Micromobility DC with Edie

"I've always prioritized training and running in a way...I've just continued to do it no matter what."

Hilary Cairns is a staple in the DC running and triathlon community. She is the founder and leader of Track Pack, a group of hearty runners who meet at 5:45am on Wednesday mornings year round. She sits on the board for Run Hope Work, an organization founded by Jose Ortiz (and modeled after his own experiences) that combines running, mindfulness , and workforce development. She casually "jumps in" many local races. Most recently, she jumped into the Army 10 Miler and won her age group.

Hilary has a bit of a different relationship than many others on this shows. Rather than loving the marathon or going after ultras, her favorite distances to race range from the 10K to 10 mile. While her mom was a runner - who ran Grandma's Marathon, a favorite destination race amongst DC runners - Hilary played tennis growing up. She found running in college. While she is an accomplished runner and an organizer in the sport, she approaches training with a bit of lightness. She doesn't overthink the Track Pack workouts she plans, she finds local races on RunWashington, and being a mom of three, she understands that she understands that sometimes you have to adapt to what life throws at you.

I really appreciated hearing about how Hilary has found longevity in running and triathlon and managed to prioritize the sport over decades - I think she provides a strong example for those of us who are faced with pressures from all directions and still want to be part of the larger running community and go after big goals. She doesn't overthink running, she just does it and adapts where needed.

If you've seen a smiley blur with a ballet bun whizzing around town, it is probably Sara Borrasso. Sara is an active member of the DC running community, participating in Northeast Track Club (NETC) and Friday West End Running Club (WERC) regularly. She also recently started working with Coach Mo'ath Alkhawaldeh, fondly referred to as Coach Mo, in order to go after some big goals. She accomplished a significant one when she ran 3:08, an over twenty minute PR, at the Berlin Marathon and Chicago Marathon this Fall - races that are only two weeks apart.

Sara ran her first Chicago Marathon in 2014 and has continued participating in it every iteration since. Coming from Chicago, she describes it as her hometown race. She also mentions not really knowing other marathons existed when she first signed up. Strangely enough, Sara learned about NETC in a corral at the 2021 Chicago Marathon from a fellow NETC runner. She decided to check it out and immediately loved being part of a club. Other runners in the group suggested that she work with Coach Mo. With the ambition to qualify for as many World Major Marathons as possible, Sara went for it. 

In this episode, we talk about Sara's 10k first race (all uphill), why she decided to run her first marathon, her first NETC run, how her training has shifted since working with a coach, her aim to run all of the World Majors, and how having running friends has made the sport really fun.

As always, thank you to Dan Hoffman for the music! Enjoy!

This month, I had the opportunity to take part in the Detroit Free Press International Marathon weekend with several of my close DC friends. One of said friends was Savannah Beck, someone I met in 2019 in circumstances completely unrelated to running or any sort of movement. Over the course of our friendship, running entered the picture at some point. At a later point, we plotted this trip to Detroit with pals. Then Savannah trained and completed her first half marathon, crossing the Canadian border along the way.

Savannah is endlessly creative, kind, and fun. She works as an editor at the Goethe Institute where she's written on a host of topics, including DC's large rat population. She hosts her own podcast on books called Slow Burn. And like many of the guests on this niche podcast, she runs! Savannah started running in school for one of the ball sports - we discuss why gym class running kind of stunk. After college, she began running 5Ks and worked her way up to an 8K. Now she's conquered the 13.1 mile distance and the sky is the limit!

We also talk about training for the first half; going from hating gym running to loving Saturday morning runs; finding run groups are not as intimidating as expected; how the cat Fizz views Savannah's running; and more. 

Thanks so much to Savannah for chatting and to Dan Hoffman for the soundtrack. And shout out to Detroit - the marathon + half marathon weekend was amazing, and I want to talk about it endlessly.

"That was the moment I was like...could I do it? I'm having a lot of success cutting my marathon time down? Could I cut it down more and qualify for the trials"

"I think now running for me is a lot of curiosity... I'm not necessarily putting in the high level of work but I'm putting in some work. And it's been really interesting to see what I can do at that level."

Caitlyn Tataishi is an accomplished ultra marathoner and marathoner - so accomplished in fact that she qualified for the 2020 Olympic Trials. One of her more recent accomplishments though has been off the run in becoming a mom. 

One of the refreshing things you will notice in speaking with Caitlyn about running and everything surrounding the sport is how driven by curiosity she is. During this conversation we covered Caitlyn's running beginnings as a "middle schooler" in Hawaii; how she gave up running while teaching in Japan to explore what her identity would be like without it; how she returned to running during Peace Corps in Zambia and ran an unofficial ultra marathon just to see if her body could go that far; her buying a one way plane ticket to DC and signing up for her first official ultra at the same time; her journey with the marathon and deciding to go for the Olympic Trials qualifying time at Grandma's Marathon (the same race at which Keira D'Amato qualified for the trials); and how here relationship with running changed and remained the same in different aspects throughout pregnancy and new motherhood. 

We both agree that DC is a wonderful running city when it comes to both places to run and people in the running community. Caitlyn shouts out Track Pack specifically.  We talk advice for setting big marathon goals - Caitlyn says even if it is a "bad day" (think rainy, windy weather) you might surprise yourself and have a good day! 

"It's about movement. It's just about getting your body out of the door, moving it, and continuing...it's just about persistence."

Matt just came off pacing the DC Half 1:40 pace group. He's an experienced pacer, and it was fun to hear about his first experiences pacing (including a port-a-potty stop) in comparison to this month's event. Matt is a wealth of knowledge about shoes, race management, and running in general. He is also very humble about this and doesn't try to force knowledge on anyone. (But I did manage to get him to nerd out on shoes for a few minutes.)

Matt has become a staple in the DC running community after moving to DC from Florida in 2020, and he is a great pal to have on the run. He will hammer out mile repeats on the track or jog a slow 3 miles with you. You can tell he loves the sport for more than just breaking PRs and winning races - he loves the community. 

"The more confident and empowered we feel, the more likely we are to speak up and use our voice."

This week, I had the opportunity to speak with activist Keshia Roberson. Keshia is a community advisor for Run4AllWomen (an organization founded by activist Alison Desir; Run4AllWomen ambassadors Mikka Kei Macdonald and Elyse Braner were on earlier episodes of this podcast). Keshia has been involved with the organization since its beginning and participated in a leg of the organization's first journey from Harlem to DC!

If Run4AllWomen sounds familiar, it may because you've been hearing all about their Women Run The Vote 3.0 Virtual Relay supporting Black Voters Matter.  This iteration of the relay runs on the virtual map from Cuba, Alabama to Phenix City, Alabama. This event uses the Racery app, which allows participants to record intentional movement (think running, walking, biking, cooking, housework...) and learn historical facts from the Alabama Black Belt.  You still have a few days to sign up, so grab a group of 6 friends and register while listening to the podcast.

Outside of discussing Keshia's involvement in Run4AllWomen, we also discussed how Keshia began combining movement with activism; her founding of Major Knox Adventures, an outdoor series that promotes radical joy of cycling and other outdoor activities while continuing to celebrate the legacies of Major Taylor, Kittie Knox, and countless lesser-known Black outdoor enthusiasts; and finding one's place in the activism space.

Keshia is a wealth of knowledge and someone who takes action to make her community a better, more inclusive space. I really enjoyed getting to learn from her, and I hope you do as well.

As always, thanks to Dan Hoffman for the soundtrack you hear.

"I made up a plan which was run a distance, and then run a little bit more, and then run a little bit more...then run even more miles in a week."

Mike Katz was one of my first DC running friends upon moving back to the district in 2019, and I am lucky because he is a genuine and wonderful human. He is also a very smart scientist in DC! For this episode, we sat down in Logan Circle to discuss how Katz got into running (his friend, Laura, bullied him a lot), turning from a sitter to a mover, his running adventures with college pals turned post-college pals, Tatsu and Laura, his first Pacers group run in a polar vortex, dealing with injury (some sage advice at the end of this episode), training for long distance races, biking and walking around DC, and Katz's role as Skechers Ambassador!

Special thanks to Katz for testing out the new mic with me. And always-thanks to Dan Hoffman for the audio. I hope you enjoy and stay engaged with the pod! Good luck to everyone running the DC Half this weekend!

"When I was in Tennessee, I worked at a camp over the summer, and I ran their biking program - because we were on a hill, and I was the only one who had the energy and interest in biking up and down the hill multiple times a day who had endless amounts of energy. So I quickly became pigeon holed as the biking guy."

This week I had the opportunity to record the first in-person episode of the pod with Eli Minter (@noahsamuel on Instagram). If you've been to a running group in DC, you've probably come across Eli. He has been in DC for over eight years now, and has gotten to know different facets of the movement community. (Eli highlights DC Capital Striders, Mid City Runners, Pacers Run Club, NE Track Club, and District Running Collective in this episode, so if you're new to DC and looking for running pals, those are a few to explore.)

Eli is friendly, super speedy, and a wealth of knowledge on bike infrastructure. In this episode, we spoke about how Capital Bikeshare has evolved over the years; European biking infrastructure and why it's difficult to just transport what's there to DC; WABA's role in DC; and how organizations such as Families for Safe Streets are striving to make roads safer. We of course talked a lot about running too! We spoke about how Eli got started running, tagging along to track workouts with his dad and older siblings; his experience starting cross country - it wasn't what he expected; his favorite marathon; and the calendar of ultras he has coming up this Fall.

As always, credit to Dan Hoffman for the soundtrack. And extra credit to Eli for helping me edit this episode. Thanks so much for listening and staying engaged with Micromobility DC!

“I think I’ve always been kind of intrigued by how far people can run.”

In Episode 5 of Micromobility DC, I spoke with Joe Snowaert, a handyman + contractor DC (hit him up on Instagram @joeinthedistrict for your handyman needs). He is an active member of the district’s running community—you can catch him at an early morning November Project workout or speeding along the Pacers Monday 7 mile route. 

If you thought the last two episodes were ultra-crazy, in this edition of the pod we talked about Joe’s recent success at the Burning River 100 Mile Race (where Joe completed 101 miles!). Joe first attempted this race in 2020 and made it over 90 miles before his ankles swelled up like grapefruits. He wanted to attempt the race again in 2021 but had stress reactions in both tibias—those tibias, man. Third year is a charm as they say though. In 2022, Joe ran the race in (significantly) under 24 hours! 

While able to crush mile after mile after mile, Joe is an incredibly humble and kind human. You can tell he genuinely appreciates living in DC and the movement community he has found here. As he says, “I’ve always said that I will stay in DC as long as I like it. And I still like it four years later.”

This episode is all about trying things out, trying again if a first you don’t succeed, seeing where your body can take you, and enjoying the ride (or run) with your friends.