Grace Harrison is Senior Runner of the Year.
While she's not Athena or Aphrodite, Grace Harrison credits her running success to being a Goddess. The 59-year-old does weekly speed work sessions with a group of women who call themselves The Goddesses. It's this track work that has led the lifelong athlete to running PRs in her 50s, and the title of 2005 Michigan Runner Senior Women's Runner of the Year. Harrison, of Ann Arbor, didn't set out to win anything when she encouraged some of the Goddesses to run the 2005 Michigan Runner Race Series. She simply wanted to try new events and run summer races. In years past, over the summer she's favored her golf game over running. The retired nurse ran nine of the 10 series races, racking up a winning 44 points in the age-graded Senior Division (runners 50 and over). "I knew that they were keeping points, but didn't really pay attention," Harrison said. "I enjoyed it, but I'd much rather golf in the summer, and I don't know if I'll do it (the series) again." While she describes herself as "very competitive," Harrison has always sought balance in her life. She was a multi-sport athlete at Linden High School from 1960-64, where for all four years she lettered in the four sports that were offered girls (speed ball, basketball, softball and track). "I was a jock girl before it was cool to be a jock girl," she said. In her 20s, Harrison continued to be a jock girl, and scheduled competitive softball around her nursing profession and raising two children. Harrison has never been a record keeper, and can't say exactly when she began running, but it was somewhere around age 30. "I muddled along for a number of years without much of a training plan," she said. "I'd run most races at about an 8:30 pace, and never thought about going much faster." When she was about 50, she began training with the Goddesses, coached by Lew Kidder. That's when she began to see big improvement in her race times. "Grace has an incredibly good attitude, and is a hard worker," Kidder said. "We affectionately call her the 'Little Engine That Could.'" With consistent, year-round speed work, Harrison has run all her PRs in her 50s. She ran her marathon best (3:38, Blue Angel Marathon in Pensacola, Fla.) at age 52. In 2003, at age 57, she ran PRs for the 5K (20:59, For Women Only, in Ann Arbor), and the half marathon (1:37:44, an age-graded 1:20:54 for first overall at the More Two-Person, in New York City). While Harrison has had a successful past year of racing, she's looking ahead to next year and going back to balance. She'll run some races, but her most-important goals don't center around winning. "My number-one goal is to stay uninjured," she said, "I want to continue to do a 10-15 mile run once a week, a weekly speed workout, spin once a week, and of course, I want to run with the Goddesses." MR

Learn more about Grace Harrison