My First Marathon

Gina didn't grow up loving running. In fact, she hated it, right up until a spontaneous half marathon at Disneyland in 2017 changed her mind for good. After two kids and a long break from racing, she found her way back through a run club that pushed her further than she expected, and a new goal started forming in the back of her head: a marathon. She signed up for the Eugene Marathon and built a t...

Jude didn't grow up as an athlete. She spent her childhood with a violin in her hands instead of running shoes, and didn't run her first step until she was 38. From there, the goals kept coming: a 5k, then an 8k, then a half marathon at 40 that she ran through a painful foot injury. After a decade away, she came back to the half at 49, and that race at Melbourne's MCG planted a seed she couldn't s...

Mikaela Gomez is a mom of three, a Navy veteran, and somehow, until last July, not a runner at all. She found running through the unlikeliest of doors: a dark romance book rabbit hole on TikTok that led her to an ultra runner known as the Ghost Runner. What started as a way to move her body for her mental health turned into something much bigger once Mikaela started processing the loss of her fath...

Maggie Lowenthal grew up a gymnast and a sprinter, but spent most of her life convinced that long distance running just wasn't for her. She ran a couple of halves, got into HYROX, built a strength training foundation, but kept watching the Chicago Marathon from the sidelines every fall. She never planned to run it herself, but that changed when she realized the 2025 race would fall on her actual 3...

Alyssa didn't grow up as a runner. After graduating college in 2023, she found herself with free time and a Planet Fitness membership, and slowly worked her way from the weight machines to the treadmill to a half marathon finish line. A run club and a few convincing friends later, she was signed up for her first marathon, telling herself that if she'd already done 13.1, she might as well see what...

Keneshia came to running the way a lot of us do, not because she set out to become a runner, but because she needed somewhere to put everything she was carrying. A former dancer and professional roller skater, she found herself battling depression after adopting two teenagers and needed something that could get her out of her own head. A local Mother's Day 5K with her mom was the answer, and once...

Jon Hwang came to running the way a lot of us do, sideways and by accident. A 5K with coworkers turned into a half marathon, and then a rough year in 2017 where a  relationship ended and his mom was diagnosed with cancer solidified running as the thing that got him through each day. By the time Jon signed up for the San Francisco Marathon, he had already met his wife through Spartan racing, tackle...

If you've stepped outside for a run lately and thought "why does this feel so much harder than it did two months ago," this one's for you. Summer running is humbling, and if you're in the middle of a training block right now, it can feel like everything is going backwards. It's not. You're just doing the hardest training of your cycle in the hardest time of year to do it. In this Wednesday mini ep...

Ashley never considered herself a runner. As a kid she dabbled in sports, hated cross country, and didn't think twice about it. It wasn't until her early thirties, going through a divorce and looking for somewhere to put all that energy, that she laced up a pair of $10 Walmart shoes and headed out onto the country roads behind her house with nothing but cheap earbuds and an Eminem playlist. She ha...

Carly Schrom grew up in a running family and carried the sport all the way through college, where she also quietly battled years of stomach issues that nobody could explain. What eventually got diagnosed as Crohn's disease derailed her senior season, and just when she thought she was finally turning a corner after graduation, a routine scan revealed something scarier waiting on the other side. Wha...

I just got back from my honeymoon in Portugal, ran a half marathon a week later, and somehow walked away with a two minute PR. In this mini episode, I'm breaking down what this training block actually looked like, why I made the call to drop my sub-two goal weeks before race day, how a heat wave, a wedding, and a week of zero running in Portugal accidentally became the best thing that could have h...

Jose Martinez has always had a complicated relationship with running. Growing up in Vancouver, it was something he returned to in waves, usually when life got messy and he needed somewhere to put it. When 2021 took his cousin and then his father, Jose found himself somewhere he didn't quite recognize. It wasn't until he and his wife started talking about making a change that he gave himself a reas...

Hey friends! I'm officially off getting married and soaking up every second of it. I'll be back with brand new episodes on May 4th, but in the meantime I'm bringing back one of your all-time favorite episodes for you to enjoy. Thanks for all the love and support. It means everything. Now let's get into it! Ariel Greenstein didn’t grow up as an athlete. She didn’t fall in love with running early. A...

Hey friends! I'm officially off getting married and soaking up every second of it. I'll be back with brand new episodes on May 4th, but in the meantime I'm bringing back one of your all-time favorite episodes for you to enjoy. Thanks for all the love and support. It means everything. Now let's get into it! Gabby’s running journey didn’t start with a finish line goal or a desire to be fast. It star...

Ryan Trask has always been a runner at heart, even when life kept pulling him away from it. From getting cut from his middle school basketball team and stumbling into cross country, to running through job loss, a pandemic, and the chaos of raising four kids, running has been the thing he keeps coming back to. So when he decided it was finally time to run a marathon before 40, it felt less like a n...

Ilana Dunn didn’t grow up a runner. In fact, she was the person who walked the mile and avoided it whenever she could. But after accidentally getting into treadmill classes, discovering run-walk intervals, and slowly building up, she found herself chasing something she once thought was impossible: the marathon. What followed wasn’t a perfect training block. It was injuries, setbacks, and figuring...

Cass Robinson’s path to her first marathon was anything but straightforward. Growing up with undiagnosed Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, she spent years dealing with injuries, pain, and being told nothing was wrong. Running came in waves throughout her life, but it eventually became the place where she could process everything she had been through and start taking back control. In this episode, she shares...

This week’s mini episode brings back coach Nick Savin for a conversation that goes way beyond splits, paces, and perfect training plans. Instead, it’s all about mindset and the role it plays in how we show up for our training, especially when things don’t go the way we expected. From missed runs to tough workouts, Nick breaks down why those moments aren’t failures at all, but actually part of the...

Krissy Murphy didn’t grow up as an athlete. She started running in her early 20s with a Couch to 5K plan, thinking it might be a one-time thing. But somewhere between a spontaneous 10K, a Disney half marathon, and a first marathon in Richmond, something shifted and she realized she belonged in this world. What started as a way to move her body turned into a long-term relationship with the marathon...

After a hip surgery at 17 ended her competitive dance career, Maya Struhar spent years away from structured movement. Running wasn’t part of the plan until a St. Patrick’s Day 5K with coworkers pulled her back in. One race turned into a 10K, then a half marathon, and before long Maya found herself training for her first marathon at Grandma’s in Duluth. Along the way she discovered a runner’s high,...

Fueling is one of the most common questions that comes up for first-time marathoners, and it can feel overwhelming when you’re not sure where to start. In this mini episode, we break fueling down into three simple steps: choosing a texture you can tolerate, testing it on lower-risk runs, and dialing in a strategy that works for your long runs and race day. We also talk through the differences betw...

Holly Kabler spent years cheering for her husband at marathons, convinced running just wasn’t for her. But after spectating the London Marathon and asking the question “how hard could it be?”, she decided to find out for herself. What started with Peloton treadmill classes and a spontaneous half marathon turned into a full training cycle and a start line at the Chicago Marathon. In this episode, H...

Anyone can run a marathon, but running a marathon is not just a race.  In this episode, I break down how that committing to training for your first marathon builds discipline, resilience, perspective, and a quiet confidence that carries into the rest of your life. You start showing up differently at work. You stop tying your entire identity to your job. You realize it is not selfish to prioritize...

Kristine Owen Wood grew up in the world of elite ballet, where movement was disciplined, aesthetic, and high pressure from a young age. After earning a spot in Alberta Ballet and ultimately stepping away for the sake of her health, she had to rebuild her relationship with her body from the ground up. Running started quietly, as something private and unstructured, before slowly becoming the place w...

In this week’s Wednesday mini episode, I’m walking through Phase Two of the First Marathon Buddy program and breaking down what actually matters during weeks 10 to 15 of a 20 week marathon training plan. This phase isn’t about testing your fitness or grading every long run. It’s about treating those miles like practice, experimenting and refining your fueling, protecting recovery as fatigue builds...