Last week, the women's cross-country team raced its top runners for the first time this season at the Iona College Meet of Champions. None was faster than Jenna Ridgway '10, who finished fourth at the race with a time of 21:48.9.
The Santa Barbara, Calif., native sat down as our Athlete of the Week and shared her stories of inspiration, pain and Princeton kids.
Herald: When did you start running?
Ridgway: I started running freshman year in high school, but I never did cross country until my senior year in high school. I started out with track and was more of a middle-distance runner - I did the 800 (meter race) and the mile - and then, from there, pretty much increased my distance. In cross country, it was the first time doing the three-mile distance, and then now in college, I do 6K in cross country and 5K in track.
Why did you start running?
Why did I? I guess in junior high - we didn't have a team or anything - but in P.E., we would do the half-mile or mile a couple of times a year and I would also try to beat the guys. I found that I was pretty good compared to the rest of the girls at running and thought I could achieve in track.
Did you beat the boys?
Yeah, (laughs), most of them.
I guess the question now is - and be honest here - do you enjoy running?
I do, I do really enjoy running.
Doesn't it hurt after awhile?
It does hurt, but the better the shape you get in, the less it hurts. I mean, the races are always going to hurt, but in a race, there's so much adrenaline, that it's like a thrill. You don't really focus on the pain because it's over before you know it.
We train really hard. There's a lot of satisfaction just out of coming out of achieving set goals ... and just having the whole team work together. We're not alone.
What are practices like?
We usually have substantial workouts a couple of times a week, which can be tempo runs, for anywhere from six to eight miles. Or we can do some sort of intervals on the track. So that's two times a week.
Three days a week are just recovery runs and they range from six to eight miles. Saturdays, we usually do a long run. My longest run has been 14 miles.
How many miles a week do you run?
I'm between about 60 to 70 miles a week now.
Wow. Aren't you tired?
Yeah. It does get tiring, so we have get a lot a lot of rest as a team. Our coaches are always asking us how much sleep we're getting, just making sure we're living an athletic lifestyle, because I don't think you can really function doing what we're doing and living a typical college lifestyle - staying up late and all that stuff. We have to be pretty righteous in our lifestyle, during the season at least.
What you do you like best about your team?
The practices where we're just doing recovery runs are very social, we're just running and not going hard, so it's just kind of like hangout time, on the run.
Do any funny moments stand out?
My teammate at (Indoor Heptagonal Championships), at the Armory in New York City, was racing the (3,000 meters), and the top six score. There was a girl from Princeton, who was also a freshman last year and who's a very good runner. She was trying to pace off (my teammate) and trying to stick with her through the whole race. And in the end - you know, sometimes you run so hard that you actually lose control of your like ... (laughs) - and this girl started peeing during the race and it was like, splashing back on my teammate.
(My teammate) didn't end up quite beating her, but she has vowed to beat her because she got peed on.
Those Princeton kids. Geez. Anyway, what do you like to do when you're not running?
I'm from Santa Barbara, so the beach. Anything outdoors-y, hiking, biking. Hanging out with friends, just anything active.
Would you ever run a marathon?
Yeah, I definitely would like to after I'm done competing in college.
All right. Respond to this statement: Running is not a sport. Have you that gotten that before?
Yeah. I think it's the purest sport there is. (Laughs) It's just pushing your body to the absolute limit. It's the purest, you don't need anything but a pair of shoes. You don't even need a pair of shoes. You don't need any equipment, and it's simple.
