During her busy day, she met with Bowdoin staff, had lunch and dinner with students, and gave an evening talk. She also met a group of newbie runners at a nearby forest path to teach an introductory workshop on trail running. The autumn leaves gleamed in the golden afternoon light.
Well, not everyone was a newbie runner. Joan Benoit Samuelson ’79, the first female Olympic marathon winner, had driven up from Freeport to meet Valerio. Valerio was overjoyed to see Samuelson, and they shared a bear hug. Valerio took lots of selfies with one of her heroes.
Valerio, who coached high school cross-country for eleven years, first had the students do a five-minute "uncompetitive warm-up" jog, and then demonstrated a few stretches. She moved on to teach the group how to tackle hills and navigate roots and wet leaves. "Look down and up, down and up," she said. "Yes, you can trip but you can also be impaled by a low-hanging branch."
After the lesson, Valerio sent everyone out for a two-mile run in the woods, but not before giving them advice on how to take the best running selfie (wide-angle from the side, holding the phone slightly above your head.)
"Trail running," she said, "is my preferred terrain. It's the most forgiving on the body, and the most beautiful."
Justin Dong ’24 had come out for the workshop in sneakers and sweats. "I thought it sounded like a unique opportunity to get outside," he said. "After three days of rain, I couldn't pass it up."
Irene Brogdon ’22 was there, too, mainly for Valerio's tips on how to run up hills. Recently she has been joining a friend for runs in the Town Commons. "Running is a wonderful way of seeing the world," she said.
Later in the day, Valerio engaged with the broader Bowdoin community in Kresge Auditorium, where she shared her running story and took questions from an audience of student and faculty runners.
Assistant Director of Wellness Services Kate Nicholson, who arranged Valerio's visit, opened the event by expressing her gratitude to Valerio for spending the day at the College.
"During the pandemic I was fortunate to discover Mirna Valerio even though she had been making headlines for years," Nicholson said. "She embodies a commitment to health and well-being on her own terms. I got excited about how bringing Mirna to campus could help our campus community start to reimagine our way back to health as well."
Edmundo Ortiz Alvarez ’24, a current Bowdoin student who was, coincidentally, coached by Valerio in high school, echoed Nicholson’s sentiments about Valerio’s inspirational power.
“We all knew in high school that she was bound to leave for bigger and greater things, and that we were lucky to have her,” Alvarez said. “What I really remember, and what stays with me to this day, is the way that she was able and willing to see me for who I am, as myself.”
Valerio shared that while she had always been an athlete, running became more important to her after a health scare in 2008.
“Running has always been the thing that brought me back to myself,” she said. “It's my litmus test now. ‘How am I feeling? Let me go for a run.’ That's how it is for me.”
Valerio also believes that her blog, Fat Girl Running, where she chronicles her experience running as a plus-sized woman, has been an instrumental component of her running journey.
“When I named the blog, people were like ‘Well, maybe you should call it something else,’” Valerio said. “There are a lot of associations with the word ‘fat’: slovenly, lazy, unintelligent, not ambitious. My goal was to help take the stigma out of the word.”
Before her evening talk, a few students met Mirna Valerio for an intimate dinner at Thorne Dining Hall's Hutchinson Room.
Valerio spoke about how field hockey and lacrosse were the gateway sports to running for her, as her coach would pace next to her, pushing her forward with the mantra “Keep going.” From then on, Valerio found that running just made her feel really good.
She joined a tight-knit running community in New York City as a recent college grad, slowly making a transition to running longer distances, from marathon to trail marathon and, finally, to ultramarathon. When asked what motivates her to keep setting ambitious goals for herself, Valerio answered that she has always been curious, “What if I go an extra five miles?”
Students asked Valerio questions about her work in diversity, equity, and inclusion. “How do you keep hope alive?” one wondered. Valerio said she derives hope from watching people trying to push through their preconceived notions and disrupt their habitual way of doing things.
Balancing this more serious talk with funny quips and her joy in becoming a visible role model and influencer in the changing athletics landscape, Valerio also spoke about learning to say no to unfulfilling opportunities and companies that did not reflect her values of inclusivity, community-building, growth, and joy.
