“How I would like people to see me is ‘She didn’t give up.’ I’ve had so many times where I’ve had to come back from injuries – even as recently as this past summer. I remember calling coach Sparks after I hurt my hip again and literally sobbing to him on the phone that my running career was over because I thought that was it. After my surgery two years ago, they had given me a 50% chance of being able to run competitively again. They didn’t know if the surgery was going to take. It’s really difficult having to deal with that and mentally realizing this is the thing I love the most in the world and I may never get to do this again. I don’t know if it’s because I’m too dumb to do anything else but it was just this thought that I can’t quit now because I feel like I haven’t done the things that I’ve wanted to do yet and this feeling that I’m leaving something on the table. I know that I’m capable of more but if I don’t sort everything in my life and get over this victim mentality or get through some of these things, I’m not going to get there. That’s why I feel like there’s never been another thing that I love as much as this. That’s why even though I couldn’t run for six months. I just keep coming back to it.”

The first guest on ‘More Than Running with Dana Giordano’ is Molly Seidel. Just a few weeks after finishing second at the 2020 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials in Atlanta, Dana and Molly sat down in her Fenway–Kenmore apartment to discuss how her much her life has changed since making her first U.S. Olympic team. The conversation was recorded before the coronavirus pandemic led to the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics to 2021.

Topics touched upon in this episode include:

– The build-up to the biggest race of her life

– Putting us in her shoes for her marathon debut

– Speaking up in response to the criticism of her Olympic teammates Aliphine Tuliamuk and Sally Kipyego for being Kenyan-born Americans.

– The media’s coverage of her after the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials and why she felt uneasy about it.

– Handling the spotlight since being a star as a high school

– How life changed after making the Olympic team

– Donuts, hot ham and rolls

– Seeking out a group and the perfect training set up with coach Jon Green

– What she and her coach expected that she would place at the Olympic trials

– What she wants to leave behind as her legacy within the sport

– Advice for younger generations of runners: Just because you fail doesn’t make you a failure.

– Showing off different bodies and diversity on the starting lines in the sport

– And much more…

Subscribe and listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and Anchor.

Photo by Kevin Morris.