Running like a girl, at least to me, means running slow but running with joy.  I’ve never been fast, but I win every time I take that first step, because I’m staying healthy and I’m staying sane.

    When I run, I solve the (my) world’s problems.

    When I run, I set an example for my young daughter.

    When I run, I test my limits and I fight my demons.

So...can YOU run like a girl?

I’m a 40 year old southern mom who loves to run. I’m built for distance, not speed. I’ve loved running since I was a teenager, but I’ve been inspired to run by my daughter.  She has cerebral palsy and can’t run, but that hasn’t stopped her from being a fighter and embracing life and pinning on a race bib, anyway.  Every step I take is for her.

It’s very hard in the beginning to understand that the whole idea is not to beat the other runners.  Eventually you learn that the competition is against the little voice inside you that wants to quit.

- George Sheehan

There are clubs you can't belong to, neighborhoods you can't live in, schools you can't get into, but the roads are always open.

- from a Nike poster

A lot of people run to see who’s the fastest. I run to see who has the most guts.

        - Steve Prefontaine

Every morning in Africa a gazelle wakes up.  It knows it must move faster than the lion or it will not survive.  Every morning a lion wakes up and it knows it must move faster than the slowest gazelle or it will starve.  It doesn’t matter if you are the lion or the gazelle, when the sun comes up, you better be running.

        - Roger Bannister

Do or do not.  There is no try.

        - Yoda

Perhaps the genius of distance running is its supreme lack of utility.  It makes no sense in a world of spaceships and supercomputers to run vast distances on foot.  There is no money in it and no fame, frequently not even the approval of peers.  But as poets, apostles and philosophers have insisted from the dawn of time, there is more to life than logic and common sense.  The runners know this instinctively.  And they know something else that is lost on the sedentary.  They understand, perhaps better than anyone, that the doors to the spirit will swing open with physical effort.  In running such long and taxing distances they answer a call from the deepest realms of their being - a call that asks who they are...       

        - Kevin Tiller