Interview w/Camille Herron

Running Buddies: Camille Herron Interview

Jamie Roberts: You're listening to Running Buddies, brought to you by Running Scared Media, where every step has a story. I'm Jamie Roberts and this is the podcast we like to call a Job Cast. Whether it's your first time out or you're a seasoned pro, Running Buddies finds stories that are bigger than running. And what is bigger than running? Subscribing to Running Scared Media. Go ahead, do that right now. It's free, it doesn't take any time at all. You can find it across all your different podcast platforms. Type in Running Scared Media, subscribe.

We have weekly episodes that come out every Tuesday. We have three podcasts, we have Soul Sisters, we have Rucking Around, and we have our flagship show, Running Buddies, where we talk to athletes, media personalities, business people, really everybody that has a story to tell. And we do it while they are doing what they love. They are running, they are walking, they are on the slope, they are on the trail, and we want you to put this podcast in while you're doing what you love to do. While you're running, while you're on the trail, while you're going for a walk. So we can sort of come together and and hear these stories.

So we have a really interesting conversation coming up. We have Camille Herron who has been running and really been on the top of the game for a very long time. We had an interesting conversation and covered many topics from some controversies in the last couple years to some of her big successes and some of her huge wins within the last decade. So she really brings for me a very informative and interesting perspective on running, ultra running, where it's been, where it is, where it's going. Go ahead and enjoy that. You know, pop it in while you're just about to lace up the shoes and go for a run.

We've had some really interesting and excellent guests on over the last few months with Tove Alexanderson and Damian Hall. We actually have some interesting guests coming up in the future. We're going to get a Soul Sisters episode out next week and then we've got something a little different planned for the third week of January. So absolutely subscribe to the podcast so you can catch that when it's a big one. Okay, so with no further ado, let's go to our conversation with Camille Herron. On today's show, we're extremely thrilled to be running with Camille Herron, a multi-world record holder, UTMB series and comrades, marathon winner, neurodiverse advocate and athlete and a coach. Welcome to the show, Camille.

Camille Herron: Yeah, thanks for having me, Jamie. It's Monday after Thanksgiving and I am sitting on the couch.

Jamie Roberts: Yeah, you know what, we normally take the live from the trail format but it's a big holiday for the American contingency. So you know what, you're just going to do it in the comforts of your couch, comforts in your space and we're going to be able to roll through a bunch of questions here. So the way we kind of operate things here at Running Scared Media and Running Buddies is we just have some quick hits. So I know you're not on a run today but can you let us know, you know, I know you've been out on runs so whereabouts are you?

Camille Herron: Yeah, I am in Hillsborough, California right now and my brother and his family live here and my brother is a chef and his wife works at a winery and we are in the middle of wine country. So we've got vineyards all around and it's beautiful and yeah, my brother chefed up an amazing meal on Thanksgiving and yeah, I'm just going to sit here on the couch now and eat leftovers and have a good time.

Jamie Roberts: Oh my god, that sounds amazing. You know, those that listen, the audience will know that you know, we're Canadian here. So Thanksgiving is like, yeah.

Camille Herron: You guys have a different one.

Jamie Roberts: No, we have a different one. Yeah, it's a month earlier and it's still big. We get together with family but I know the American Thanksgiving is like, that's the big holiday but that's so nice you get to spend it with family and you get to be out there. I'm curious, when you do go running and in that area, where do you go?  Is there a spot that people need to check out if they're in that area? A great run? What should we know?

Camille Herron: Gosh, I mean, we're actually on a major road here and I mean, there's vineyards all around. There's like paths that go through the vineyards and so yeah, I mean, you can just like go explore the vineyards or get on the major road and there's like a lot of bikes that go along here and if I go like about a mile to the west, I can go across a bridge and get on a quieter road that has a little bit less traffic and then we're also about, I think, about seven miles from Lake Sonoma and Lake Sonoma is where they have the the 50 miler in the spring but they're actually going to be having 100k this year and so yeah, you can't beat the Lake Sonoma trails. I mean, it's pretty dang awesome. I was just out there on Saturday and ran with the Hillsburg Running Company group so yeah, if you come to Hillsburg, you gotta go run at Lake Sonoma.

Jamie Roberts: No, that's good to know. Honestly, you know what? That's the thing. I've never been to California. I've been out in the southwest a lot but never out there but I'd love to go there. My sister went there for her honeymoon. She went out to wine country. Yeah, the guy she married is a kind of a wine kind of story but yeah, you never, I don't know, I wouldn't really think of first off running with Sonoma County but I'm glad you brought that up because that's interesting, right? It just shows you that the running communities are everywhere. I know you're from Tucson or you're living in Tucson. Is there a great spot or area to go in that community?

Camille Herron: Oh gosh, Tucson's amazing for running. I don't even know where to start. I mean, there's so many trails but I mean, I guess if you do come to Tucson, you have to hit up the Sabino Canyon Trails and there's, I mean, they just go all over and you can get on the app Trail Run Project and look at all the trails in Tucson but yeah, we live in kind of like the northeast part and there's like bike routes and everything and I usually just get on the bike routes for my road running and then not too far from the Sabino Canyon Trails to get on the trails there but I mean, there's, it's a running community. I mean, it's got like a, it's got what's called the loop that is like a bike route that goes around Tucson and so that's kind of like the popular place for road running or cyclists and then, but yeah, I mean, I personally prefer road running, like actual road running and so I live and by a bike route and it's pretty awesome so.

Jamie Roberts: Yeah, I know there's something to be said for running different terrains and different weather and kind of, you know, myself, like I get after it depending, whatever weather is out there but like when it's snow and it's ice and it's slush for like eight months of the year, you know what I mean? It's like, I just, I would love it if it was just dry and warm and you know, for a prolonged period of time but we just don't get that much but anyways, I want to, I kind of want to, I want to shift gears a little bit and you know, my first question for you is really, you know, we want to kind of position the whole, the whole conversation around a chronology of like how things were and how things kind of are and where things are going so can you take us back to the beginning of the story and how did running start for you? Like how did you get into this?  How did, where did it all begin? Who was the inspiration? Talk about that.

Camille Herron: Yeah, sure, sure. Yeah, I love, I love talking about the beginning, how I got into running. I, so I'm originally from Oklahoma and my dad and my grandpa played basketball at Oklahoma State so I grew up around basketball and wanted to be a basketball player and like playing college like my dad and my grandpa and so yeah, I was really into, really into sports in general but mainly basketball and dance and played softball and like golf and but yeah, I was a point guard on the basketball team so I did the most running on the, on the team and my dad, my dad likes to tell the story because we lived out in the country amongst the wheat fields when I was a girl and I, my earliest memories of running were running around the wheat fields chasing the wildlife and my dad, I, I mean I loved being outside, loved being out in the country.

My dad likes to tell the story about how we were, he had just gotten home and he saw me running out of the wheat field and asked me what I was doing and I told him I was chasing a rabbit so I was chasing a rabbit out of the wheat field and he like, that's one of his favorite stories to tell and but I, I spent most of my time in the driveway playing basketball and, and when we, we, we used to do like the presidential physical fitness mile when I was in elementary school and I was the best girl at my elementary school and so those, those were like my earliest memories of like actually competing and then in junior high our basketball team had to go out for off-season track and I just remember from the very first day of track practice I could just do loops and loops and loops around the middle school and, and I just didn't get tired and I, I remember, I remember thinking the other little kids were like a bunch of wimps and thinking like why are they getting tired and not realizing that I have like the physiology for endurance running and so, so yeah those are my earliest memories of realizing okay I think I can run, I literally feel like I can run forever and so yeah that's kind of how it all began.

Jamie Roberts: Well you know what and that's kind of like my follow-up question and I ask that a lot it's like when and I remember talking with um Reid Coolstead who's a, who's a Canadian marathoner.

Camille Herron: Oh yeah, yeah.

Jamie Roberts: And, and Reid lives in my neighborhood I know him and oh my gosh yeah Reid's a good dude and I, and I you know we had a conversation about um when like when you realize that you have an aptitude for, for the sport, for the running right and I've talked to other athletes about this so was it at that point we were like oh man I like I just don't get tired I can just run and like did that not happen in the basketball sphere that more was just like well.

Camille Herron: I used to use my, I used to use my running ability like I knew from elementary school I was like the best girl on the mile and I used to use my running ability to my advantage because I would try to wear out whoever was guarding me by like just running all over the court and um and then they just couldn't they would get tired and they couldn't keep up and they didn't realize what I was doing but I was, I was being pretty smart about it and I just tried to wear out uh who was guarding me because I knew I could like outlast anybody on the court and um so so yeah I think I think like and especially just that first day of track practice like realizing I mean the other kids would start walking and I didn't understand like why they were tired I thought everybody was like why are they tired I don't understand um so yeah I just uh and then I just remember we had to try out for all the different events in track and as the distance got longer and I mean I was just light years above about above everybody I mean I think I was like maybe the second best in the 400 meters and then I was like the best in 800 meters when we tried out and I was terrible at any kind of jumping and like we tried to jump hurdles and I tripped over the hurdle and I tried to throw the shot put and the discus and definitely could not throw anything so yeah.

Jamie Roberts: so you've got this moment when you're young and then if you sort of you know if you kind of go way off into the future world records um UTMB first place finishes like all these all these achievements amazing achievements if I'm gonna throw a dart right in the middle or somewhere in the middle what's the inflection point what is the point where you're you're you're changing your life and making decisions that you're solely focused on running what where does where do we land at that point

Camille Herron: yeah I mean I think uh I think when I when I made the leap from the marathon up to ultra running back in 2015 um I mean I always thought that the marathon was going to be my event and I just it just hadn't like really I just didn't know until I like went into ultra running that I like kind of I kind of tapped into like a whole other level of ability um and I just always assumed like oh you know like anybody anybody could go and anybody that's like a good marathoner could try ultra running and be good at it but what I found was I was really really good at it um and I think that the the story I like to tell is when I I had run my first ultra back in 2013 I ran two oceans in South Africa which is 56 kilometers so that's not that much further than the marathon and I did I ran okay but it wasn't like I just like set the world on fire and and then I went and ran com rounds in 2014 and I had a stomach virus that that race and um ended up dropping out I ended up well I didn't just drop out I passed out and so I kind of like after after that race I was kind of scared to do ultra running because I was like I don't think this is going to be good for me like I don't know I I was really on the fence because I had been a marathoner for a long time and I had already made and I think at that point I had qualified for three Olympic marathon trials so I was kind of at the point where I was like I think I'm done competing I don't think I want to keep going with this but I kind of had like this epiphany at Christmas time where I was like you know what I'm going to sign up for a hun I'm going to sign up for the mad city 100k in Madison which is the u.s 100 100k championship and so it was kind of I just took this leap and this like and just thinking you know what I'm going to go for 100k and see what happens and I didn't know that I had run a really fast time so I was driving to work on a Monday and I got a call from the race director while I was driving to work and he was thrilled he was really really excited because I had broken a a long time record that was held by Anne Trayson who is a legend in the sport and I think like the record it was like the championship 100k record and I think it had stood for like 25 years or something like that so it was kind of a it was kind of a big deal to break any record by Anne Trayson and it was a long-standing record that I broke and um and I mean I even when I when I went and did the race I didn't know like what pace to run it wasn't like I was like shooting for like oh I'm gonna go run this I'm gonna go try and break this record I was just out there running at I said I think I can run about 80 percent of max heart rate effort which I had like kind of practiced in training I kind of thought oh I think I can run 80 percent so I kind of went into the race thinking I'm just gonna like focus on running at like 80 percent and I felt really really good like the whole race like it actually felt like I felt so much more comfortable with 100k pace than I ever did as a marathoner so I kind of knew like from that moment like I think I'm really I really like going further and um but anyways when I got to work I had to I had to google who Anne Trayson was and I was like who is Anne Trayson and um that's what it that's what it dawned on me oh oh my gosh I broke a record by a legend in the sport and um that was that was really the epiphany that was really the epiphany of oh my gosh like maybe I should keep going with this yeah and and then and then in that fall because I qualified for the world championship I ended up winning I won 100k a world world title and then I went and ran 50 miles in October and I I surpassed Anne Trayson's 50 mile world record um but because the course was a point-to-point course it only counted as a world best and so I ended up I ended up being the I was the first woman to run under 540 for 50 miles um I ran 538 and and then in December I went to the 50k world championship and and the the crazy thing was when I ran the 100k at Mad City I didn't realize I qualified for the 50k team as well so I qualified for about the 50k team because of my split for 100k so I was going fast enough to qualify for two teams and so I went to the the 50k world championship in December and won that world title as well so in my first year I had won two world titles and the 50 mile uh set a 50 mile world best and had broken um Anne Trayson's 100k championship record so I literally like a star was born in my first year like oh my gosh like and here I mean a year before that I was thinking about retiring like really yeah I was like I mean I I had already done so much as a marathoner and I was kind of like done with like competing so I feel so blessed that I even gave ultra running a shot and decided to go further and found out you know that the further the further that I go that it seems like the better I do so nice okay

Jamie Roberts: so then at that point how does how does it all change is it um is it is it more events is it is it now like you're you're not taking it seriously because you clearly were uh but is it is it um more you know is there sponsorship more attention is there more media is there more like how does running change at that point when

Camille Herron: oh yes yeah it vastly changed my life I mean I was working I was working full time at that point and I mean suddenly I was getting all these like emails and requests for interviews and I mean it was it was overwhelmed it was really overwhelming and um and I I realized like because I had had an agent when I was a marathoner and so I my my like you know in that moment I thought okay I think I need to get an agent and I didn't realize at that time that like getting an agent as an ultra runner wasn't really a thing and so I ended up connecting with um uh Meb Kifleski's brother Howie Kifleski because I knew Howie from when I was a marathoner and um so I connected with him and then he connected me with another guy that was um kind of collaborating with him that was a trail runner I ended up signing with them and he was basically telling me that nobody cares about road ultras and you have to go into trail running because that's where the sponsors like put their put their marketing in their focus so I felt like I was kind of being like forced to become a trail runner and I mean I wanted it to be something that I did because I wanted to do it I didn't want to I didn't want trail running to be something that I'm just doing because it's what sponsors care about but I ended up running my first trail race and um it was actually Lake Sonoma in 2016 and I had a hamstring injury like a couple weeks before that and in hindsight I should not have done the race but I felt like forced I felt kind of forced to do it because at that time they were having some sort of like team competition and I was going to be on the team and and and like be competing and I was going to be competing for a golden ticket to get into western states yeah so I ended up I kind of felt forced to do the race even though I was like kind of gimpy and had my injured hamstring and um and well it started raining halfway into the race and I was leading the race and um and I ended up injuring my hamstring even worse yeah so um so anyways so I was limping really badly at Lake Sonoma because I injured my hamstring and I ended up and I can't remember what place it was a third place or fourth place I can't remember now um but I ended up missing I ended up getting passed in like the last mile of that race and ended up missing out on a golden ticket to western states and um I really badly injured my hamstring like I think I tore when I got the MRI on it I think I torn like 90 percent of the tendon um and so literally like literally as my ultra running career was like taking off I was really badly injured and thought it was going to like come to a halt and um and those months after that were really challenging and um ultimately what I I ended up um running a 50 mile race and the White River 50 miler in July and I won my first ultra trail race at White River and but but pretty soon after that I realized that um it was really best for me to I ended up firing my agent that I had because I just felt like he wasn't the right person to be representing me and I felt like he was um I was kind of being like emotionally broken down because I felt like I felt like I should I should have been just going with what I was good at what which was the road ultras and not having even cared about being like pushed into the trail running and it wasn't like I mean I wanted I wanted it my career to like kind of unfold more organically and you know to do trail running when I felt like I was ready to do it I didn't want it to be something I was forced to do um and so so yeah I felt like um like at that time it was a really challenging time and I mean my career my career had taken off and then it just ended up coming and ended up having a challenging year but I ended up getting um the same agent that Jim Wamsley had um he was representing Jim and then he got Hayden Hawks and me so this is like 2016 um that I ended up getting the same agent as Jim and he was the one that made the connection to Nike for me and um and Nike ended up being my first sponsor as an alternative and so yeah yeah no no no honestly I think your kind of openness and your candidness of your experience going through that as you transitioned into this into this sort of new world I think yeah um you know you talk about running the democratization of running and how it's for everybody and and it's a great community but not that you're being overly critical but candid is probably the better word and referencing your experience and just how yeah as the as the sport um professionalizes and and this is this is a decade ago right as you know there's going to be a lot of increased things that kind of come with it so I'm gonna

Jamie Roberts: I'm gonna actually jump forward to a question because I think it just fits nicely into what you were talking about yeah so with um with the increase like professionalization uh professionalization of and the business and this is something you alluded to right the business of ultra running yeah you know faster faster paces longer distances you know kind of a two-part here what's the what's the motivation of like this generation of ultra athletes and then as a larger question like where do you see the ultra running and the business of running going because again I think that last decade you've really kind of experienced it and and seen it but what is what's the motivation of of the new generation and then how has how has the business changed how where's it going

Camille Herron: oh my gosh this is such a loaded question I think we could literally do the entire podcast on this I mean I think I think what we did what we were doing what me Jim and Hayden were doing back in 2016 um because we ended up getting an agent who used to be the head of marketing for Hoka and so he was used to working on the brand side and negotiating with athletes and and then he switched roles and was um being the one going to bat for the athletes but he knew he knew how to develop the contract structure so that we had like bonuses and travel and um and then our our salary and for our contracts so what we were doing what we did back then in 2016 was we set the expectation for brands that we kind of brought what track and field athletes had the sort of contracts that they had and with the bonus the bonuses and the salary we brought that into Ultra Trail and we brought that expectation that it used to be at the beginning of my ultra career that most of the top athletes would have like a full-time job um and they would just do like the running on the side and they might have like a lot of different sponsors that were giving them you know whatever but we changed the sport and we made it so that more athletes could be full-time professional athletes and um and so at that at that point like I went from being a once I got my contract with Nike I ended up cutting back on my my full my full-time job I was working reduced hours for a couple years um and so it like it it was really nice I mean it was nice because I mean I well I mean I I actually think that I did really really well I obviously did really well when I worked full-time and I didn't have all these sponsors and I was I had a lot of success in my first year but but being able to to reduce my my hours with my day job and to be able to balance it with my um you know my my ultra running career was kind of taking off at that point um but ultimately I ended up uh quitting my day job and went full-time into running um ultra running in 2019 um and at that point I mean I had so much support that I was able to do that um and and the other thing is because I was in my mid I was in my mid-30s when I when I got into ultra running and so I figured well you know I got to make the most of my my you know this time in my life I'm just going to go all in on the ultra running um but yeah I mean this is like pre-pandemic and I mean I like I think that there were only like maybe a like really like a handful of us that were full-time athletes like fully like fully supported fully um you know being able to just be full-time athletes and so um I think like after the pandemic like things just really took off from there and I think a lot of it was things like um HOKA got into like you know joining with UTMB yeah and you started seeing like more brands getting into like event sponsorships um with like western