Rebecca Donaghue, 33, has been running under the radar for a long time. But in 2008, she started to establish herself as one of the best distance runners in the U.S. After struggling with biomechanical injuries for 10 years, she regained her stride and her form, and she announced her comeback by qualifying for the 2008 5,000m Olympic Trials and finishing 8th. That same year, she also finished in the top 10 at the USA Championships in the 5K, 8K and 10K. She continued her streak in 2009 by opening her season with a string of PRs on the European circuit; she came back to the states to finish no worse than 4th overall and second American in five major road races. With road PRs of 15:30 in the 5K and 32:29 in the 10K, Donaghue is contemplating her marathon debut later this fall. And with her range and speed across distances from 800m to 15K, it will be fun to see what is in store for her in 2012. She credits her coach, Artie Gilkes, with her running success.

In addition to her life as a professional runner, Donaghue coaches high school cross-country and track and and field in State College, PA. Unlike many professional runners who train full-time, she balances the demands of working and training. When she is not running or coaching, she pursues her passion for art and photo-realism. Two of her paintings are posted in the interview below. You can read more about Donaghue, her coaching and her training on her blog, Running Rebecca.

EliteRunning: First of all congrats on a great start to your 2010 racing season. You finished 5th among a tough field of women in the U.S. 15K Championships, you ran the 3000 at the Brutus Hamilton Invite on April 23rd and you ran a PR in the 10K on May 5th, 32:50.32. So how are you feeling right now?

Rebecca Donaghue: The 15 K I was proud of because I felt strong throughout it and I really maintained my form and my composure and I finished strong. I ran a couple of seconds slower than last year, but I felt a lot better this year so I did feel like that was huge. I was really excited with that and my place was a little higher. It was a deeper field this time around, and I knew the course a little bit better. The one difference was that last year I had several races building up to this race, and not having that experience this year was definitely a different thing for me. So I wasn’t upset, but I wasn’t super excited – I thought I would be a little bit faster, but considering everything, I was happy.

At the 3K, Brutus Hamilton, that was not as fast as I had hoped. I was hoping to be right around nine minutes or to even break nine minutes. The conditions were hot and super windy, but I think I was just rusty with the speed work. I felt like I competed, but I may not have run the best tactical race.

I am actually pretty disappointed with the Cardinal Invite and how that went even though I PR’d. I saw myself running loads faster and being up there with the other women and that just didn’t happen. I lost focus early, and once that happened, it was really hard to get back on track – it was too late. A lot of people congratulate me on that, but, inside, I am thinking, “oh no, that is not what I wanted at all.”

ER: What kind of time were you aiming for?

RD: I was aiming for a really big PR. My finish has been improving drastically and my training has been off the charts. I thought low 32, even in the 31s is what I had envisioned. It just didn’t happen. I still think I ran a little bit stronger with my form than I did last year. Last year there wasn’t as much competition and I ended up out front at more of a tempo effort. So I was 18 seconds faster than that this year. It’s still early and I really don’t want to be in top form yet.

ER: Do you have any more 10Ks planned for the summer?

RD: No, not on the track. I think I will most likely do the 5,000m at the USATF Championships. You just don’t know how hot it is going to be out there in Iowa. But nothing is definite. It looks like the 5,000m, but we might switch it. We will have to see how things progress in the next month. But I’m getting ready for a road mile. New Balance is holding a road mile near Chicago May 31. I’ve only done one road mile and it was an uphill road mile in State College about five years ago. I don’t even know if I broke five minutes because it was uphill. I am excited for this race because New Balance is hosting it and I get to help out and hand out awards. It should be fun!

A week after that, I am doing the Freihofer’s 5K. I am really excited for that! I have always wanted to run it, and I remember seeing pictures of Lynn Johnson dominating that race, and Benita (Johnson) Willis. The race is just pretty awesome and stellar. The woman that won Boston and Freihofer’s last year, Teyba Erkesso, is back, and Magdalena Lewy Boulet is in it. I am hoping for a fast 5K and that I can go into USAs really strong.

ER: With such a fast field of women, tt sounds like you might be able to crack 15:30 (Donaghue’s PR).

RD: I hope so! At CVS last year I ran 15:30 and I feel like I am stronger than I was last year. I think it is going to take cracking 15:30 to win it. If I can just hang on, I know I always have this burst at the end that I am really confident with.

ER: In the March 2010 issue of Running Times, you are noted as a runner who has “quietly established” herself as one of the top runners in the country. You’ve been running for a long time, but in 2008, you had a turning point and you really started to make a splash and that continued in 2009 – you ran extremely well on the European circuit and you came back to the states to finish no worse than 4th overall and second American in the five major road races that you ran. It has been awesome to watch you the past few years! What accounts for your success over the past 2-3 years?

RD: Basically, I had been injured for many years. From the end of my college career and right after that, I was injured with all kinds of biomechanical problems. I ran with pain for years, but I still always trained and I jumped into races. I was with Reebok Boston, coached by Bob Sevene, and just when I started to feel like I was getting a hold of these injuries, I would do a race or a hard workout and it would knock me back down and it was this vicious cycle over and over again for 10 years. I never ran to my potential in college, which was just so frustrating. I made nationals twice for cross country and just missed them in the 1500. It was frustrating because I knew I had a lot in me, but I couldn’t do it while injured.

I graduated from college and kept running. I PR’d in the 1500 and 800 while injured, but I was still hobbling around and I was never able to cool down or run the next day. I would start a run and have to turn around because I was always in pain. It was not ideal to train that way, but I just kept pushing, knowing that someday it had to change. I wanted it so badly and I had to stay positive. Then I moved out to State College and I found someone who was able to fix me, and that is how it all started.

ER: Was that in 2003 that you moved to State College?

RD: Yes. I was a full-time art teacher in Dedham, MA, and I was coaching and running as well. Budget cuts hit the school really hard with the state deficit and they laid me off and cut my position. I figured then was the perfect time to start my graduate degree, and my boyfriend, Artie Gilkes, suggested that we move out here to State College. He went to Penn State and said it was the perfect place to train, and Penn State could help me out with using the facilities, and I could possibly go to graduate school there. Once we moved, Artie had me see one of the athletic trainers – the trainers really studied my biomechanical imbalances and they had me start from scratch. I was told, “you’re not going to train for three months.”

I always water ran – I water ran at Walden Pond sometimes twice a day and I even got a wet suit so that I could water run into October. I hated the pool and Walden Pond was so beautiful. I was a die-hard cross-trainer because I knew what I wanted to do running-wise and I knew that I needed to keep up my fitness. But for a doctor to see what was going on, I had to stop training so that the inflammation could go down. When he told me that I couldn’t do anything for three months, I actually had a good time! I was fine with it. I don’t run for an outlet. I wanted to do whatever it was going to take to heal and get better. I really enjoyed my break and just knew that good things were going to happen if I took a break. I got to do some art work, and I just knew that it was going to be great. Sure enough, the trainer figured it out and I was running pain free for the first time in about 10 years. It was pretty emotional.

ER: Do you know now what the biomechanical culprits were that led to your injuries?

RD: It was my hips. I have told quite a people that it’s confusing and complicated to explain it. It took the doctor studying my full body x-rays to see it all. There is a twist in my hips that needs to be there, but it causes a leg-length discrepancy that is not all that uncommon. But the weird thing is that I wear a lift in the shoe of my longer leg.

ER: Seriously?

RD: Yeah (laughs). It’s weird. I put in the lift and the doctor watched me walk and he analyzed everything. He gave me some very specific exercises to strengthen my hips and work on my weaknesses. He gave me every little detail. I did everything that he told me to do for a summer, and it really paid off. He had me running on the treadmill for 1 minute and he watched my gait and then he had me do the strengthening exercises and he would put me back on the treadmill. The build-up took forever – every day. But I was so excited when I ran for 2 minutes without any pain – it was the weirdest feeling!

I also had these weird bumps on my heels called “Haglund’s Deformity.” Mine were so inflamed and swollen that I couldn’t walk – they put me on crutches in college because it was so painful. I almost had surgery, but I decided against it. It seemed too risky to shave the bone down in my heel. So I wore a night brace and cut the back of my shoes out to alleviate the rubbing . . . I also had a lot of calf trouble. You name it. I was limping when I was walking and limping when I was running. People would say, “why are you still running? It looks so painful.” And it was – every step. I was sweating more than I had to because I was in so much pain. Maybe I am stubborn, but I just knew that I had to keep persevering.

ER: I remember reading something about you being unable to cool down after races because you were in so much pain. What made you persevere?

RD: It was awful – there were so many runs where I just stopped in the middle and broke down. But something in me would force me to pick myself back up and try it again. I just kept persevering through it. All I wanted, at some point, was to finish a race and enjoy a cool down – that is part of the fun! You get to talk with your friends and your competitors and catch up. You get to think about what you did in your race, but I could never do that. It was miserable, absolutely miserable. But there was something in me that kept me thinking that I had to keep going, that something positive was going to happen.

ER: It sounds like adopting a positive attitude and staying optimistic in the midst of that kept you going.

RD: My mother has always encouraged me to think positively. As negative as she can be as a New Englander (laughs), she always encouraged positive thinking, and that really struck. She always told me to keep at it. I think my parents knew that I had more to give – they watched me run in high school and college, and they knew that I needed to keep at it. It’s so nice now, every single run. I could never do morning runs before, and now I can do morning runs. I always reminisce about when I couldn’t run in the morning.

ER: That’s why it was so heart-breaking to read about your freak accident while you were out walking your dog, Paavo, and you ended up breaking your wrist. You only had 13 weeks to get ready for the 2008 Trials. You had just overcome all of these injury humps and now this. What was that experience like?

RD: I know. It was such a good year and I was so ready to be at an Olympic Trials – finally – because the past two times I had missed qualifying because of injuries. This time, I was not going to be injured, no matter what, and then that happened. Artie, who is also my coach, was asking the surgeon what the alternatives were to allow me to train through it rather than having a cast all the way past my elbow. A cast like that would have made it really difficult to train. The surgeon, who was a football player at Penn State, knew how important it was for me to train; he knew the needs of an athlete and the urgency of getting the training in. He was the perfect person. He came up with an alternative – an external fixator surgery. Instead of a cast, I had a titanium rod on the outside of my arm that served as the stabilizer. My nickname was “Robo Rebecca.” I was embarrassed sometimes to be running around with a titanium rod and screws coming out of me. If it was raining, I had to put a bag over my arm . . . so I was running around with a bag on my arm, but I was running around and I was happy. It was a different kind of pain than the biomechanical imbalances and the running injuries.

ER: And you ran well at the Trials that year.

RD: I was able to add a lot of elliptical training before I was able to run after the surgery. The elliptical was huge; it is such a great training device. Leading up to the trials, I knew I had just one shot to qualify. I had gone to Hillsdale, MI to try to get a 10,000m qualifier, but I ended up dropping out. It was the worst heat that you could imagine, and I want to say that 80% of the people in the whole meet dropped out because it was so hot. I still couldn’t believe that I dropped out, but I was off pace right away. After that, I knew I had one last shot to qualify in the 5,000m. We found the 5,000 USATF New England Championships at Bentley College. It was my only chance so I was dead set on doing it, and I knew that I could run a PR. I had a rabbit for two laps, which was so nice, even for two laps. After two laps, I was alone and I ran a PR and I snuck into the Trials. That was really a big turning point, to make it to the Trials, and then to PR in the prelims and again in the finals. I had three PRs in two weeks.

ER: And you PR’d by a lot in the semi-final and the final – going from your qualifier of 15:55 to 15:38 to 15:35. It had to be nice to finally have some company to run with.

RD: It was so nice. It felt comfortable for almost the entire race except for maybe the final two laps. There’s a difference when you have people to pull you along.

ER: Now that you are healthy again, do you still do a lot of the “little things” to keep your old injuries from cropping back up?

RD: I go in and out of spurts of cross-training just for the heck of it. I do the elliptical and pool running, just to increase my mileage. I am not a super high mileage person to begin with so to make up for that, I will do something in the pool or I will elliptical. It’s nice to do it knowing that I am doing it just as part of my training and not because I am injured. I do a little bit of lifting, but not as much as I did in college. I felt like I was a little bulked up from that and we cut back on that. I lost a ton of the muscle mass, which is good for a distance runner because you don’t want to be too bulky. I do light lifting with very little weight and high reps. I do a lot of core work and I continue to do the strengthening and agility work that the trainer gave me. I do a lot of plyometrics before workouts and sometimes after; I do a lot of the “little” things now that I couldn’t do while I was injured or working full time as a teacher.

ER: Has doing the “little things” been another key factor in your turn around?

RD: Yes. It’s still difficult because I am coaching. I love coaching and I think it is really important to have that something else going on. At the same time, it has its challenges and it can be tricky to try to take naps. I don’t often get to do that in between runs. I’m at a lot of track meets for the entire day when I should ideally be off my feet or doing another training run. We have to adjust my schedule to make everything fit. I can’t see myself not coaching. I need to do it financially or I wouldn’t be able to survive. I am torn a little bit as to coaching and professional running.

It’s frustrating because I am at the point where I know what my competition is doing. I know that many of my competitors train full time. It’s just the way that the system is. You really have to get the job done in college to be set up really well after that. Otherwise, it’s a constant struggle. But it’s my life and I am happy. I can’t see it any other way. That doesn’t mean that I don’t wonder what it could be like to train full time, but I don’t have that choice. I have to work, and I do love it.

ER: Is balancing work and professional running, then, one of the reasons that you do not do high mileage?

RD: Yeah – I am increasing my volume little by little each year. But you have to have the time for recovery. It’s difficult to get the recovery in so I think it’s wise to keep my mileage a little lower right now.

ER: What is your training volume like right now?

RD: Little by little, I’ve worked my way up to 80 miles/week. It has taken a long time, which is the right way to do it. You don’t want to jump to 80 when you’ve been doing 60. My coach feels really strongly that this is the right way to do it – very, very gradually and year-by-year, and eventually I will be at 100 miles a week, but we don’t know when that will be.

ER: Do you run twice a day? How many workouts are you doing a week?

RD: I run twice a day almost every day. There are days that I can’t. Yesterday we had the district meet for the high school so I was only able to run once. If I have a meet, I don’t always have a chance to get a second run in, but sometimes I run at the meet if there is a long break in between my girls’ events. I’ll sneak a run in.

For workouts, I mostly do them twice a week. It all depends on how I am recovering. I am not the standard Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday workout runner. I am on a 10-day cycle and it rotates. If I feel like I am really worn out from a workout or a high school meet, Artie will give me another easy day. That has really helped me a lot, rather than forcing something just because it is a Tuesday.

I followed the standard Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday schedule throughout college and after, but I needed more recovery. You have to do what is right for you. No one is the same so you have to discover what works for you. I try to do that in coaching – I try to individualize the workout plan for different groups, and it is hard on a coach, especially if you have a lot of kids. But I do what I can.

ER: I wanted to ask you about your coaching, and the philosophy you bring to your work as a coach. You coach high school athletes at State College High School and help with the Nittany Valley Youth Track Club. Is your coaching similar to your own training?

RD: I do feel like it is very similar to what I do. I just tone it down a little bit and I also believe in what my high school coach had me do. He always had me do really low mileage, and I think that is important, especially if you want your athletes to run in college and after college, even if it is just recreational running. You have to be good to them in the early years or they are going to be burnt out mentally or physically. My philosophy is to keep the sport alive and to keep kids excited about it and fresh in both their minds and their bodies. My high school coach always said that he wanted me to have fresh legs in college. I don’t even know if I ran 30 miles/week in high school, and I didn’t do high mileage in college. For me, I had a lot of biomechanical issues that were going to happen no matter what I did.

I don’t have my girls do high mileage. They do a lot of similar workouts to what I do, but I tone it down quite a bit. I don’t have them do the same workouts at the same time – they don’t know what every Wednesday workout is going to be. We mix it up.

ER: It sounds like a few of your girls have run some pretty fast times this year!

RD: They have. I am so proud to have the group that I have. These girls are the best – they are so coachable and so mature and well-mannered and friendly and fun. And they are super talented. One of them is heavily recruited. She has run a 2:10 800m. I actually did a workout with her last week. She didn’t do the entire workout with me, but I incorporated her into it. We did 300s together at the end and she just buried me. She was doing 44 second 300s. She is pretty special. Last night she ran a 56 split in the 4×4, a 2:12 800m, and then I had her do the mile as a workout. The first three laps were a controlled tempo at 80 seconds/laps and then the last lap I wanted to her to switch gears, and she finished in a 73. She is the real deal. She is a junior and she is trying to figure out what she wants to do in college. It’s really exciting.

ER: To switch gears – I’ve been excited to ask you about this. There was mention in 2009 that you were thinking about a marathon, and you recently mentioned that you are planning to make your marathon debut in 2010. Are you still thinking in that direction?

RD: Yeah, we are definitely thinking about it. My coach goes back and forth. I want to do it just to see. I know that there are benefits to doing the marathon and coming back to the shorter distances; you are so much stronger. I do a lot of my long runs pretty quickly so I wonder, and Artie wonders, if I could be good at it. At the same time, I ran the 20K Championships and I couldn’t fathom doing it again and then more! But I think if we really planned for it, then it might work. Last year, we just said, “let’s see how the 20K goes” and then maybe we’ll do the Twin Cities Marathon, and that was only two weeks later. There was no build-up. The 20K didn’t go as well as I thought it might so we scrapped the marathon. This year, we will really decide mid-summer and stick to the plan.

ER: Have you made any tweaks to your training with that goal in the future?

RD: My mileage has gone up a little bit to eventually hit in the 90s, and then the 100s. We can make that next mileage step this summer. Some of the workouts that I do are a little longer. My plan is going to be similar to last summer, and then when the summer races are over, we can start gearing up for a fall marathon.

I’ve always had a dream to run Boston. My first memories of running are watching the Boston Marathon growing up. That has always stuck even though I have not been not physically and mentally ready to do a marathon. But I’ve always wanted to do it. I want to do it sooner rather than later, and they say that the training is harder to recover from than the actual race. It will be interesting for me.

ER: This makes me think ahead to 2012. You are someone who has made a name for herself running well at any distance from 800m to 15K. It’s worth mentioning that you were a fast 200m runner in high school. When you are that talented across so many distances, where do you think you will be most competitive in 2012?

RD: It’s so hard. I need to get the 10,000 down and the track down. I am still learning how to run the 10,000 and the 5,000 on the track. I have it down on the roads, for some reason, but I am still learning the track. I’m not willing to give up on the track because I know that I really need to master that. I have been doing a lot of thinking after my most recent track 10,000 and I keep wondering what’s going on. I have a lot of evaluating to do to figure it out. If I can put it together, the 10,000 might be my event. I am super confident on the road, so who knows – it could be the marathon. But I go back and forth. I still like the 5,000 and I can crank it out really well.

I think it’s important to have that range. If you look at the top runners, they all have that range that is really impressive. I don’t quite see myself with the stellar range that they have, but I have a good range. It goes a long way, and it’s important to your overall athleticism.

ER: How would you describe your overall training philosophy?

RD: That’s hard. Touching on speed, long distance, agility and recovery is important. Recovery for me is really important. I think it’s important for everyone to be a well-rounded athlete and to be smart about what’s best for YOU.

I apply this to my athletes. All of my athletes, if they have a problem, I genuinely want to listen to what it is so that we can figure it out. I put myself in their shoes and I want to listen to them. I want to do what is best for them. In cross-country, I had 65 athletes, and it was hard to do that, but it was important to talk to them one-on-one to understand their individual needs. I know that I want that for myself. I think my athletes really appreciate that, and I am proud that I am able to do that.

ER: You have worked with your coach and boyfriend Artie Gilkes for several years now. How would you describe your relationship with him? How much of a factor has he been in your running career?

RD: Artie has been a huge factor in my success – huge. I don’t even know where to begin. He knows the sport better than anyone I know and he has a passion for it more than anyone I know. He has this desire to do well himself, and he is an inspiration on many levels. He has type I diabetes and he was diagnosed while he was running for Penn State during his sophomore year and he still made the varsity team and went to nationals in cross country. He has a few other autoimmune disorders, and he is shooting for another marathon – hopefully the Olympic Trials time for men. He is doing all of this in the midst of his health issues, and this makes him a total inspiration to me. His knowledge and passion are above and beyond. He is also coaching Ryan Sheehan – he just won the Pittsburgh half marathon. He has only been coaching him for six months, but he has already made huge improvements. Artie is doing a great job with him and I see him coaching other people to a high level.

So Artie has been huge when it comes to my success. He understands what I need and he has come up with everything. He knows when I need to have more recovery time and when I have to pull back on workouts. He has taught me to always be ready to adjust. He would be an interesting interview! I feel like what I have done is nothing compared to what Artie has done with his life.

Artie helps me in workouts too. He’ll pace me a lot.

ER: Is Artie your only training partner?

RD: Yeah – I do a lot alone, but it is so nice to have Artie at workouts. It is a great team that we have.

ER: Is it hard separating Artie as your coach and boyfriend?

RD: Somehow I completely separate it and it doesn’t affect our relationship at all. And he’s a pretty tough coach; he’ll do a lot of yelling, but yelling in a good way! He is loud. It’s good. Sometimes he will try to kick my heels a little bit so that I am on top of things. He wants to prepare me to race. He prepares me to be ready for anything, and he is a genius when it comes to coaching and understanding all of the details. He has so much character and enthusiasm. Artie compares my career to the boxer, Marvin Hagler, all the time. We both have to work. We’re both blue collar. It’s funny – he knows all of these stories from history and he brings them up during our runs. They’re always motivational. I didn’t come out of college with a big contract, and I’ve had to fight for it. But I’m not the only one out there who has had to do it this way, and Artie reminds me of that.

ER: Looking back now over the past few years, are you surprised by your success, or did you always feel that you had that kind of potential brewing inside of you?

RD: I always knew, but I didn’t know when. I’ve envisioned even bigger things. It’s just about being patient and putting the work in and never giving up. You have to know that it’s going to hurt most of the time and you have to get used to that hurt. Artie, my parents and so many people in my life have taught me that. I’m never happy. I always feel like I have to continue and keep going.

ER: It sounds like you plan to stay in the sport until you are 45.

RD: That’s exactly right. I don’t have all of the high mileage or races in my legs that other runners have. I feel like I am just getting started. People like Colleen De Reuck are huge inspirations to me and they have me so excited. I have told Colleen a few times that she is an inspiration to me. I want to be doing what she is doing at her age. She is just rockin’. She is unbelievable.

ER: What has been the highlight of your running career so far?

RD: Being the second American at Falmouth was a highlight. I don’t want that to be my number one highlight at all, but that was such an amazing race. I have always loved the Falmouth Road race even though that was just my second time running it. Growing up in MA., it was always a race I wanted to run. Coming in as the first American and second overall was such a cool feeling, and I felt super strong. CVS was another highlight. I was second and I really pushed myself in that race. I had my old kick back and I think I surprised a lot of people. I didn’t necessarily surprise myself because I know that I have those performances in me. It is just a matter of putting it all together on race day.

Being in Jordan and representing the USA for World Cross was definitely a great experience.

ER: How has it been to work with your sponsor, New Balance?

RD: New Balance has played a big role in my journey.Their support and loyalty has been key in my career. I’m so thankful for that. I also wouldn’t be where I am without my agent, Tom Ratcliffe of KIMbia Athletics. He’s both a friend and an agent, which I think is super important. If it weren’t for him, the New Balance support would not have happened.

ER: Aside from running, you paint as well. How would you describe your art?

RD: I’ve done portrait work for a lot of people. I’ve done portrait work for weddings and of dogs. I really enjoy the work. For one of my old teammates, I did a portrait of her and her husband with their dog. That was one of my favorite paintings.

I’ve been obsessed with photo realistic artwork. It’s called photo-realism or hyperrealism. It’s a style that I really enjoy, and the paintings are so realistic that you think they are photos. I strive for that realism in my work. I’ve done loose styles before and that is hard for me to do. That is how I am as a runner, too. It’s hard to loosen up and just relax.

I take a lot of time with my art work. The end result is the reward. After I am done with running, I plan to go back into teaching art. I started the graduate program at Penn State, but it was difficult with training and I couldn’t financially afford it. I do plan to go back eventually, though.

ER: Real quickly, I have to ask you to describe your dog, Paavo (see Paavo on left). I own two Vizslas myself and I am pretty obsessed with the breed.

RD: I cannot imagine my life without him! Artie just brought him home without telling me, and I was torn at first. I didn’t know if we could do this, with me trying to go to school and we had just moved, but now I cannot imagine life without him.

Paavo’s our little kid. Vizsla’s look like people – there’s something about their faces that makes them look human and different from other dogs. They are so much like people. I could go on and on about Paavo. He runs with me, too. The furthest that he has run is 12 or 14 miles. He even licked some gels and he ran even better after licking them! He likes the winter better than the heat. He is slowing down a bit now – he is going to be six. But I can’t imagine Paavo not being active – he would go crazy.

Now for the quick-fire questions:

My favorite book is: The Big House by George Howe Colt
My favorite song is: Hero of the Day-Metallica
My favorite meal is: Maine lobster
I indulge in: coffee, cookies, potato chips, and scary movies
The word that best describes me is: determined
My favorite workout is: anything on the mountain roads of Rothrock State Park in PA or the carriage trails on Mount Desert Island up in Maine
My pre-race ritual is: sipping on coffee
The one thing that people would be surprised to find out about me is: I haven’t thrown up since I was 4 years old
My life philosophy is: “The Will to win means nothing without the will to prepare.” -Juma Ikangaa
When I was a kid, I wanted to be: an illustrator
The most miles I have ever run in a week is: 86
My worst injury was: running related-bursitis in my heels, non-running related-slipping on ice and shattering my right wrist
My worst running moment was: sliding down Franklin Park’s Bear cage hill on my stomach in the 1997 ECAC Championships, and then watching my last chance to qualify for NCAA cross slip away
My greatest running moment was: finally making it to the Olympic Trials after just missing in 2000 and again in 2004
My number one running goal is: making an Olympic Team

Interview conducted on May 21, 2010, and posted on May 27, 2010.

View Original Post at eliterunning.com

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AnnGaff

What an unsung hero! Great interview Bridget, Rebecca is going to do big things.

Thursday, June 10, 2010 at 3:03pm PDT