At 41 years old, Williamsburg resident and accomplished distance runner Jennifer Quarles says her days of setting personal-best times are over.
But that does not mean the local running sensation is slowing down anytime soon.
Quite the contrary.
Quarles has committed herself to running 12 half-marathons in 12 months this year. While maintaining her fitness and feeding her passion for competitive running are incentives, her main goal is to raise money for Wounded Warriors, a national organization dedicated to raising awareness for the needs of injured service members.
Quarles said she got the idea of running for a cause from a high school friend who did a similar project in Maryland. Choosing an organization to benefit from her fundraising was easy.
“I have never done a fundraising project before, and I feel pretty passionate about Wounded Warriors,” Quarles said. “My dad was a fighter pilot in the Air Force for 20 years, and I recently heard that for every solider that is killed in action, another 1.7 are injured.”
After earning a bachelor’s degree in marketing from Mary Baldwin College in 1994 and a graduate degree in early childhood education from Old Dominion University in 1996, Quarles did not discover her passion for running until 2000 when she and her husband, Dan, moved to Williamsburg.
She immediately joined local running club Colonial Road Runners, which trained across the street from her house, and quickly emerged as one of the best distance runners in the entire state.
She began competing in all varieties of races — marathons, half-marathons and even ultra-marathons — frequently. Her marathon times hovered around 3 hours, 20 minutes, which was good enough to win races such as the 2004 Grizzly Marathon in Montana (3:26) and the 2005 Moab Marathon in Utah (3:16). She also participated in the 2004 Boston Marathon and finished in 3:30.
With a hunger to bring her race times under 3 hours, she intensified her training and began running anywhere from 80 to 100 miles per week until she completed a 2005 marathon in Richmond in 2 hours, 59 minutes.
Eight years later, she is one of the most accomplished runners the Peninsula has to offer.
A seven-time champion of the Colonial Road Runners Grand Prix, Quarles also won the 2012 Achievable Dream half-marathon in 1 hour, 29 minutes. In January 2013, she was inducted into the Virginia Peninsula Road Racing Hall of Fame.
“It’s a great honor,” Quarles said of the Hall of Fame, “but running is just a great hobby.”
While half-marathons have become her forte — full marathons and ultras have taken a toll on the veteran runner’s body, although she won’t admit to never competing in one again — she has never attempted anything as challenging as 12 races in 12 months. She is confident, though, her training — running five times a week, including one day of speed work and one or two days of long runs of anywhere from 10 from 16 miles — will help her persevere.
The only difference is, for the first time, she can run freely without worrying about besting any of her previous performances.
“My days of PRs are long gone, so I need something else to work towards,” Quarles said. “And I can’t think of anything better than for a good cause.”
Quarles says her goal is to raise $10,000 by December, and she is off to a solid start. Having not even ran in her first race, which is coming up this Saturday in South Carolina when she competes in the Charleston half-marathon, she has already received more than $1,400 in donations. To help the cause, she donates her entry fees when race directors agree to waive the cost for participating.
The support from the community has been overwhelming, Quarles says. When she went to pick up her Wounded Warriors singlet – or running top – it was too small. So she took it Saigon Tailors in Williamsburg for alterations, but was not charged because the tailor said she appreciated Quarles’ efforts.
“It’s been amazing,” Quarles said. “I’m doing this strictly for Wounded Warriors, but the generosity I’ve already received from so many people is just awesome.”
Visit Quarles’ fundraising page and help her reach her goal by clicking here. Click here to read more about the Wounded Warriors Project.
