When Holly Garcia and Stephanie Anderson toe the lines of many marathons and half marathons in the state of Utah, they do it with one purpose in mind — to help others reach their goals.
Since 2012 Garcia of Springville and Anderson of Spanish Fork, have run a race pace organization called Run Your Race, making it their goal to ensure that each runner who enters a race is able to do exactly that.
“It’s so rewarding to be able to put our own goals and times aside and be able to help others achieve their goals,” the duo told Serve Daily in a message “It’s fun to get to meet and talk to new people along the course.”
The way race pacing works is experienced runners sign on to pace a particular time, and on race day, pacers hold a sign with that time on it, letting racers know where they are on the race course. Runners who want to remove the worry of managing their goal pace, can stay with the pacers and let them do the work so they can focus on running.
“We strive to provide a positive running experience to athletes of all levels, our objective is to help all of those around us achieve their running goals,” the mission statement reads.
Pacers usually start at around 3:00 for the marathon and 1:30 for the half marathon, and go every five minutes through 4:30 for the marathon and 2:30 for the half marathon. They even offer “sweepers” toward the end of the race to encourage those in the back. Each pacer is pacing a time that is comfortable enough to carry on a conversation, allowing them to be encouraging to those they are running with.
Additionally, each pace is catered specifically to each course, taking into account the various elevation changes throughout the course.
“It’s so rewarding to be able to put our own goals and times aside and be able to help others achieve their goals,” they said. “It’s fun to get to meet and talk to new people along the course.”
Starting the pacing group began when a local race director asked for pacers at some of his races.
“We were good friends with David Bell and he asked us to start a pacing team to pace all of his races,” they said.
David Bell was the owner of 26.2 Running Co. in American Fork and owned Runtastic Events, which holds some of the most popular races in the state, including the Nebo Marathon and Half Marathon. Bell drowned in a whirlpool along with two other friends while hiking in the Sierra Nevada mountains in August, 2024. Bell died while attempting to save a friend.
“The year David passed away, we all wore our favorite picture of him on our backs and we really felt him close as we paced a hard race,” they said.
Another key player in the beginning days of Run Your Race Pacing was Holly Garcia’s husband Jorge Garcia.
“Jorge was an integral part of starting the team and really pushing it the first few years until he had his heart attack,” Holly Garcia said. “He hasn’t been able to run consistently since.”
Jorge Garcia has also been a big proponent of suicide awareness.
Garcia and Anderson said that they strive to bring that same spirit of help and determination that Bell and Jorge Garcia have brought to this life, with them on the racecourse. They both said among the things they look for in race pacers are strength, patience, energy, encouragement, discipline and speed.
“(We love) having people come up to us at the end that we didn’t know were following us and having them thank us for helping them finish in their goal time,” they said. “Helping a lady qualify for Boston at Big Cottonwood one year was another highlight.”
The two said that their favorite distance is the marathon, and this year, they get to pace three fulls, along with the 17 half marathons on their race calendar. They also said that they are always looking for experienced runners to join their pacing team.
“Pacing is an amazing opportunity to get to do more races and to volunteer to help others and put yourself aside,” they said. ”It has really brought us both out of our comfort zones to be more social and outgoing. If anyone is interested in pacing they can join our group. We love having new pacers join us!”
For more information, find Run Your Race Utah based pacing team on Facebook.
