Running in my 20's

I was elated to have a team of female athletes to train and do life with at UGA, and stay close to my family. Unfortunately, at college I also battled strings of injuries in my hips, lower leg tendons, and feet (metatarsals) and did not really improve. I tried to come back time and time again, settling in to running less and doing more weight lifting, yoga, and biking, convinced my body just could not hold up to the high mileage needed to improve.

After undergrad, I eventually began to increase mileage more, from 20, 40, 50, then 65 miles a week. I felt strengthened by the other activities and kept up strength and yoga weekly to counteract the impact and overall toll/breakdown running takes on my body. Around this time, I was running a lot of races in Tallahassee, FL with Gulf Winds Track Club, and made a lot of friends through this club. I had started to really gear my training towards peaking for half marathons, but never seemed to get it right.

The half marathon felt strangely long to me. I kept increasing my mileage, finding 70-80 mile weeks and more threshold workout repeats to be key ingredients in massive breakthroughs! 

I lowered my 1:20 half PB to 1:16 then 1:14 in a year and half's time. Finally things were clicking!