Making Great Strives - Strivers Running Club

Making Great Strives
Natick’s ‘Coach Colleen’ surrounds life with running
by Tim Dumas
Colleen Phelps
Phelps is
is making
making aa career
career out
out of
of running.
running. Without
Without prize
prize money.
money.
Colleen
There are
are rewards,
rewards, however…when
however…when she
she watches
watches aa fourth-grader
fourth-grader finfinThere
ish her
her first
first 5K…when
5K…when her
her charges
charges raise
raise thousands
thousands for
for charity…when
charity…when
ish
Uta Pippig
Pippig shows
shows up
up to
to one
one of
of her
her events.
events.
Uta
Even without
without the
the running
running club
club for
for young
young girls
girls she
she founded,
founded, Phelps,
Phelps,
Even
46, still
still has
has an
an impressive
impressive resume.
resume.
46,
She recently
recently completed
completed her fifth Boston Marathon (in 3:37) and was
She
first master
master at
at the
the B.A.A.
B.A.A. Half
Half Marathon
Marathon in
in 2009.
2009. The
The mother
mother of
of two
two midmidfirst
dle-school-age children
children has
has also
also completed
completed 17
17 Falmouth
Falmouth Road
Road Races.
Races.
dle-school-age
But around
around Natick,
Natick, Mass.,
Mass., she’s
she’s known
known simply
simply as
as Coach
Coach Colleen.
Colleen.
But
Strivers Running Club For Girls
Founder and Coach, Colleen Phelps.
Photo courtesy of Strivers Running Club
Clubbing it at a local road race.
Photo courtesy of Strivers Running Club
52
New England Runner, July/August 2014
Feature
In the five years since creating Strivers
Running Club for Girls (nee Natick Fit Girls),
Phelps has helped hundreds of youngsters not
only to complete their first 5K, but to give back
to the community.
The combination of Strivers and her own
running has allowed Phelps to immerse herself in the sport. Phelps, who earned an MBA
at Bentley University and worked in the financial industry prior to founding the club, trains
in the morning, then joins the Strivers on their
own runs in the afternoon.
Phelps is also a member of Suburban
Striders in Weston, where she is mentored by
former Boston College coach and Olympic Trials 1500 runner Kathy Fleming.
“I live a blessed life,” said Phelps, who
grew up in Sutton, Mass.
Strivers, for girls in grades 4-6, recently
hosted the inaugural Mother’s Day 5K at Natick High School—a race that drew a field of
600, many of whom sported the purple
Strivers T-shirts that have become common at
local races. Phelps organized the Mother’s Day
race as well as the Jingle Bell Run, which has
become a popular holiday tradition.
The club debuted modestly with 20 girls
in 2009 and now includes two sessions (35-40
girls attend each session, which sell out “in
hours,” according to Phelps’ co-coach Kathy
Landry) in both fall and spring. More than 300
girls have completed one session and more
than half of that total have come back for another.
The popularity, which led one of Natick’s
middle school cross country teams to double
its size in the fall of 2011, has not happened by
accident.
“Colleen is always looking for ways to improve the program,” said Landry, who has
been with Strivers/Fit Girls since its inception.
“We meet at the end of every session to review
what worked and what needs to change—then
Colleen spends most of the winter planning
the next season.”
Perhaps the most impressive statistic of all
is that every Striver in program history has
crossed the finish line at a 5K race, which concludes each session. A pasta party precedes
the race, which serves a dual purpose: teambuilding and carbo-loading.
The club experience, Phelps believes, provides an opportunity that other sports, some
that include cuts, do not.
“Some of these girls are not ready to go
into a tryout and put themselves on the line,
but they still want to be part of a team,”
Phelps, a USATF Level 1 certified coach, said.
“I thought this offered them another athletic
venue to be part of a team—there isn’t a tryout, and it’s all about self-improvement in a
supportive team environment.”
Each session includes an introduction to
jargon such as splits, pace and fartleks. There
is also instruction for stretching, speed work,
cross training, yoga and nutrition.
Running, however, is not the dominating
theme. There are book discussions and community outreach projects, which many of the-
Three-time Boston Marathon winner Uta Pippig
was part of the 600-strong field at the Strivers
Mother’s Day 5K in Natick on May 11. Here she
poses with Maggie Carr of Natick (L) and Jenna
Brandaleone of Wayland.
Photo by Renee Bender-Cohn
girls enjoy as much as the running.
The club has raised money for, among
others, the Doug Flutie Jr. Autism Foundation;
the Travis Roy Foundation; and Lovelane, a
therapeutic horseback riding program for children with special needs.
The club doesn’t simply hand over a
check, however.
For Lovelane, located in Lincoln, Mass.,
the girls teamed up with a “patient partner,”
who then became a Strivers club member and
joined the girls in a half-mile walk prior to that
session’s 5K, the Susan McDaniel Run for
Lovelane.
The club has also collected books for a local hospital’s pediatric unit, filled backpacks to
benefit a food pantry and donated time to the
Natick Service Council, which provides services for those less fortunate.
Strivers also raised nearly $8,000 for the
One Fund, which benefits victims of the
Boston Marathon bombing.
“You get a bunch of runners together, and
they have a powerful impact on a community,” Phelps said. “The Boston Marathon—how
many people out there are charity runners? It’s
amazing what people can do and I think that’s
part of the message to the girls: Here’s a sport
that not only can you achieve personal satisfaction with, you can then take it that much
further and positively impact outside of yourself.”
Cara McDonald, 12, is one of three McDonald siblings to participate in the program,
along with twin sister, Brenna, and Alanna,
who is now 14 and was among the first group
of Strivers/Fit Girls five years ago.
“The community service has really
opened up all our eyes to see that there are
people struggling in not only large cities like
Boston, but in our very own town,” Cara said.
“Giving back to the community has made me
feel like I’m making a difference.”
Maeve Sheehy, 13, is one of many converts to the sport who later served as a junior
coach for the club. Before joining, she rode
horses and played basketball and soccer.
Sprinting short distances was all she knew.
But she saw her mother occasionally run,
which sparked
Maeve’s interest.
She wanted to impress mom, yet became
exhausted giving an allout effort. Within the first
week, Phelps and Landry
taught Maeve how to pace
herself and to employ
proper form using the
acronym LEAF (lean, eyes,
arms, feet). Her times soon
dropped. She was hooked.
“By the end of my
first session I was running
3-5 times a week,” Maeve said, “continuing on
the days we didn’t have practice.”
Like Maeve, Alanna McDonald also
served as a junior coach, and is grateful for the
overall experience.
“Not only was I able to become a runner
but I learned how to lead and teach,” Alanna
said.
The McDonald sisters aren’t the only ones
to take up the sport. Their parents, even their
brother, became runners.
Another highlight of the program is the
guest speakers. Joan Benoit Samuelson and
Thomas Madut—who placed top 50 at the
Boston Marathon in 2012 and is one of the Lost
Boys of Sudan—as well as Travis Roy have
made appearances. Pippig, a three-time winner at Boston in the 1990s, not only spoke to
the club the day after this year’s Boston
Marathon, she called Phelps two days before
the Mother’s Day 5K to ask if she could don
purple and run with the girls.
“It was wonderful,” Phelps said. “It made
me a nervous wreck.”
Pippig, who ran the B.A.A. 5K two days
before Boston, ran with the Strivers during the
Mother’s Day race, pinballing along the course
to encourage runners.
“I hope it makes them feel that they are
part of a real athletic team: ‘You are athletes.
An elite athlete has chosen to run with you,”’
Phelps said of Pippig’s race appearance.
As for her own running, Phelps has done
well to remain a top-of-the-line performer. Her
best time at Boston is a 3:31 in 2010 and her
3:37 this year was well below the qualifying
standard (3:55) for next year. She constantly
finishes within the top 3 to 5 percent in her age
group and has also run the Vermont City and
Providence marathons.
“I have to stay on top of my game,” she
says. “I make sure in addition to going to seminars for the coaching aspect, I get coached
too.”
Immersing herself in running has led to a
joyful life for Phelps. It’s a career she passes on
with each Strivers session.
“I believe you create your own happiness,” she said. “Hopefully my happiness
helps others achieve the fulfillment they deNR
sire.”
For more information: striversrunningclub.com;
facebook.com/striversrunningclub
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