Team 5am Running Madness

Celebrate each victory big or small! out there crushing his track workout this morning hitting some of his fastest ever 200s. So many things outside your control can go wrong on a race day and we can feel like we failed. But it's those small victories along the way that remind us how strong we are and what we're capable of. Celebrate every victory! Thanks for inspiring us and reminding us of that today Ashley!

Team 5am had the pleasure to meet and run with , a travel writer visiting Eugene all the way from Belgium to learn more about Track Town and the running community! Thanks, Kris, we hope you had a great experience and we enjoyed meeting you! With your choice of 100k+ races with 10,000ft+ elevation we think you're mad. So you fit right in 🙃
Also Happy National Donut day to everyone!

Competition may be the focus of our training, but community is the heart of this team. It's not the love of running that keeps us committed to getting up and running at 445, it's the amazing people we get the opportunity to know and connect with when we're there.

Eugene Marathon and Half was 4 weeks ago but we're still celebrating. We had 17 runners out on the course. Overall it was a spectacular experience for us all; getting to run on our home course and finishing on the new Hayward track for the first time. We had 8 athletes reach new PRs, many with 5+ min improvement. 8 runners qualified for the NYC or Boston marathon. Every runner put their heart in the run whether they were pacing, racing, coming back from illness or injury, or pushing through struggles. Always inspiring to watch these athletes train and race, but it is even more inspiring to see their sense of community and how they support each other.

Tomorrow .5am.running.madness takes on the and half! We have 5 athletes doing the half-marathon tomorrow and 12 doing the full! Couldn't be more proud of this team and all they put into this training cycle. Tomorrow is a celebration of all their hard work, passion, dedication, and bravery. Keep your eyes out for those black and teal singlets on the course.

New athlete profile! joined our Team at the beginning of 2022 and has been pursuing big goals training for her next OTQ 2:37. We love having her energy on the team and can't wait to see her performances this year. Keep your eye out for her at on May 1st! See her bio below and on our website!

PRs
Marathon: 2:39:06 - OTQ - CIM 2017
Half Marathon: 1:17:25
10k: 34:31
5k: 16:33
Guiness World Record: Fastest Half-Marathon Pulling a Stroller (KidRunner Stroller)

I started running as an awkward tween in middle school because I had a lot of energy but didn't like the physical contact of other sports or balls flying at me. When my high school cross-country team went to a summer training camp, I found out that I could race fast if I ran over the summer. I've been running regularly ever since: competitively racing for the University of Portland and then joining the elite team Oiselle Haute Volee after graduating Grad School. Now I am a 2x USA Marathon Olympic Trials Qualifier, trying to make my third while navigating motherhood and a full-time career in tech.

I love wine country long open road races in the summertime as well as slow training miles on single track trails. Training fills my soul and I love the tired feeling after a tempo run; but racing gives me the biggest thrill. There is something really special and addicting about running the fastest your body has ever gone on a certain course, distance, age...
I like the Team 5am Running Madness because the runners are pursuing many goals beyond running - the group is fun, witty, dedicated, and diverse. After the pandemic, I was exhausted from running solo and was craving a community that wasn't "virtual" and it is a bonus that the team meets at my favorite Eugene coffee shop on Sundays!

Hayward Premiere Fieldtrip.

Always a fun experience getting inspired at Hayward Field! Congratulations to all the talented athletes out there loving their sport.

The Red Queen's Race - A Half Marathon Invitational. Such a great day out on the Row River trail with our team and other local runners. We put together this training race for our athletes as a key workout in their Marathon and half-marathon traing cycle. They totally smashed it. We even had 4 people PR in the training run. Thank you to for being out there timing and announcing for us today and thanks to all our volunteers! This is the first of many small training races we hope to put on where we bring the different running groups of Eugene and Springfield together for some non-competetive, supportive training and community building. Thanks to the runners that joined us out there today. And as a bonus we got to cheer on out there for their weekend long run.

“But I don’t want to go among mad people," Alice remarked.
"Oh, you can’t help that," said the Cat: "We’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad."
"How do you know I’m mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn’t have come here.”
― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
We are more than just a team, we are a very special community of people brought together under the mad idea of running together before 5am. That idea alone is not enough to hold the group together however, it is the connection shared between each person on the team. There must be something pretty special about the people of Team 5am if each person is willing to consistently wake up at absurd times each week to go run together in the dark.

We love Saturdays ❤️ cold morning but so beautiful. Another great weekend for a long run as we prepare for . When you run at 5am, gotta soak up that sunshine whenever you can 😎☀️