The Running Streak

History 

Taylor Jacob Pate was born on September 11th, 1983 in a small town in Louisiana. He got his bachelors in English at Louisiana State University or better known as LSU, from there he got his masters at The university of Texas at Austin where he studied English in Fine arts, not only being a student but also a professor for three semesters. During this time he stopped smoking cigarette's and picked up running, since then he hasn't stopped as he has ran every single day for the past 7 years.  

The Beginning

Taylor started running during grad school which was around 2012. " I didn't have responsibilities except teaching people so I started drinking heavily and I gained a bunch of weight so I started running to lose all that, get healthy and to clean out" Taylor says in our interview. For the first three months Taylor hated running but one day everything clicked and that was when trail running came into the picture. 

Specialization 

At first trail running was his favorite, being one with nature and enjoying the trails but trail running is very demanding and did cause many injuries for Taylor. Two years into running Taylor started running on a track, where he decided to jump into tempo runs and really enjoyed the feeling of being fast. "1500 meters to 5K runs" is Taylors specialty he says. "My goal was to break a 5 minute mile" Taylor says in our interview, which he did clocking a personal best 4 minutes and 51 seconds.

The Gear

Taylor has used hundreds of running shoes during his running career but three stand out the most. The Hoka Clifton 3 was one of those shoes as it was a light, soft, everyday trainer of a shoe, " I had over 20 pairs" Taylor says talking about the Hoka Clifton 3's. Boston Boost 7 was another as it was a nice daily trainer and good for speed. Lastly was the the Nike Vaporfly next percent as it was "Just F*****g Fast" in Taylor words. 

Training

Monday through Friday Taylor runs about 60-70 minutes a day which is around 7-10 miles, than from there he goes to the gym for about an hour to an hour and a half. The weekends are different as Saturdays are recovery days, running around 30-35 minutes and Sundays are long run days which he runs around 10-13 miles.

Recovery 

During the beginning of Taylor's running journey recovery was crucial as muscles tend to be sore and tight. Hot baths and yoga sessions were some ways Taylor would incorporate different types of recovery, as well as stretching 3-5 minutes before and after a run.

Weight Training

Preventing major injuries is the main focus with weight training. "As soon as I started working out in the gym recovery came easier" Taylor says in our interview. Taylor doesn't lift a lot of weight during these sessions but just enough where he's not sore and building muscle. Building muscle helps strengthen joints and bone density which is crucial for runners. 

Thoughts

Running with friends and with music usually keeps his mind occupied so he doesn't have time to think and when he's running on a treadmill Taylor watches movies. On those days where he has no phone, no one to run with or no movies Taylor uses running as time for meditation to clear his mind. 

Enjoyment

"I have ran over 20,000 miles over the past 7 years so the novelty of it is not the same" says Taylor in his interview. Being in a good head space or having good weather is when enjoyment flutters back again. In our interview Taylor says "I would feel weird not running" as it has become a routine for him.

Accomplishment

"To this point the fact that I am still running every single day, and also breaking a 5 minute mile has been my biggest accomplishments so far" he says in our interview. When running for years on end your body goes through an extreme amount of fatigue, so running every day for 7 years is immensely difficult and impressive and because of that I applaud Taylor. 

What Now?

Taylor says he's currently on "Maintenance mode", not training for anything but training just enough where he does not regress. Recently he just got certified as a personal trainer so that is in the works as well. A dream for Taylor is to Run the Rim2Rim Run at the Grand Canyon (photo above text) and I totally believe he can and will do it.