{"id":65822,"date":"2019-07-01T12:32:01","date_gmt":"2019-07-01T19:32:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/?p=65822"},"modified":"2021-06-03T14:50:48","modified_gmt":"2021-06-03T21:50:48","slug":"her-name-is-grace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/run\/her-name-is-grace","title":{"rendered":"Her Name is Grace"},"content":{"rendered":"

Standing at the starting line of the <\/span>Western States Endurance Run<\/span><\/a>, a 100-mile trail-running race that takes place in late June in the high peaks of California\u2019s Sierra Nevada, Grace Fisher has a mantra: Smile every mile. It\u2019s something her coach taught her, but it also embodies the effect running long distances has on her days. Running makes her happy.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m more at peace now than I\u2019ve ever been. I\u2019m more content with life,\u201d Fisher said from her home outside Washington, D.C., a few weeks before this past weekend\u2019s Western States race. \u201cRunning saved my life in many ways.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

It took six years of unsuccessful lottery results for Fisher to finally earn a coveted spot at Western States, a pinnacle event in the ultrarunning community that always has a lengthy wait-list and thousands of runners who don\u2019t make the cut. This year, 5,862 people applied for 369 spots.<\/span><\/p>\n

Fisher has had strong results at other ultramarathons: She\u2019s earned multiple top-10 finishes at the Vermont 100<\/a>\u00a0and last September, she placed fifth overall and first in the women\u2019s field in the <\/span>Yeti 100-Mile Endurance Run<\/span><\/a> in Virginia.\u00a0<\/span>But Western States was a life goal of hers. It wasn\u2019t an easy path to the starting line.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Grace

Grace Fisher ran the 100-mile Western States Endurance Run this past weekend. (Credit: Andrew Mangum)<\/p><\/div>\n

To understand this fully, you have to go back in time to when Grace wasn\u2019t yet Grace. Born to a Mormon family an hour north of Salt Lake City and assigned male at birth, Fisher started running in high school, in a summer track club. After graduating, she served for two years on a Mormon mission in Hungary and running didn\u2019t fit into her lifestyle there, so she put it on hold.<\/span><\/p>\n

After college at Utah State University, she got a job working for the U.S. Army at a military proving ground for new weapon testing\u00a0in Yuma, Arizona. She married her first wife, and they had two children. At first,\u00a0she didn\u2019t have the time or desire to run. \u201cWorking 60-hour weeks or more and with the stresses of life, I needed some kind of release,\u201d she said. So, she started running again on\u00a0a flat, two-mile loop near her house.<\/span><\/p>\n

It helped, but it didn\u2019t fix the bigger issues she was dealing with. She was depressed and struggling in her marriage. Still living as a man, she found herself dressing in women\u2019s clothes in secret. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI felt alone,\u201d she said. \u201cI didn\u2019t know what it was exactly, but my outlook on life was, I\u2019d say, stormy.\u201d Eventually, Fisher went to a therapist, who helped her process her feelings. She and her wife divorced in 2012.<\/span><\/p>\n

She never planned on transitioning, but she met a new partner and the woman who became her second wife encouraged her to explore her options. Fisher joined a support group for people who are transgender.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHaving that safe space really helped me to decide to transition,\u201d she said. \u201cRealizing that there were other people out there like me, I no longer felt alone.\u201d In late 2013, she began taking the first steps toward coming out as a woman.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

When she started transitioning, <\/span>which for Grace included hormone treatment, <\/span>her second-oldest son, who was four years old at the time, would tell\u00a0others, \u201cDaddy feels like a girl on the inside.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThat was a bit awkward, but kids are so accepting of things adults can\u2019t always wrap their heads around,\u201d Fisher said.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Grace

Fisher says that running is where she feels most like herself. (Photo Credit: Andrew Mangum)<\/p><\/div>\n

Now 38, Fisher works as an analyst for the federal government <\/span>in Washington, D.C. She and her wife have two children of their own, the youngest born just this year, and they\u2019re also raising the two boys from Fisher\u2019s previous marriage. She makes running\u00a0a regular part of her busy life.<\/span><\/p>\n

After returning to the sport while living in Arizona, she started logging about 40 miles per week and would sign up for the occasional 10K race.\u00a0When one of her friends was training for a marathon, she ran 16 miles on a training run, the farthest she\u2019d ever <\/span>gone.\u00a0Once, while on a trip to Monterey, California, she went for a jog on the beach and ended up covering 14 miles on a whim. \u201cI loved it,\u201d she said. \u201cRunning is where I felt like myself.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

She read the popular book <\/span>Born to Run<\/span><\/i>, but remembers thinking, \u201cRunning 100 miles? That\u2019s crazy.\u201d She signed up for her first marathon, then a friend encouraged her to try a 50K. For many years, she entered races as male. But starting in 2014, she began entering races consistently as female. Nobody seemed to notice.<\/span><\/p>\n

Fisher is hardly the first ultrarunner who is transgender. Ultrarunner Amelia Gapin<\/a>, who is transgender, appeared on the cover of Women\u2019s Running<\/i> in 2016 and started a Facebook group for runners who are transgender. Bo Aucoin<\/a>, an ultrarunner and triathlete, was assigned female at birth and has come out as male. There are certainly others, including those who may be transgender but don\u2019t feel safe enough to come out. Fisher said the ultrarunning community in general has been incredibly welcoming to her and others.<\/span><\/p>\n

By 2016, she still hadn\u2019t changed her name legally, but when she signed up for the Boston Marathon as female, she asked the race organizers if she could run under her new name, Grace Fisher. But the night before the race, without her knowing it, her gender in the entry data was changed to male. She\u2019s not sure how<\/span>\u00a0that happened, but after the race, Fisher worked with the organizers to change it back to female. In 2018, in response to Fisher and several other runners who are transgender\u00a0participating in the Boston Marathon, race officials issued a <\/span>statement<\/span><\/a>, saying that athletes can enter the race in the category that aligns with their gender identity.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

It was a big step for the running world. Other races are starting to follow suit, and in February of this year, Western States created an official <\/span>policy<\/span><\/a> on entrants who are transgender, making it one of the first ultramarathons to address the issue head on.\u00a0<\/span>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe were notified that Grace was selected in the lottery,\u201d said Diana Fitzpatrick, a board member of the Western States Endurance Run. \u201cWe felt it was better for us as a race organization to put together a policy so we weren\u2019t caught off guard and scrambling to put together rules. We wanted the language to be as inclusive and welcoming as possible to transgender runners, but we also wanted to make it clear that we took into account fairness issues for all competitors.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The committee spent months examining existing policies, including those of USA Track & Field, the National Collegiate Athletic Association and others, before drafting their own version, which states that a runner\u2019s self-declared gender at registration will be taken at face value and there will be no tolerance of a challenge to a runner\u2019s self-declared gender unless a top-10 finish or age group award is at stake. If a runner\u2019s top-10 results are challenged, they may be asked for documentation from a doctor or other certified professional showing that they have undergone medically supervised hormone treatment for gender transition for at least a year prior to the race.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Grace

It took six years of applying for the lottery for Grace Fisher to earn a spot in the Western States Endurance Run. (Photo Credit: Andrew Mangum)<\/p><\/div>\n

At Western States, the smile every mile ethos worked for Fisher. She placed 20th amongst females, finishing the race in 22 hours, 59 minutes, well under her goal of 24 hours.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

When asked what she would say to someone in her position 10 years ago\u2014someone struggling with who they are and their place in the world\u2014Fisher paused, then stumbled over an answer.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d say, \u2018Follow your heart,\u2019\u201d she said.<\/span>\u00a0\u201cI\u2019ve learned that self-care is important. Be honest and open with yourself and others.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Later, Fisher would go for a long run and ponder this question. How could she help others who feel alone or haven\u2019t revealed who they really are? Transgender or not, finding one\u2019s identity is perhaps life\u2019s greatest challenge. Running can help answer those big questions. She returned home from her run, then jotted down a more thorough response.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI would tell them to go for it, try it out. Do anything but keep silent,\u201d she wrote. \u201cTell someone what you\u2019re feeling, whether it\u2019s a therapist, a significant other or a stranger on the bus. There is so much healing power in telling someone. In coming out.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Standing at the starting line of the Western States Endurance Run, a 100-mile trail-running race that takes place in late June in the high peaks of California\u2019s Sierra Nevada, Grace Fisher has a mantra: Smile every mile. It\u2019s something her coach taught her, but it also embodies the effect running long distances has on her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":65825,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[1866,727,1376,927],"internal-tag":[],"class_list":["post-65822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-run","tag-inclusion","tag-latest-posts","tag-running","tag-western-states"],"parsely":{"version":"1.1.0","canonical_url":"https:\/\/rei.com\/blog\/run\/her-name-is-grace","smart_links":{"inbound":0,"outbound":0},"traffic_boost_suggestions_count":0,"meta":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","headline":"Her Name is Grace","url":"http:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/run\/her-name-is-grace","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"http:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/run\/her-name-is-grace"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2019\/06\/DSC_2714.jpg?resize=150%2C150","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2019\/06\/DSC_2714.jpg?fit=2500%2C1668"},"articleSection":"Run","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Michelle Flandreau"}],"creator":["Michelle Flandreau"],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Uncommon Path \u2013 An REI Co-op Publication","logo":""},"keywords":["inclusion","latest posts","running","western states"],"dateCreated":"2019-07-01T19:32:01Z","datePublished":"2019-07-01T19:32:01Z","dateModified":"2021-06-03T21:50:48Z"},"rendered":"