Running Towards Your Potential: The Women's Running Accademy

I’m writing this as I sit here and watch the Millrose Games track meet, records getting broken left and right!  Josh Kerr just broke the world record for the 2-mile, 8:00:67!! It’s crazy that there was a time when we didn’t think it was humanly possible to run A single mile in less than 4 minutes. Now we are knocking on the door of 2 miles at a sub 4 pace. The potential of the human body is still relatively untapped!

If you’ve been to my “About Me”, you probably read my running story already so I’ll spare you the full recap here. I talked a little bit about how I became OBSESSED with running (telling me I can’t do something is a surefire way to make sure I do it!) and a bit about how having babies also brought to light some biomechanical inefficiencies that reared their ugly head in the form of constant hip, knee and back pain and pelvic floor symptoms. I had it all!

I firmly believe these inefficiencies prevented me from reaching my full potential well before my childbearing years. Addressing those inefficiencies not only eliminated my symptoms, it made me a stronger, more efficient, and more powerful runner overall.

I love looking back at the old Boston Marathon photos and KNOWING that someday soon I will smoke her. Back then I wasted so much energy and had so much untapped potential.

I was on a continuing education call about physiology, breath, health and performance this past week where one of the other participants said:

“We as humans are the most complicated beings. Right now we are still using our bodies as if we are using a smartphone as purely a torch (flashlight)”

So much untapped potential!!

That brings me back to Josh Kerr, Roger Banister (the first to break the 4-minute mile), and, of course, my favorite, Eliud Kipchoge (who broke the 2-hour marathon).

They are all there doing things that we didn’t even think was humanly possible!

Every single runner in the men's mile at Millrose Games ran it in well under 4 minutes!

What does that have to do with you and me? I know I’m never going to break the 4-minute mile or get even anywhere near a marathon where the first number starts with 2, but it does make me wonder even more where the limit of my potential lies and how close/or far I am from reaching that limit.

I truly believe I have not yet reached that potential!

That notion comes now with excitement, but I also know what it’s like for that notion to feel more like frustration.

I know what it feels like to spend years spinning my wheels, where every time I started to train harder or build mileage, I would have issues creep up that would make me have to cut back or take time off. Cutting back, slowing down, or time off helped me avoid true injury, but it’s stopped me from making progress and reaching my potential.

Does that feel familiar to you? You are definitely not alone. I’ve worked with so many runners who’ve felt the same way!

In my experience, after years of digging deep into the world of human physiology and running biomechanics and coaching hundreds of runners, the main thing stopping most runners from reaching their potential is treating the human body as just the sum of its parts. 

We are one body, it works together. We need to understand how all the parts are connected.

When you don’t look at your body as a whole, you end up chasing one injury only to create another, you make progress, but then plateau, feel like you are always managing something.

When you look at your body as a whole and begin to truly understand how all the pieces start to come together, you can move more freely and efficiently overall, you can get out of your head and back into your joy with running, you can fully tap into your potential.

This is exactly how we approach training in the Women’s Running Academy.

I talk to so many runners who, after years of struggling with injury, burnout, and falling short of their goals are stuck in their heads and lose all the joy of running.

I know that feeling myself and have worked with so many runners who’ve felt it too.

It’s why after the Women’s Running Academy the first few rounds I added the promise of “get out of your head and back into your joy with running.” Maybe it’s a woo woo promise, but after years of running this program, it’s a promise I know I can make. 

“Insane difference in no longer feeling the pain, running faster, running easier. That was a game changer. Can't believe it but my 10k pace was 7:20 per km when I started. I raced myself at the end of the program at 6:30 per km. That felt amazing and honestly it wasn't even that hard because of the consistent training.... It really pays off! "I'm a better runner for it, better at training for it and I've really fallen more in love with running from it."

Angell K.

Women's Running Academy

 Here is what you can expect when starting Women's Runnin Academy.

1 - Self Assessment and Understanding:

We’ll look at some basic running biomechanics to help you understand the demands of running and work through a set of targeted self-assessments to help you fully understand the needs of your body to meet those demands.

We look at core activation, hip mobility, strength and the role of the pelvic floor, we look at foot strength and mobility, and we look at the role of what you can’t see, your physiology. We look at how it’s all connected.

2 – Skill Development:

Using my 5 Skills Framework and your new understanding of the needs of your body and how it’s all connected we’ll practice the skills needed to run efficiently.

3 – Training Strategy Optimization:

We’ll create a targeted strength training and running training strategy that directly supports your body and your goals.

4 – Program Integration:

We’ll zoom back out, put it all together, and learn how to plan a full, seasonal training program to keep making progress toward all your future running goals.

Step by step, week after week we’ll apply the system together so that by the end of the 12 weeks you’ve confidently ditched the cycle of injury and burnout.

​AND, through the education along the way, you’ll have all the tools to continue to apply it to make real, consistent progress towards any goal you set in the future and untapping your full potential.

The Women’s Running Academy started years ago to help women run strong, ditch the cycle of injury and burnout, and reach their performance potential.

While that is still a big part of what I do, it’s not the heart of what I do.

Over the past 3.5 years, it’s evolved. The more I learn it becomes the little things. To teach you to breathe, slow down, move intentionally, and step INTO your body (not tune out) and your power. To help you understand what your body is telling you, to learn its language, and support its needs. To help you understand that this training we do does not exist in a vacuum, you are a WHOLE HUMAN.

I love getting into the nitty gritty of form, positions, muscle actions, running biomechanics etc. Of course, that's part of it. But YOU are at the heart of it.

Whether my coaching helps you get out of that cycle of injury and burnout to finally conquer that moonshot distance and get that dream PR or refind your joy and freedom with running or even decide that running isn’t as important to you as you once thought, I’ve done my job because you learned about and put your body first.

“Even though there was a little bit of a learning curve with some of the exercises that were newer to me, I liked the process of figuring it out. I loved the videos. They really helped with the workouts. Overall I feel more in tune with my own body and understand the importance of mindfully working out, having a purpose and intention.”

Deanna C.

The Women’s Running Academy Includes:

• A 12 week progressive and intentional strength training program created to meet the demands of running.
• 2 Full body workouts per week, approx. 45 minutes long with full written and video cuing for each exercise.
• Video guided, multipoint self assessment to help understand the specific needs of your specific body
• Weekly educational modules so that you can use that understanding to optimize your strength training with a targeted strategy.
• A full library of base building and race specific running programs to meet you where you are now and intentionally progress towards your running goal.
• Weekly breathing exercises that progress over time to optimize your movement mechanics, oxygen efficiency, stress resilience and recovery.
• Three group coaching calls to help solidify your application of the concepts, ask questions, and receive feedback from me. Think of this as an opportunity for 1-on-1 coaching within a group setting while also learning from the questions others ask.
• A full library of bonus materials to support you as a whole athlete and human including training with your menstrual cycle, more specific pelvic floor education, breathing for performance, and recordings of guest lessons on nutrition, stress resiliency, advocacy for women in athletics and more.
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Through the Women’s Running Academy you will:

• Learn what it really means to train mobility so that you can move more efficiently and feel fluid with every run.
• Connect your movements - shoulder, hips, all the way down to your feet - so that you can get out of the cycle of treating one injury only to create another.
• Progressively build strength to meet the demands of running so that you can continue safely at volume and intensity to your running without constantly having to manage pains that pop up.
• Run purposeful miles with purposeful pacing into your week using my “3 Key Runs” so that you are intentionally building volume while also improving your metabolic efficiency, and prioritizing the development of a solid strength training foundation.
• Improve your running economy by improving your biomechanical efficiency (the strength work), improving your metabolic efficiency (the purposeful pacing in your running), and your oxygen efficiency (the breathwork).
• Become your own best advocate, the expert in your own body, and the boss of your training and goals.
• Have the support you need to show up for yourself and your goals.

Join the Women's Running Academy waitlist for the next round now!