is Samia Akbar and I work at New Balance Athletics, Inc.
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Speaker 5: Based in Boston.
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Speaker 4: I work in the marketing department and I'm responsible for
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Speaker 4: launching all of our performance running product around the globe.
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Speaker 3: Hi, I'm Molly Ridderbeck.
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Speaker 6: I am the fitness, training and health director at Runners
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Speaker 6: World Magazine and Bicycling Magazine.
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Speaker 2: All right, so today we are talking about women and
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Speaker 2: sport and our relationship with sport.
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Speaker 3: Curious pull of the audience.
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Speaker 2: How many people here would say that they started with
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Speaker 2: sport at a young age?
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Speaker 3: Raiser hand?
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Speaker 2: How many people in here would say they started in
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Speaker 2: sport as an adult.
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Speaker 3: I consider myself in the adult area.
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Speaker 2: You know, I played ayso soccer in Connecticut, but extent
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Speaker 2: of my athletics growing up.
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Speaker 3: I'm curious.
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Speaker 2: I would love to kick us off by hearing about
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Speaker 2: what your introductions to sport really looked like.
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Speaker 3: Molly, why don't you get me started?
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Speaker 6: I've played sports since I was like six, as long
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Speaker 6: as I can remember.
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Speaker 3: I played soccer, basketball, t ball.
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Speaker 5: Growing up.
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Speaker 6: I was big into team sports and I was a
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Speaker 6: cheerleader at one point, and then as I it became
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Speaker 6: an adult, I got I shifted a little bit more
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Speaker 6: into endurance sports, T ball, t ball. At six, I
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Speaker 6: was a first base player, first base woman.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm very proud of that.
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Speaker 6: I quit after they took away the Tea's.
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Speaker 3: Tough, Sama, what about you?
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Speaker 4: So I didn't play really any organized sports when I
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Speaker 4: was younger. I was a tomboy and I lived in
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Speaker 4: a development where basically I just like hopped in anything
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Speaker 4: that all of the neighborhood kids were doing, So that
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Speaker 4: was pretty much my thing. I mean, as I got
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Speaker 4: a little bit older, I had an aunt that is
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Speaker 4: a horseback rider, and I started like going to these
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Speaker 4: like camps and stuff, and I got into riding a
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Speaker 4: little bit. But for the most part, running has been
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Speaker 4: one of these things where, you know, I have a
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Speaker 4: large family, and my brothers and.
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Speaker 5: Sisters all like played soccer.
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Speaker 4: Or did dance, and by the time like I came around,
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Speaker 4: I'm one of the younger ones, they were just like,
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Speaker 4: we don't have any money.
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Speaker 5: For any of these activities.
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Speaker 4: So you know, just like keep going and running is
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Speaker 4: like really straightforward. You know, you don't need a lot
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Speaker 4: of equipment, you can do it on your own or
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Speaker 4: with a group. And as I got older, you know,
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Speaker 4: I found other people that you know, did like summer
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Speaker 4: track and that sort of thing.
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Speaker 5: So that was kind of my entree into running.
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Speaker 4: And my dad used to like run sometimes as part
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Speaker 4: of his like workout regimen, and I.
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Speaker 5: Would go with him. But that that's pretty much it.
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Speaker 2: This begs the question, how many of you think that
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Speaker 2: we have over complicated running? Like you just said, all
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Speaker 2: we need is like a pair of sneekers in the
6:41
Speaker 2: will to get out there. Yet for some reason, it
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Speaker 2: is so easy to make so many excuses as to
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Speaker 2: why we just can't run. Lindsay, talk to me about
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Speaker 2: your experience with sport growing up.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, so I grew up as a professional dancer from
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Speaker 1: the time well I started as a dancer turned into
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Speaker 1: a professional dancer, so I started dancing when I was three.
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Speaker 1: I also was like a true leader growing up. I
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Speaker 1: was the captain, which was a great precursor to me
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Speaker 1: being a fitness instructor in New York City. I think, like,
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Speaker 1: hi girl, I had like a brief stint in track
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Speaker 1: when I was in high school, but because of my
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Speaker 1: dance background, I would do hurdles and grange dete over
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Speaker 1: them and be like the last one, but did it
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Speaker 1: very eloquently, So that didn't last. So I was a
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Speaker 1: professional dancer, and then about ten years ago is when
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Speaker 1: I really started taking running and sports seriously.
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Speaker 2: It's interesting, right also, because when you're young and you
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Speaker 2: are participating in sports, so much of it is just
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Speaker 2: fun and games and socializing. So my next question for
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Speaker 2: all of you is do you remember when you realize
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Speaker 2: that sport had this like competitive aspect, like when you
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Speaker 2: felt like it was bigger than just having fun out there.
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Speaker 1: I'll go first speaking from a dance perspective, like I
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Speaker 1: was taught from a very early age that dance was
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Speaker 1: very competitive, Like I was a competition dancer, so there
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Speaker 1: was always like a very competitive, very strict edge to
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Speaker 1: everything that I did.
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Speaker 4: That for me personally, I think, because like I was saying,
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Speaker 4: I was a tomboy when I was younger, it felt
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Speaker 4: competitive from the beginning. So that was like, you know,
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Speaker 4: it's always fun to win things. That was kind of
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Speaker 4: my attitude, and I think that's kind of the beauty
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Speaker 4: of my connection with sport over the years, is that
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Speaker 4: I feel like, especially with women and girls, you kind
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Speaker 4: of start to shrink yourself as you age in a
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Speaker 4: lot of different areas in your life.
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Speaker 5: And I feel so lucky that I've.
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Speaker 4: Been able to hang on to like having that light
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Speaker 4: and taking up space and wanting to compete with other people,
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Speaker 4: whether it was men or women, and so that started
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Speaker 4: at a pretty young age. But I think also there
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Speaker 4: was a big fun aspect. It wasn't all just the
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Speaker 4: competition piece.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, I was the same way.
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Speaker 6: I was so serious when I was a kid, Like
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Speaker 6: you're playing basketball and you're twelve, Like, it's not that serious,
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Speaker 6: But there was always I was a very competitive I
9:07
Speaker 6: am a very competitive person. So I feel like that
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Speaker 6: through line was always there. And actually in my adult life,
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Speaker 6: I don't race as much anymore, just because I want
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Speaker 6: to preserve the fun and I know myself well enough
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Speaker 6: to know, like when the training stops being fun for me,
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Speaker 6: I don't want to lose that, so I try to
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Speaker 6: maintain that within sport.
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Speaker 2: I think so many of us also as adults, lean
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Speaker 2: into sport as an outlet to de stress or again,
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Speaker 2: as the panel that just happened for with Ali, the
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Speaker 2: woman we're talking about, how they lean into sport to
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Speaker 2: get through hard stuff, like to get through breakups, to
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Speaker 2: get through tough stuff at the office. So for adults especially,
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Speaker 2: I mean, yes, we can be as competitive, but I
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Speaker 2: almost feel as if it's so critical that we adopt
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Speaker 2: that approach that you have as well. I love what
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Speaker 2: Samia said about learning from a young age to take
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Speaker 2: up space. What a valuable lesson that's sport has taught you.
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Speaker 2: What other lessons would you say that participating in sport
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Speaker 2: from a young age has given you, even through now
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Speaker 2: to your adultness.
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Speaker 3: I feel like it's endless.
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Speaker 6: I mean, especially because I played team sports, understanding how
10:17
Speaker 6: to work as a team, I feel that every day
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Speaker 6: in my career, so you know, things that go so
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Speaker 6: far beyond the run or the game or whatever it is,
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Speaker 6: it transfers into your everyday life. On the other things
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Speaker 6: I felt like I took away from that was just
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Speaker 6: the belief in yourself. You accomplish these things that you know,
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Speaker 6: maybe you didn't think were possible, but you do them.
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Speaker 6: And so I carry that with me throughout all areas
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Speaker 6: of my life as well, just to.
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Speaker 4: Kind of piggyback off of that. That's a really big one,
10:50
Speaker 4: is the belief in yourself. I came from. I grew
10:53
Speaker 4: up in the suburbs. I'm from Northern Virginia of Washington,
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Speaker 4: d C. And a lot of times I would be
11:00
Speaker 4: like the only person of color in my whole grade.
11:03
Speaker 4: And I think that it was very you know, like
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Speaker 4: my my family, we all have like really strong personalities
11:13
Speaker 4: and they always instilled a lot of like self confidence
11:16
Speaker 4: and independence in myself and my sisters. But I think
11:20
Speaker 4: that it was really really cool to kind of have
11:23
Speaker 4: this journey where I carved out space for myself and
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Speaker 4: I did something that I enjoyed, and as I got
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Speaker 4: older and you know, awkward in high school, I really
11:35
Speaker 4: really saw my body as something that you know, was
11:40
Speaker 4: just like strong and formidable and something to take care
11:43
Speaker 4: of and to be valued, and that it was very
11:47
Speaker 4: clear that it carved out this really nice space for
11:49
Speaker 4: me at a young age that it was outside of
11:51
Speaker 4: anybody else's gaze, right, because I think that that's another
11:56
Speaker 4: like weird thing as you're as you're as you're getting older,
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Speaker 4: and so I think it just like gave me this
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Speaker 4: really nice base of strength and perseverance, and it bleeds
12:07
Speaker 4: into everything that you do, you know, and also allows
12:13
Speaker 4: you to think pretty like critically about your focuses and
12:18
Speaker 4: start to think about the things that are really important
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Speaker 4: to you if you have goals and running, which I
12:23
Speaker 4: did because I ran in high school and then I
12:25
Speaker 4: ran at American University on full scholarship, and then I
12:28
Speaker 4: ran as a professional sponsored by Reebach for about seven years.
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Speaker 4: And it teaches you that you can do so many things.
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Speaker 4: You can do whatever you want, but maybe not all
12:39
Speaker 4: at the same time. And so you know, everybody has
12:43
Speaker 4: like different seasons in their life, and running definitely taught
12:46
Speaker 4: me that, you you know, if there's something that you
12:49
Speaker 4: care about or that you have a goal that you
12:52
Speaker 4: want to achieve, you just have to carve out space
12:54
Speaker 4: and stay focused and patient and consistent and really nurture
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Speaker 4: everything to kind of like push that thing forward, you know,
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Speaker 4: for success.
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Speaker 2: So did you think when you were a young girl
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Speaker 2: that you would make some sort of brief career out
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Speaker 2: of sport.
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Speaker 4: No, So, I, like I said, it was fun and
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Speaker 4: I could beat all the boys in sixth grade in
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Speaker 4: the mile, right, So that was awesome. And you know,
13:24
Speaker 4: as I got older, it didn't occur to me until
13:29
Speaker 4: like my junior or senior year in high school that
13:33
Speaker 4: running was even like I never really connected the people
13:37
Speaker 4: I saw at the Olympics with like a full career
13:40
Speaker 4: as an as a runner, right, And I think that
13:45
Speaker 4: it wasn't until I started to get recruited for school
13:48
Speaker 4: where I, you know, became very aware of this other
13:52
Speaker 4: world that I could do that for a living. And
13:55
Speaker 4: it was really really exciting.
13:59
Speaker 3: Lindsay talked to me.
14:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, jeez, dance taught me. First of all,
14:04
Speaker 1: it made me strong, right, It made me learn, It
14:07
Speaker 1: helped me become strong in my own body and to
14:10
Speaker 1: understand the power of that also dance, And I mean
14:13
Speaker 1: I was like a theater nerd growing up, but it
14:16
Speaker 1: taught me so much about persistence and being resilient. It
14:20
Speaker 1: gave me so much responsibility, and I think as I
14:23
Speaker 1: got older, I mean there were also good things and
14:26
Speaker 1: bad things about growing up in dance because there was
14:28
Speaker 1: a lot of negative body image issues that I had
14:31
Speaker 1: to deal with. I really took like my weight was
14:35
Speaker 1: my worth, and I have been told to lose.
14:38
Speaker 3: Weight, like by dance teachers.
14:40
Speaker 1: I've been cast and like national tours and been told yeah,
14:43
Speaker 1: but you need to be ten pounds thinner.
14:45
Speaker 3: So that was like.
14:46
Speaker 1: A really negative part of dance that since I have
14:52
Speaker 1: turned in sort of being in running and fitness, it's
14:55
Speaker 1: like really changed the way I look at because it's
14:58
Speaker 1: like that was such a negative of space to be in.
15:02
Speaker 1: But with fitness now it's all about like how I feel.
15:05
Speaker 1: Why I run is because I want to feel good,
15:07
Speaker 1: not about how I look. So I guess I don't
15:10
Speaker 1: know that it sounds negative, but there was a dance
15:12
Speaker 1: growing up as a professional dancer was just really hard.
15:14
Speaker 1: It was really strict. So I take good and bad
15:17
Speaker 1: things from that.
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Speaker 2: I guess I think you all three of you touched on,
15:21
Speaker 2: you know, our relationship with our bodies from the time
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Speaker 2: that we're young until now. And what I will say
15:27
Speaker 2: is that coming to terms with the idea that I
15:31
Speaker 2: am an athlete, because I think that's something that we
15:33
Speaker 2: all experience, certainly gave me a new appreciation for my body.
15:39
Speaker 2: A little bit about my backstory. I lost seventy pounds
15:42
Speaker 2: in college and really struggled and still struggle with body
15:47
Speaker 2: acceptance and understanding that yes, you can appreciate your body,
15:51
Speaker 2: but it's the whole dialogue that's happening internally that makes
15:54
Speaker 2: you really appreciate your body.
15:56
Speaker 3: And so I would love to kind of wrap on that.
15:59
Speaker 2: I guess for a minute of when maybe there was
16:04
Speaker 2: a time for you that you really started to appreciate
16:09
Speaker 2: your body, not just as an athlete, but now these
16:12
Speaker 2: days as a woman.
16:14
Speaker 3: And I mean, I'll kick us off.
16:15
Speaker 2: I had a really bad bout of negative self talk
16:19
Speaker 2: about a year and a half ago, and I was
16:21
Speaker 2: actually on a work trip in Spain, and I remember
16:24
Speaker 2: running up these huge mountains, things that I could have
16:27
Speaker 2: never done years ago, but the whole time, instead of
16:31
Speaker 2: enjoying that experience, I remember the negative dialogue.
16:35
Speaker 3: I remember what I was saying to myself.
16:36
Speaker 2: And I got home from that trip and I literally
16:38
Speaker 2: sat myself down and I was like, you are powerful,
16:42
Speaker 2: you are strong, and you need to take some time
16:45
Speaker 2: to reshape this and appreciate what you're capable of. And
16:49
Speaker 2: so I mean that was my experience with the appreciation
16:52
Speaker 2: of not just my body, but of what I can
16:54
Speaker 2: do with sports. So I'd love for you all the
16:56
Speaker 2: kind of touch on that and talk to me about
16:58
Speaker 2: maybe lindsay, even just when did you get to the
17:01
Speaker 2: point And I'm assuming maybe it was with running after
17:04
Speaker 2: dance that you were just like, Wow, how beautiful is
17:08
Speaker 2: it that I can do this.
17:09
Speaker 5: Yeah.
17:10
Speaker 1: So the about five years ago, I tore my acl
17:15
Speaker 1: and it was like if you know, if you know,
17:17
Speaker 1: it's the worst injury, right, And it was one of
17:21
Speaker 1: the hardest times of my life. It was like I
17:23
Speaker 1: became so depressed, I was so I felt fat, I
17:26
Speaker 1: felt sad, and I just felt like useless and I
17:28
Speaker 1: felt like it's a really long recovery. So for eight months,
17:32
Speaker 1: I was like I'm never gonna be able to walk again,
17:35
Speaker 1: and like I miss being able to move and jump
17:38
Speaker 1: and like dance and feel strong in my body. So,
17:42
Speaker 1: oh my god. I remember the when I was finally cleared,
17:45
Speaker 1: which felt like literally years to jog on a treadmill.
17:49
Speaker 1: I just sabbed because I was just like, I'm jogging
17:53
Speaker 1: at like a four to ozho. But it made me
17:56
Speaker 1: realize and like I really did not realize this until
17:59
Speaker 1: this happened to me, that like movement and your ability,
18:02
Speaker 1: your body's ability to move is such a gift and
18:05
Speaker 1: it could be taken away from you at any second,
18:08
Speaker 1: And that injury was horrible, but it was also like
18:11
Speaker 1: the best thing that ever happened to me, because I
18:14
Speaker 1: there is not a day that goes by whether I'm
18:16
Speaker 1: teaching or I'm running that I'm just I can only
18:20
Speaker 1: be grateful for the body I have. And it also
18:23
Speaker 1: flipped the script on I don't care how I look.
18:26
Speaker 1: I care that I can move, and like losing weight
18:30
Speaker 1: or whatever your fitness goals are, that's going to come
18:32
Speaker 1: with that. But if you start with the reason why,
18:35
Speaker 1: like the looking good or like having a nice butt,
18:39
Speaker 1: like that is such a bonus to like the gift
18:41
Speaker 1: that movement brings.
18:42
Speaker 3: Me personally, no one can take away or why. Yeah.
18:45
Speaker 4: Ever, one thing I would add is that I like
18:51
Speaker 4: I told you guys that I felt really strong as
18:54
Speaker 4: I was like going through my teenage years and you know,
18:59
Speaker 4: getting into to adulthood because of running. I know for
19:04
Speaker 4: sure that like that's a thing in the running community.
19:09
Speaker 4: I always felt extremely lucky to go to a school
19:12
Speaker 4: that we had just started our like Division one status,
19:16
Speaker 4: and so the folks on the team, it was a
19:18
Speaker 4: really small team at AU. They came in all shapes
19:22
Speaker 4: and sizes and there was all different ability levels. They
19:25
Speaker 4: weren't necessarily recruited right the team that I joined at American,
19:30
Speaker 4: And as a result, I had a wonderful college experience
19:34
Speaker 4: when I talked to a lot of my colleagues who
19:39
Speaker 4: were other professional athletes, and they talked to me about college.
19:42
Speaker 5: There were so many.
19:43
Speaker 4: Stories about like crazy coaches that would like have this
19:47
Speaker 4: culture of girls like weighing themselves and pitting people against
19:50
Speaker 4: each other. I mean, I have a good friend that
19:54
Speaker 4: went to Wake Forest and she said that her coach
19:57
Speaker 4: didn't want eating disorders to spread, and so she like
20:00
Speaker 4: broke the team up into eaters and non eaters, and
20:02
Speaker 4: she like didn't want the healthy girls to hang out
20:06
Speaker 4: too much with the girls that weren't eating.
20:08
Speaker 5: It was like a whole thing.
20:10
Speaker 4: And I that was like bizarre, Like I never I
20:14
Speaker 4: you know, I never experienced that in college. So for that,
20:17
Speaker 4: I'm really thankful. But I will say that when I
20:22
Speaker 4: became a professional athlete, one of the things that really
20:25
Speaker 4: disturbed me was that I would go places in like
20:28
Speaker 4: plain clothes or be somewhere with my mom and her
20:32
Speaker 4: friends would be like, oh my gosh, like you look great,
20:36
Speaker 4: like you're so skinny. Do you eat few things? So
20:40
Speaker 4: first off, like I don't, you know, it bothered me
20:44
Speaker 4: a lot. You know, I'm an African American woman, and
20:46
Speaker 4: in my community, it's almost the opposite, Like if you're skinny,
20:49
Speaker 4: people are worried about you. You know, They're like, are
20:52
Speaker 4: you okay? Are you eating? You know, are you resting?
20:56
Speaker 4: You know, that's like a cultural thing, and so I
21:00
Speaker 4: don't know how that got so tightly linked for some
21:02
Speaker 4: people with like beauty and acceptance. And the other thing
21:07
Speaker 4: was that I was training for a marathon during those times,
21:10
Speaker 4: and I was running like one hundred eighty five miles
21:14
Speaker 4: a week, right, and I was eating at a voracious appetite.
21:18
Speaker 4: I was eating everything that like anybody left out, you know,
21:21
Speaker 4: arently you know, eating other people's leftovers and my refrigerator.
21:26
Speaker 5: And it was very bizarre to me that like people.
21:30
Speaker 4: Didn't make this connection between like strength and taking care
21:34
Speaker 4: of yourself, and that they would look at somebody who
21:37
Speaker 4: was really tiny and really live and not understand that
21:41
Speaker 4: this person has a lifestyle dedicated to this thing. Like
21:45
Speaker 4: I look that way kind of as a function of
21:48
Speaker 4: what I was doing and not because I was trying
21:51
Speaker 4: to like fit into this jumpsuit or those genes. And
21:54
Speaker 4: so that I got a lot of comments like that
21:57
Speaker 4: from other women, and I would always talk to them
22:00
Speaker 4: and say like, well, like I want you to know that,
22:02
Speaker 4: you know, I spend hours in pilates classes and doing
22:07
Speaker 4: workouts and doing eighteen mile long runs. You know, why
22:12
Speaker 4: on earth would you ever compare yourself to me unless
22:16
Speaker 4: like you're endeavoring to do the same kind of thing.
22:18
Speaker 5: It was very disturbing.
22:19
Speaker 4: So I think that like people, you know, it's really
22:23
Speaker 4: good that we're having these kinds of conversations because I
22:27
Speaker 4: think that it's so important that people look at their
22:30
Speaker 4: body as something very different than like what we get
22:34
Speaker 4: from like magazines and television on a consistent basis.
22:38
Speaker 2: Two quick things and then I'd love to hear from Molly.
22:40
Speaker 2: First off, the jumpsuit is fire. Secondly, I sat down
22:45
Speaker 2: with Robin Arzon from Peloton for the show and she
22:49
Speaker 2: said something that I thought was really valuable is that
22:52
Speaker 2: so many people look at her and they say, how
22:55
Speaker 2: can I get your ABS? And she says, I spend
22:58
Speaker 2: six hours a day doing fitness. I don't want you
23:02
Speaker 2: to have my ABS unless you were also doing six
23:05
Speaker 2: hours a day doing fitness. And so often we look
23:09
Speaker 2: at someone who might have something that we want or
23:12
Speaker 2: we think that we want, but then you have to
23:14
Speaker 2: ask yourself, like is it a function of my life?
23:16
Speaker 2: To have that thing and if it's not, that's okay.
23:19
Speaker 2: It's okay, Mollie.
23:21
Speaker 3: Yeah, I totally identify with all that.
23:23
Speaker 6: I always say, if I wanted to look a different way,
23:25
Speaker 6: I would train a different way.
23:27
Speaker 3: But I trained by what I love to do.
23:29
Speaker 6: I love to run, I love to ride my bike,
23:31
Speaker 6: and so my body is just a result of that.
23:35
Speaker 6: By doing those things, I've found so much pride and
23:38
Speaker 6: self confidence in my body. It became something more than
23:41
Speaker 6: just what it looks like. My body is what it
23:44
Speaker 6: can do and what I can do. But similarly to you, Lynn,
23:48
Speaker 6: I broke my ankle when I was sixteen years old, like.
23:51
Speaker 3: A horrible break.
23:52
Speaker 6: I had a double for exture dislocation, and doctors told
23:57
Speaker 6: me I would never run again, I would never do
24:00
Speaker 6: much of anything.
24:01
Speaker 3: And I was just a kid. So my mom was like,
24:05
Speaker 3: screw that.
24:06
Speaker 6: I was told it couldn't curse, so I just had
24:08
Speaker 6: to make sure I didn't and like we got a
24:11
Speaker 6: second opinion, and she was like, you're sixteen years old, Like,
24:14
Speaker 6: go be a kid. If you have to deal with
24:16
Speaker 6: it when you're forty, then we'll figure that out when
24:17
Speaker 6: you're forty. And so I went back to playing soccer,
24:21
Speaker 6: and I've since run mile races to half marathon races.
24:26
Speaker 6: I work at Runners World, and I started riding my
24:30
Speaker 6: bike as a way to cross train because it's easier
24:35
Speaker 6: on your joints. And I have then, you know, ridden
24:38
Speaker 6: a bike and all the most beautiful places in the world.
24:41
Speaker 6: It's taken me on adventures I could have never dreamed of.
24:44
Speaker 6: And you know, I get to work in cycling as well.
24:48
Speaker 3: And so.
24:50
Speaker 6: The injury for me has changed my entire perspective on
24:54
Speaker 6: everything that my body can do.
24:55
Speaker 3: I'm so grateful to just be able to like walk every.
24:59
Speaker 6: Day times same literally same, and I want to wish
25:03
Speaker 6: it upon anyone. I don't want anybody to have to
25:05
Speaker 6: go through like a horrible injury to like develop that
25:09
Speaker 6: perspective or that gratitude.
25:11
Speaker 3: But it's completely changed my life.
25:13
Speaker 6: Like I'm just so glad that I can do anything
25:15
Speaker 6: that I'm able to do because of that.
25:18
Speaker 3: To me, I has injury ever really stricken you? Obviously.
25:21
Speaker 2: Lindsay and Molly talked about their experiences I had.
25:25
Speaker 4: I had like a bad training stint because we had
25:28
Speaker 4: a really rough winter in Virginia and our team didn't
25:30
Speaker 4: like go away somewhere else to train over like the
25:35
Speaker 4: winter months, and so there was like snow and ice
25:39
Speaker 4: and it kept like melting and refreezing, and I was
25:42
Speaker 4: running doing like some of my like long runs on
25:45
Speaker 4: that and I had like a like a weird thing
25:48
Speaker 4: with my hip that had to get a lot of
25:50
Speaker 4: like treatment. But otherwise I haven't really I can't say
25:54
Speaker 4: that I was like ever hindered by a lot of injury.
25:57
Speaker 4: My coach at the time was big on like soft
26:00
Speaker 4: surface running, and so a lot of times, especially for
26:04
Speaker 4: longer races, if I had like two runs in a day,
26:07
Speaker 4: I would do my shorter runs on like like through
26:10
Speaker 4: the neighborhood on the asphalt. But almost everything else, even
26:13
Speaker 4: my tempos, was done on like a dirt path or
26:15
Speaker 4: a gravel path.
26:17
Speaker 3: Interesting.
26:19
Speaker 2: I'm curious to know from all of you if you
26:22
Speaker 2: have a specific time, either growing up as an athlete
26:26
Speaker 2: or now as an athlete, that you reflect on as
26:29
Speaker 2: one of your most proud moments in your sports.
26:38
Speaker 3: I'll kick us off. You're welcome.
26:42
Speaker 2: These days, I'm a runner, it's still like every time
26:45
Speaker 2: I say it, it still never feels real, which is
26:47
Speaker 2: just ridiculous because I probably run five or six days
26:50
Speaker 2: a week.
26:50
Speaker 3: I'm sure a lot of you can relate.
26:53
Speaker 2: I last year trained my butt off for Chicago, and
27:00
Speaker 2: I went into it after a summer for the first
27:03
Speaker 2: time of what I would like to call for me
27:07
Speaker 2: running fast. I was running faster than I ever had
27:10
Speaker 2: before because I was training for short distance races, which
27:13
Speaker 2: was so fun as someone who considers themselves a long
27:17
Speaker 2: distance person. And so I went out there and I
27:19
Speaker 2: ran fast, and I tried a different couple of mile
27:21
Speaker 2: races and they were a whole lot of fun. And
27:23
Speaker 2: so I showed up for Chicago and ran a BQ.
27:29
Speaker 2: And that was something that Emily in college, who struggled
27:34
Speaker 2: with her weight and body acceptance and all of these
27:36
Speaker 2: things like it was never in my vocabulary.
27:39
Speaker 3: It was never something I even dreamed of.
27:41
Speaker 2: So to do that for me and kind of let
27:43
Speaker 2: go of this version of myself, this self limiting version
27:46
Speaker 2: of myself, was so empowering. So I'd love to know
27:50
Speaker 2: from you guys, when has sport truly empowered you to
27:54
Speaker 2: be your best self.
27:56
Speaker 1: The first marathon I ran was the New York City Marathon,
28:00
Speaker 1: and the end I was like, Okay, this was obviously
28:02
Speaker 1: the most incredible experience of my life, but I think
28:05
Speaker 1: I want to do it again just so I can
28:07
Speaker 1: do it just a little bit better. So even if
28:09
Speaker 1: it's just like my confidence, or if it's just like.
28:12
Speaker 3: A minute faster.
28:14
Speaker 1: And this earlier before the second New York City Marathon,
28:19
Speaker 1: I ran I started reading Dina Caster's book let Your
28:21
Speaker 1: Mind Run, which if you haven't read it, it's such
28:24
Speaker 1: an incredible book and it really talks all about like
28:27
Speaker 1: what are you saying to yourself?
28:29
Speaker 5: What?
28:30
Speaker 1: And you could take that in life or when you're running.
28:32
Speaker 1: And it was like an exercise like go out on
28:34
Speaker 1: a run and just like listen to what you're saying
28:36
Speaker 1: to yourself. And I could not believe like the excuses
28:40
Speaker 1: that I would come up with, the negative comments I
28:43
Speaker 1: would like say to myself like oh, like I would
28:46
Speaker 1: look at my watch and instantly like sabotage myself on
28:48
Speaker 1: my run. So it started out small, and it started
28:51
Speaker 1: out with like a couple miles of me just like
28:54
Speaker 1: like I feel like a psycho, but like on a
28:55
Speaker 1: loop just being like yes you can, Yes you can,
28:58
Speaker 1: Yes you can, you can do it. And like saying
29:00
Speaker 1: these words over and over had such a great impact
29:04
Speaker 1: on me. So when the second marathon I ran. I
29:08
Speaker 1: ran a forty one minute PR and I honest yeah,
29:12
Speaker 1: like it was it was almost like and I know
29:15
Speaker 1: you guys have probably had these runds before, you know,
29:18
Speaker 1: when like everything is just flowing and you just feel
29:20
Speaker 1: like someone's like carrying you forward, like and like you
29:23
Speaker 1: wished for those moments and for it to haven't at
29:26
Speaker 1: the marathon was just like I was so grateful and
29:29
Speaker 1: it was just it was the PR was my body
29:33
Speaker 1: could have done it always, but it was in my mind.
29:35
Speaker 3: So that was like such a huge accomplishment for me.
29:37
Speaker 2: Isn't it so powerful when you realize that you did that,
29:41
Speaker 2: Like you did that, you showed up and you put
29:45
Speaker 2: in the work and that happened because you showed up
29:48
Speaker 2: for you and that's just really empowered.
29:50
Speaker 1: It's well, it's like I never thought I could run
29:52
Speaker 1: a marathon. I never thought I could run a half marathon.
29:54
Speaker 1: I never thought I could run a ten k, And
29:56
Speaker 1: it's like you do these things and you're like, who
29:58
Speaker 1: is this girl? Like I look that and I'm like
30:00
Speaker 1: I knew she was always there. But like it's so
30:02
Speaker 1: cool because you're always becoming and to see like you
30:06
Speaker 1: your self evolved This.
30:08
Speaker 3: Is so awesome. What a rock star. So thanks sm Molly.
30:14
Speaker 3: What about you?
30:16
Speaker 6: Last year, I did what's called a prestige bike race.
30:21
Speaker 3: I don't know, it's hard to call it a race.
30:22
Speaker 3: It's a timed event.
30:23
Speaker 6: But uh, it's not like a it's not like a
30:28
Speaker 6: sanctioned by grace.
30:31
Speaker 3: It was out in Boulder, Colorado.
30:33
Speaker 6: I had ridden there a couple of times prior to that,
30:35
Speaker 6: and I'm garbage at altitude, like truly just no oxygen
30:40
Speaker 6: to be had, and so I've ridden out there before,
30:43
Speaker 6: but I could only make it like twenty miles and
30:46
Speaker 6: then I'm You're out. Like it's very hard coming from
30:49
Speaker 6: New York City. So this Prestige was I think it
30:55
Speaker 6: was ninety miles over ten thousand feet of climbing, so
30:59
Speaker 6: it's just it's a bear. I had a lot of
31:03
Speaker 6: anxiety going out to it. You do it in teams
31:06
Speaker 6: of four, and this event was all women, which was
31:09
Speaker 6: really special and awesome. I did it with my one
31:13
Speaker 6: girlfriend from New York and two women from la We
31:17
Speaker 6: were the sea level team because everybody else was local,
31:21
Speaker 6: and we were like, this is gonna be so difficult
31:24
Speaker 6: for us, but you just roll out and you take
31:28
Speaker 6: it one climb at a time, and during the biggest
31:32
Speaker 6: climb of the day, you get to the top of
31:33
Speaker 6: the mountain and you'd like look out into the most
31:35
Speaker 6: beautiful vista you can ever imagine, and I just I
31:39
Speaker 6: was just sobbing, and.
31:41
Speaker 3: My friend's like, are you okay, are you hurt?
31:43
Speaker 5: Like what's wrong?
31:44
Speaker 6: And I was just I was just so proud, Like
31:46
Speaker 6: I set my mind to doing this thing. I was
31:49
Speaker 6: going through like a lot of stuff in my personal life,
31:52
Speaker 6: and I went out there with like a few of
31:55
Speaker 6: my closest girlfriends and we just did it together. And
31:59
Speaker 6: finishing that day was just such a huge moment of
32:04
Speaker 6: pride for me. And you just feel so accomplished. And
32:07
Speaker 6: it's exactly what you say, You just show up for yourself.
32:10
Speaker 6: Nobody else did it for you. You know, there's a
32:12
Speaker 6: ton of people that help you get there, and a
32:14
Speaker 6: ton of things in your mind that helped you get there,
32:15
Speaker 6: but at the end of the day, it's just you.
32:17
Speaker 3: So I think that was really powerful for me.
32:20
Speaker 5: I think.
32:22
Speaker 4: Probably the most like kind of limiting thought that I
32:28
Speaker 4: had was maybe earlier on in my running career when
32:31
Speaker 4: I was in college and my coach was trying to
32:33
Speaker 4: get me to transition to longer distances in high school,
32:37
Speaker 4: every anybody that's running college kind of goes through this anyway,
32:40
Speaker 4: where you think you're like so fast at something shorter
32:44
Speaker 4: than you really are, and you end up being like
32:48
Speaker 4: encouraged to move up, and that's kind of like where
32:50
Speaker 4: you shine. So for in high school, I think I
32:54
Speaker 4: ran like mile two miles, so I was always on
32:56
Speaker 4: the longer end of the spectrum. And basically I made
32:59
Speaker 4: a move from doing like cross country and five k
33:04
Speaker 4: on the track to the ten k. And I really
33:07
Speaker 4: fought my coach forever about this. I mean I was like,
33:10
Speaker 4: people go get hot dogs during the ten k? I mean,
33:13
Speaker 4: how many laughs is it? Like what is the point?
33:15
Speaker 4: Like it's so boring, like what are we even doing?
33:18
Speaker 4: So I ran it twice in college, and the second time, no,
33:22
Speaker 4: I ran it three times in college. And the third
33:24
Speaker 4: time is when I became one of the first female
33:27
Speaker 4: All Americans at American University. And so I was like,
33:31
Speaker 4: well that went pretty good at NCAA's and so I
33:35
Speaker 4: think I'm okay with this like really long. You know,
33:38
Speaker 4: it's still kind of boring, but I'm okay with it.
33:40
Speaker 4: And so that really helped shape the rest of my
33:43
Speaker 4: career and get into a lot of road running and
33:46
Speaker 4: stuff after that. I would say that, you know, my
33:51
Speaker 4: proudest moment was when I was in this weird transitional
33:57
Speaker 4: period between college and running professionally. I was like a
34:03
Speaker 4: fifth year, like first year master's degree student in psychology
34:06
Speaker 4: at AU and I wasn't really sure what was going
34:11
Speaker 4: to come next. I really wanted to run full time,
34:15
Speaker 4: and I basically on like Father's Day in June, I
34:20
Speaker 4: ran this five k because I was living at home,
34:23
Speaker 4: I didn't really have any money, and my dad was
34:28
Speaker 4: always so proud of every like running achievement I ever had.
34:32
Speaker 4: So we did this five k race together and I
34:34
Speaker 4: want it and I want a new pair of shoes,
34:36
Speaker 4: and I gave them these shoes. And that's when I
34:39
Speaker 4: met my professional what would become my professional coach, and
34:44
Speaker 4: eventually got this sponsorship with Reebok. But it was it
34:49
Speaker 4: went from something that made me feel really like sad
34:52
Speaker 4: and kind of like, you know, a loser.
34:54
Speaker 5: A lot of my friends were going off.
34:56
Speaker 4: To like start their careers and getting married and having kids,
35:01
Speaker 4: all kinds of stuff, and I was really proud of
35:06
Speaker 4: myself for kind of you know, holding on tight to
35:10
Speaker 4: my own goals and dreams, because something that seemed very
35:14
Speaker 4: like attractive and kind of what everybody else was doing
35:16
Speaker 4: at the next stage of their life ended up being
35:19
Speaker 4: like the best adventure of a lifetime. You know, running
35:23
Speaker 4: is giving me everything, traveled around the world, meant wonderful people,
35:29
Speaker 4: and learned a lot about myself. And so yeah, I
35:32
Speaker 4: think that was probably like the beginning of, you know,
35:35
Speaker 4: a very proud moment for me.
35:37
Speaker 3: I love that. So we talked proud moments.
35:39
Speaker 2: But what I think is important also to touch upon
35:43
Speaker 2: might be some of those more difficult times injuries aside.
35:45
Speaker 2: I know we've wrapped on that a little bit, but
35:47
Speaker 2: if you can reflect on a certain moment growing up
35:49
Speaker 2: in sport that taught you a really important lesson for me, I,
35:55
Speaker 2: as everyone does freshman year. Everyone's a lot on the
35:57
Speaker 2: freshman volleyball team in high school, but not the JV
36:00
Speaker 2: volleyball team fun back. So I came back personally my
36:04
Speaker 2: sophomore year, not really considering myself an athlete, and I
36:07
Speaker 2: had worked so hard over that summer to try to
36:10
Speaker 2: run a mile in under ten minutes, and I was
36:13
Speaker 2: running all the time and was running all the time.
36:16
Speaker 3: And then it came the day that I had to
36:18
Speaker 3: run the mile and I.
36:19
Speaker 2: Couldn't do it in under ten minutes and I didn't
36:21
Speaker 2: make the JV volleyball team.
36:23
Speaker 3: And it's funny because.
36:24
Speaker 2: I look back on that time now because that experience
36:26
Speaker 2: actually deterred me from sport for a while. I felt
36:29
Speaker 2: like I wasn't good enough, and how horrible is that
36:31
Speaker 2: that that's how we talk to young woman.
36:34
Speaker 3: You're not good enough.
36:35
Speaker 2: You can't be on this team because you can't do
36:37
Speaker 2: this little itty bitty thing.
36:39
Speaker 3: I was great at serving the ball, just FYI.
36:41
Speaker 2: So that was a moment that really, I mean sadly
36:46
Speaker 2: at the time to turn me from sport. But I
36:47
Speaker 2: look back on it now almost with like affection because
36:50
Speaker 2: I'm like, well, take them be cute. So anything tough
36:55
Speaker 2: that you guys went through as young athletes, that has
36:57
Speaker 2: framed who you are today.
36:59
Speaker 1: Just again and being a professional dancer and like on
37:03
Speaker 1: when I was I was eighteen when I did my
37:05
Speaker 1: first national tour. I did the Broadway show Grease and
37:09
Speaker 1: I literally left college for it, Like I left and
37:12
Speaker 1: was on like a bus.
37:13
Speaker 5: The next day.
37:14
Speaker 1: I was like I don't even know what I'm doing,
37:17
Speaker 1: Like it was wild and even you know, growing up
37:21
Speaker 1: and dance, weight was a big issue, but we were
37:23
Speaker 1: being weighed weekly by a male stage manager on Greece
37:28
Speaker 1: and like now, now me, I would be like absolutely
37:33
Speaker 1: not like no way. But at the time, you're just
37:35
Speaker 1: like this is normal and you're standing in line with
37:38
Speaker 1: girls and now that girl is skinnier than you, and
37:41
Speaker 1: like it was so damaging. So like the relationship that
37:45
Speaker 1: and I've like truly I've never been skinny or larger,
37:50
Speaker 1: like I just I feel like I'm a very just
37:52
Speaker 1: average looking woman. But my relationship with like the way
37:57
Speaker 1: that I looked and the way that other people looked
37:59
Speaker 1: at it felt like almost competitive, like these girls will
38:02
Speaker 1: get the best jobs or the best shows because of
38:05
Speaker 1: how their body looks. So it was really like it
38:08
Speaker 1: was really hard for me and it took some time
38:10
Speaker 1: to overcome.
38:11
Speaker 3: And again it was my.
38:12
Speaker 1: Injury that really taught me to care less about how
38:14
Speaker 1: I looked and more about how I feel.
38:16
Speaker 3: But that was it was rough.
38:18
Speaker 2: I think your stellar thanks and non average any tough
38:25
Speaker 2: moments for the two of you to reflect on.
38:27
Speaker 3: I mean, I talked about my injury.
38:29
Speaker 6: It certainly changed the trajectory of my life. So that
38:34
Speaker 6: that was probably the hardest thing I've ever gone through.
38:37
Speaker 6: And it's something when you have chronic arth, write is,
38:40
Speaker 6: it's something you it just never goes away. So when
38:43
Speaker 6: I got the job at Runners World, it's hard for
38:48
Speaker 6: me to I feel so proud that I could represent
38:52
Speaker 6: a different voice.
38:53
Speaker 3: At Runners World.
38:54
Speaker 6: I didn't grow up running track and field or that
38:58
Speaker 6: just wasn't my background.
38:59
Speaker 3: My background was fit.
39:01
Speaker 6: So I'm all about sexy pace. That's the pace I run.
39:05
Speaker 6: It's not slow, it's sexy. You look good running it.
39:09
Speaker 2: Molly, talk to me, like, give some more definition to
39:11
Speaker 2: sexy yea, yeah, yeah, I use sexy pace so much.
39:14
Speaker 3: And people are like, what does that mean.
39:16
Speaker 6: It's at runners Leve will go for lunch runs and
39:20
Speaker 6: you want to, you know, tell people what pace you're running,
39:22
Speaker 6: and we just don't ever want to.
39:25
Speaker 3: Call anything slow.
39:26
Speaker 6: It's it's negative, it's it just has a negative connotation,
39:30
Speaker 6: and so we started calling them sexy pace runs.
39:34
Speaker 3: And you just look good doing it. I mean, nobody
39:36
Speaker 3: looks good.
39:37
Speaker 6: Sprinting to a finish line, like you're like drooling at
39:40
Speaker 6: your mouth. That's not sexy pace. That's like your fast
39:43
Speaker 6: sprint pace, that's your mile pace. So I'm a big
39:47
Speaker 6: believer in sexy pace runs. And for me, like it
39:51
Speaker 6: the injury. As I became an adult, I had to
39:54
Speaker 6: learn how to like own this part of me and
39:56
Speaker 6: and know that that's valuable too, and that it's okay
39:59
Speaker 6: that my badackground isn't a certain thing and actually it's
40:01
Speaker 6: a positive aspect. I can bring a different perspective to things,
40:05
Speaker 6: I can bring a different voice to things.
40:07
Speaker 3: So I feel like that's.
40:08
Speaker 6: Been a journey that I've I've been on, I'm still on,
40:11
Speaker 6: and but it's it's been really good for me.
40:16
Speaker 4: I think that I touched on, you know, the most
40:21
Speaker 4: difficult sort of thing earlier, which is just creating a
40:26
Speaker 4: life in a space and a career and something that
40:29
Speaker 4: like wasn't really a thing. You don't get like drafted
40:32
Speaker 4: to be a professional runner. It's not like you're like
40:36
Speaker 4: on television like an NBA player, like waiting for somebody
40:41
Speaker 4: to like pick you for a team and then you
40:44
Speaker 4: go off and like I don't know what they do,
40:47
Speaker 4: like right out of the stadium in a Lamborghini.
40:50
Speaker 5: That's not what it was with running.
40:52
Speaker 4: And you definitely you know everything that you do because
40:59
Speaker 4: running is kind of an individual sport. You know, there's
41:01
Speaker 4: aspects of a team sport and cross country, but you
41:05
Speaker 4: know it's it's on you, right, and so that's a
41:09
Speaker 4: good thing and a bad thing. The best part is
41:11
Speaker 4: that you know you can give yourself credit, you know,
41:14
Speaker 4: for persevering. And I ran in as a professional for
41:17
Speaker 4: seven years and I had a really like awesome career
41:20
Speaker 4: that I'm very proud of, and I think that you know,
41:26
Speaker 4: it's a it's a non traditional way to go.
41:29
Speaker 3: Like I said, there was a lot of.
41:30
Speaker 4: Things happening around me with my peers and people that
41:33
Speaker 4: ran with me on my college team, and it takes
41:38
Speaker 4: a lot of courage to do something that's not like, okay,
41:42
Speaker 4: step one in life is like this, and then you
41:45
Speaker 4: know step two is that, and you know a lot
41:48
Speaker 4: of things. I got married, you know later in life.
41:53
Speaker 4: You know, I don't have any children to this day.
41:55
Speaker 4: Like a lot of things that people don't always like
41:57
Speaker 4: talk about, right, I talked about it all the time
42:00
Speaker 4: I'm with my colleagues. But again it comes down to
42:04
Speaker 4: you know, thinking about what it is that you really want,
42:08
Speaker 4: you know, like what really lights you up right, and
42:11
Speaker 4: trying your best to like create a life for yourself
42:15
Speaker 4: that kind of falls around that instead of doing what's
42:20
Speaker 4: always expected of you.
42:22
Speaker 2: So definitely, so right now, if this room was full
42:27
Speaker 2: of young girls, young women, young athletes that you were
42:35
Speaker 2: just like at one point, if this room was full
42:37
Speaker 2: of young women and they were looking to you for
42:39
Speaker 2: some sort of advice on you know, should I keep
42:42
Speaker 2: with this sport thing?
42:43
Speaker 3: What should I do? What shouldn't I do? What piece
42:47
Speaker 3: of advice would you offer these young girls?
42:54
Speaker 6: I would just I mean, if I'm thinking about my
42:57
Speaker 6: younger self, I would just say to believe in yourself.
43:01
Speaker 6: I mean, the self limiting thoughts and some of those insecurities.
43:05
Speaker 6: I think that's just a part of being human and
43:09
Speaker 6: not necessarily a part of being a female. But unfortunately
43:12
Speaker 6: for females, you know, there's like systemic problems that emphasize
43:18
Speaker 6: that for us, and some of the things that you
43:20
Speaker 6: mentioned and the struggles that we've all had are the
43:24
Speaker 6: system failing us and not necessarily us self limiting because
43:29
Speaker 6: of our gender. And so I would want young women
43:33
Speaker 6: out there to know that they can do whatever they
43:35
Speaker 6: put their minds to, and that you know we're all
43:39
Speaker 6: I hope we're all working as hard as we can
43:41
Speaker 6: to change that for them and to change the root
43:45
Speaker 6: of the problems and to help them see their potential
43:48
Speaker 6: and so that they can fulfill it.
43:50
Speaker 1: Jeez, I would say, I would say, stop comparing yourself
43:55
Speaker 1: to the person to the right and left of you,
43:57
Speaker 1: because it's so easy to do. And the more you
43:59
Speaker 1: can yourself, the more you're taking away all the gifts
44:03
Speaker 1: that you have to bring.
44:05
Speaker 3: You know.
44:05
Speaker 1: I used to think it was like me against this girl,
44:07
Speaker 1: me against that girl. And the second I realized like, no,
44:10
Speaker 1: we can all do this together, and we can all
44:14
Speaker 1: rise higher and vibrate higher together, Like that really changed
44:18
Speaker 1: everything for me.
44:19
Speaker 3: And I think it's so important that women.
44:21
Speaker 1: Encourage and respect and lift up other women, and that
44:25
Speaker 1: should start from a young age.
44:27
Speaker 3: Doesn't have to start when you're older. It can start
44:29
Speaker 3: as kids, you know.
44:32
Speaker 4: And I think to piggyback off of that, I think
44:35
Speaker 4: that you know, you can lift other people up if
44:40
Speaker 4: you are happy, if you feel lifted, you know, generally,
44:43
Speaker 4: And I'm not one of those people that thinks like
44:45
Speaker 4: happiness is like a destination, like check happy. Now I
44:48
Speaker 4: can just like chill I think, you know, life is hard,
44:51
Speaker 4: there's lots of struggles. You should try really hard to
44:54
Speaker 4: find joy. But to that end, I think, especially for women,
44:59
Speaker 4: we do many things for other people, whether it's like
45:03
Speaker 4: the comparison thing or like I said, I'm not a mom,
45:06
Speaker 4: but I have a lot of friends and family who
45:08
Speaker 4: are you know, just like doing stuff for your family
45:11
Speaker 4: or your spouse or whatever, or for other people's approval.
45:16
Speaker 4: And I think that you know, people forget that, you know,
45:20
Speaker 4: it's okay to like think about your life in terms
45:24
Speaker 4: of like what it is that's truly going to make
45:26
Speaker 4: you happy, you know, in the race of like trying
45:29
Speaker 4: to make sure that you can take care of yourself
45:31
Speaker 4: and have like food and shelter and do the fun
45:34
Speaker 4: things that you want to do, make sure that like
45:36
Speaker 4: that's always at the core of whatever it is. And
45:39
Speaker 4: you know, I feel like you'll find your way if
45:42
Speaker 4: you can kind of like stick to that path.
45:44
Speaker 2: And I think just one other thing that I would
45:46
Speaker 2: add is that it's okay if things don't go as
45:49
Speaker 2: you had hoped. And there's so much beauty in what
45:53
Speaker 2: we might commonly refer to as failure, because when those
45:56
Speaker 2: things happen that's an opportunity for us all to learn
46:00
Speaker 2: and then reshape that and then move forward. And oftentimes
46:03
Speaker 2: when we move forward, we're better than when we started. Anyway,
46:07
Speaker 2: winding down here, what does sport look like for you
46:10
Speaker 2: guys today and do you have any goals on the horizon?
46:14
Speaker 6: What does sport look like for me today? Honestly, it's
46:19
Speaker 6: exactly what you were speaking to. I just try to
46:22
Speaker 6: do what makes me happy. I'm running a little bit,
46:26
Speaker 6: riding my.
46:27
Speaker 3: Bike a little bit.
46:27
Speaker 6: I do a bit of yoga and strength training, and
46:30
Speaker 6: I'm just in the pursuit of balance, like physically and mentally.
46:36
Speaker 6: I just you know, I try to wake up every
46:39
Speaker 6: day and just say, like what do I feel like
46:41
Speaker 6: doing today? What's going to make me feel good? So
46:44
Speaker 6: I don't have any races on the calendar, any big events.
46:47
Speaker 6: I'm just really trying to enjoy it. A lot of
46:49
Speaker 6: what I remember from being an athlete as a kid,
46:52
Speaker 6: or like the mundane things, like my dad was my
46:56
Speaker 6: coach and we would lose games, but we'd get in
46:59
Speaker 6: the car and like play music and sing together. And
47:02
Speaker 6: I'm trying to as I get older, remember like those
47:05
Speaker 6: are those are the big things it's not like if
47:07
Speaker 6: you won the game or lost the game. It's like
47:09
Speaker 6: that minutia. It's like being present in those moments and
47:12
Speaker 6: so on. That's really what it looks like for me today.
47:17
Speaker 5: I'm not racing at all these days. I just want
47:20
Speaker 5: to run forever, you know.
47:22
Speaker 4: I just want to go out on a green space
47:24
Speaker 4: with not too many people, listen to some music, come
47:28
Speaker 4: back and be like not grumpy, and have my head
47:32
Speaker 4: feel like clear and sharp, and be available to you know,
47:37
Speaker 4: be able to pour love in every other aspect of
47:39
Speaker 4: my life.
47:40
Speaker 1: So jeez, I mean, yeah, I'm running. I guess I
47:45
Speaker 1: am kind of running a lot this year. I'm taking
47:47
Speaker 1: a break from the New York City Marathon because my
47:50
Speaker 1: pr was so epic. I'm gonna let it settle, Oh
47:52
Speaker 1: your subtle vermanute. But I'm going to run the Chicago
47:55
Speaker 1: Marathon this year. I'm excited for that because it's I
47:58
Speaker 1: hear it's flat.
47:59
Speaker 3: It's very flat. There's one hill that's very at the end. Great.
48:02
Speaker 3: I'm thrilled for that.
48:04
Speaker 1: I'm running Seaweeds in Vancouver, which I'm like really excited
48:07
Speaker 1: for because that's supposed to be like the most incredible
48:10
Speaker 1: half marathon, and I just want to continue encouraging other
48:15
Speaker 1: women to enjoy running and find your why behind it
48:20
Speaker 1: and to worry less about your splits and your pace,
48:24
Speaker 1: and just like I just want us all to like
48:27
Speaker 1: get out there because we love it and because it
48:29
Speaker 1: makes us feel good.
48:30
Speaker 2: So well, I just want to take the time to
48:32
Speaker 2: thank the three of you for coming to sit down
48:34
Speaker 2: with me. And again, if you don't subscribe to Hurdle yet,
48:37
Speaker 2: please head on into the iTunes store, rate, subscribe, review,
48:41
Speaker 2: and tune in on the regular.
48:42
Speaker 3: Let's give it up for these ladies right here. Thank you.