Dare Dares to Dream
By Josh Talevski
As Taylor Dare prepared for the 2019 Grandma’s Marathon, she wasn’t sure if she would even finish the race.
Stomach issues plagued Dare’s training, forcing her to stop every eight miles for a bathroom break. While Dare was focused on running a healthy race, she was determined to meet the qualifying time or set a record for the number of portable toilet stops.
On June 22, Dare never even glanced at a bathroom as she finished Grandma’s with a time of 2:42:21, which qualified her for the 2020 U.S. Olympic Team Trials - Marathon in Atlanta. For Dare, Grandma’s taught her to let go of her anxieties and simply enjoy the race.
“I was defining my performance by that time on the clock and had to learn a lot through that and realize that, no, you know what, it’s a blessing to get to be here,” Dare said.
For Dare, 27, of Fort Worth, Texas, to race in the Trials is truly the culmination of years of doubt, setbacks, and injuries that she has overcome.
Some of those, like a torn hamstring in 2018, are standard fare for runners. But aside from injuries, Dare also had to confront the eating disorder that nearly took her life. Dare, then a high school cross country runner at Loyola College Prep in Shreveport, Louisiana, required inpatient treatment for the disorder.
“If I wouldn’t have gone there, I physically wouldn’t have lived,” said Dare.
While Dare successfully overcame her eating disorder and ran her senior year, she chose not to run competitively at TCU. However, she continued to run for enjoyment, rediscovered her love for distance running and slowly began to focus on running long-distance events.
After finishing third in women’s overall at the Cowtown Marathon in 2016, running in the 2017 Boston Marathon and then missing the Trials qualifying time at the 2018 Houston Marathon, Dare decided to hire a coach.
Dare's teammate in her local running club, Liz Northern, introduced her to Gary Brimmer. Brimmer became instrumental in helping Dare manage the mental aspect of competitive running. He provided workouts, helped control her training and made sure Dare didn’t misuse running as she did with her eating disorder.
Along with Brimmer, Dare credits her husband, Cayden, her teammates and her relationship with Christ as key influences who sustain her running career.
“I haven’t gotten here on my own,” said Dare, “I just wouldn’t be where I am without all those people that have invested all their time and care into me.”
Now, Dare is hoping to use the lessons learned from her setbacks. As a current physical therapy student at UNT Health Science Center, Dare is pursuing her dream with hopes of inspiring others, just as her influences encouraged her.
“Her life is found in how she loves and serves people and how she can use physical therapy to improve others’ lives,” said husband Cayden Dare.
Additionally, Taylor Dare is taking advantage of her physical therapy knowledge as she is currently battling bursitis in her heel that impeded her training for six weeks. Dare has finally returned to running every day but is focused on assessing how her foot feels and running healthy come Feb. 29.
Dare will not let her time define her. As she heads into the Olympic Trials, her mindset is set solely on one thing: “It really is a gift.”
Leading up to the 2020 U.S. Olympic Team Trials – Marathon, Atlanta Track Club partnered with the Grady Sports Media program at the University of Georgia to profile some of the competitors in the 2020 Olympic Marathon Trials. The authors of these stories are undergraduate students enrolled in the program and have been lightly edited by the Club. See all of the stories at https://www.atlanta2020trials.com/news/uga-trials-project.