Stephanie Bowen

Stephanie Bowen, Communications Officer, provincial government (Victoria BC)

Posted by Sarah 

Image 2Steph has been running for 6 years now. Well, racing that is. You could say she’s always been running – as a soccer player in high school she ran to stay in shape. Then she started entering races and realized how much fun they were!

Steph’s “running career” has had its ups and downs: an injury here and there, times of running less and times of running more. But through it all running has been her form of meditation. Nothing calms her down, soothes her frazzled nerves or energizes her like hitting the road (or trails) for a long, quiet run. She calls it her ‘meditation-in-motion’, which I personally can completely relate to!

So let’s talk with Steph on how she fuels her running! Here she is on how eating to run helps her to be a strong, healthy and fast runner:

Q&A with Stephanie

sarah- Why do you eat to run instead of running and then indulging?

steph- As I grew stronger as a runner I became more and more aware of how every little thing I put in my body was effecting my performance. Fried food on a Friday night? Groggy, sluggish run on a Saturday morning. Too few carbs and protein after a Monday night track workout? An exhausted, completely drained morning on Tuesday. The more you run, the more in touch with your body you become, and, for me, the more I want that body to behave like a well oiled machine. It just makes sense to pay attention to what you’re using for fuel.

sarah- Fave pre-run eats?

steph- I started off with whole grain toast, nut butter and banana (which still makes me salivate when I think about it… yum!), but that started feeling too heavy real quick. Now it’s a berry & banana smoothie with whey protein and coconut water. Sound familiar? 😉

sarah- Ha, yes! Yes it does 🙂 Fave post-run eats?

steph- Anything Eat 2 Run Headquarters puts in front of me. Seriously. I always walk away from our post-run breakfasts feeling totally satisfied and like a million dollars. When I’m forced to, you know, take care of myself (ugh), I love the Eat 2 Run recovery smoothie, followed by a breakfast bowl (roasted yams & potatoes, fresh spinach, fresh cherry tomatoes and avocado, topped with two poached eggs, pepper, and smoked paprika) about an hour later. YUM.

sarah- Super awesome… You are living proof eating to run works! Okay… Fave race you’ve run?

steph- That honor definitely goes to my first and only full marathon, the Nike Women’s run in San Francisco. You start out with 20,000 women in Union Square, but only 5,000 or so do the full marathon and there’s only a tiny elite field. So I found myself alone, taking in stunning vistas of that gorgeous city, and way ahead of the pack for most of the race. It was incredibly energizing at first, and incredibly calming at 20 miles, when I thought my legs might actually fall off. And I blew my goal time out of the water 😀

sarah- Wow. You just made me really want to run that marathon! Tell us what’s next?

steph- I’m leading a run group this season here in Victoria, and I love the change in perspective and drive. Rather than focus on my own goals, I’m really excited to support that small group and make them fall in love with running and racing the way I did. It’s a neat thing, to go from being so self-focused to taking care of others. So I guess my goal is to help every one of my 13 runners hit their goal times.

sarah- Amazing goal. I can fully relate to being committed and super excited to helping other runners reach their goals!

Before I sign off, I want to share Steph’s awesome PB’s – because as I’ve mentioned before, we all rock and deserve to be super proud of our PB’s.

Steph’s Personal Bests

  • 5 km – 20:18
  • 10km – 41:56
  • Half marathon – 1:36:45
  • Marathon – 3:28:14