Sisters in Sport

We celebrated National Girls and Women in Sports Day 2013 with a Twitter campaign of photos from all of our #SistersInSport. Check out the incredibly fun collection of photos from our tweeps. Special thanks to @MegRunnerGirl for creating this Storify of the day's uploads. Click on the photo below for the link to the all of the photos!

Sisters in Sport- by Ro

We are social beings. Social support is known to be effective for stress reduction, better training (running faster and longer), for fun, healing, inspiration and motivation, for belief in self, encouragement, well being, and ultimately to find meaning in life. Although you stand alone on the start line in a race or a job interview, without the support from people in your life you wouldn't be there. How many champions do we hear speaking about the team behind them that helped them become their best? We learn from each other - how to walk and talk, how to read, do math, sing, dance, run. No (wo)man is an island! read more

As a child I ran because I enjoyed the feeling of running fast. I STILL run because as a child I joined a club where my passion of running was nurtured by a supportive coach, parents and club members. I had the support to follow the desires and the dreams in my heart. Later when I got to college I had a huge number of teammates and an excellent coach to push me, teach me and help me reach my potential. I have lifelong best-friendships that started as teammates but are now literally like sisters to me. Luckily after college a group of aspiring professional athletes formed in Providence, and together we ran all the way to World and Olympic championships.

Running can sometimes be a lonely job. It can cause a person to feel isolated and “weird” (especially since the majority of people don't realize that being a professional runner is a profession!) Just as doctors need other doctors around, just as musicians hang with other musicians, mothers need other mothers, its so beneficial to find the birds of your feather.

Back in the day, Lueven 2006 with Kim Smith, Marie Davenport, Amy Rudolph, Mary Cullen and I

Since my husband and I decided to start a family and I began the transition away from full-time training, my network of daily training partners has slowly dwindled. I get to run with the girls (super stars Kim Smith and Molly Huddle ) now and again, but I now primarily train alone. It has taken some time to get used to this situation, but I feel as good as ever.

My sisters in sport no longer need to be PHYSICALLY present pushing me on a run, instead they now encourage me and support in different ways, like taking turns babysitting, which allows me to go out and train. In addition I’ve been opened up to a whole new world of sisters in sport through Believe I Am.

Lauren and I (Ro) live 3000 miles apart, yet together we were able to create Believe I Am; we provided encouragement, validation of each others ideas, constructively critiqued, shared knowledge, kept each other accountable and laughed along the way. Undoubtedly we created something together that alone we could never have. Now we are delighted to open up and connect with a community of bloggers who are sharing their goals and their roller-coaster journeys en route to realizing their dreams.

Although we’ve only just begun, by reading the blogs thus far I’m already feeling the support, the motivation and the inspiration, to go ahead and set more goals, to keep myself accountable, and to keep going! I’m so excited for this new source of daily inspiration, its already working like a fertilizer on the flowers in my garden :), my flowers are coming back to life and budding again. Individual motivation and goal setting is important, but finding the right support crew is also important. Together we can encourage each (in person or via the internet) to really stay on track, get out of bed, to cross train, rehab an injury, get to the starting line, or even just go out for that run. Thanks to all the bloggers who are participating. I hope that you find the benefits of sharing your story and learn so much from each other. By tapping into the sisters in sport network my hope is that we can all go further than we could alone.

Check out the links below. Each blogger is willing to share their goals and journeys for the next four months. Follow on twitter under #sistersinsport. Go ahead and dare yourself to dream, set some goals, and go after them like your pants are on fire!!