Julia Reid-Howell wasn’t sure what level of running she’d reach after having her daughter, Winnie.
But about six weeks postpartum, the Fredericton-based runner gradually returned to the sport. When Winnie was six months, she joined her mom for many runs in the stroller.
After a fantastic race season which saw her crowned female runner of the year by Run New Brunswick, Reid-Howell wondered if there was something else she could work toward during the remainder of her maternity leave.
“I was chatting with a group of my girlfriends that would meet up to go running with Winnie in the stroller each week and we were talking about how there’s Guinness World Records for stroller runs. And so that kind of sent me down a rabbit hole,” she said.
She discovered the fastest female one kilometre while pushing a stroller is held by a woman from France, with a time of 3:35:14.
A time Reid-Howell thought she could chase.
So, on Feb. 28, she made the attempt, with a long list of supporters cheering her on, including her family, her run team — Fredericton V-MAXXERS — Base Gagetown’s fitness facility and several independent witnesses.
Most important: Winnie was there every step of the way.
Her time: 3:17:37.
“I just felt so elated… I wasn’t even really looking ahead on the track. I could just look down and her feet were wagging and like, she was clapping her hands and smiling. I was like, this memory is going to be just in my mind forever. Because I know she was having fun too,” she said.
The person least surprised? Reid-Howell’s husband, Patrick.
“The things she can do when she sets her mind to something, it’s almost like I’ve become desensitized to it. Like, when she says she’s going to do something, I’m like, yeah, of course,” he said. “So, it wasn’t shocking to me at all that she broke the record.”
Winnie is a pro, too. The 17-month-old loves being along for the ride. When CTV Atlantic caught up with the pair at the Grant-Harvey Centre track on Thursday, it was just another stroller run for Winnie. Reid-Howell believes they’ve run about a thousand kilometres together.
Her advice: you don’t have to be an elite athlete or Olympian to chase these kinds of goals.
The family is finalizing her submission to Guinness World Records this week, and then they wait for confirmation.
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