Hi, Rebels! I’m Jill Angie, the founder and Head Rebel of Not Your Average Runner. When I first started running over 20 years ago, all I wanted to do was burn calories and lose weight. And I hated every minute of it. It felt like punishment and I was always frustrated and disappointed.
In 2009 I decided to stop thinking about running as a means to an end and started using it as a tool to build up my strength and confidence. That mental shift got me through all the times when running wasn’t easy (and there were a lot of those times)!
I became a triathlete. I ran half marathons. I became a personal trainer with my own studio. And I noticed that as vast as the running community was, there weren’t a lot of people out there who looked like me.
I knew how awesome running made me feel, and I wanted to help other women like me get the same benefit – not just improved fitness, but increased self-confidence and self-love.
So I wrote a book and became a running and life coach!
I love coaching and I love seeing so many women join our #NotYourAverageRunner movement, and I’m incredibly honored to support women like you who want to change their lives through running.
Hi I’m Jen! Some people call me Chef Jen (mostly former students of mine) and some people call me Coach. I am a runner, chef, author, educator, wife to Mike and mom to Ike (yep, they’re Mike & Ike) and I help Jill coach our Run Your Best Life Rebels and love every minute of it. I am also a cookbook author for the American Diabetes Association and Director of Programs for one of the largest Food Banks in the country.
I have a BA in Journalism from Indiana University in Bloomington, IN; a Certificate of Professional Cooking from the Cooking and Hospitality Institute of Chicago and an MBA in Leadership from the Morris Graduate School of Management in Chicago. I have been a working professional in communications, management, education, culinary arts and coaching for the last 22 years and live in the suburbs of Chicago.
I started out as Jill’s client, finding my way back to running and mental health in the summer of 2016 and transformed my life through her proven model of running and life coaching. I started working for Not Your Average Runner in the Fall of 2018 and I feel like I’ve been training for this my whole life! I am a die-hard Rebel Runner and my style of tough but tender coaching (and warped sense of humor) serves me well in helping our Rebels not only train to be successful runners, but also how to be successful at life. I am so honored to be on this team and to be part of this community of badass Rebel Runners!
I’m Elle Dee, and I started running in my late forties. I am the prototypical Not Your Average Runner—I was never athletic in school and always picked last for PE teams. I’d always admired runners and loved the idea of my body moving in that way, but I never thought that I’d be able to do it.
When I started, I had no idea what I was doing. I walked my first half in a 3/4-length puffy coat which I quickly discovered was a mistake. I tried several 5K running programs while trying to learn to run, but I’d get injured and quit. I don’t know why I kept trying, but I did.
In 2013, I tried WalkB4URun, a program sponsored by Black Girls Run. I kept running after that and eventually became an ambassador of the local chapter and the run coordinator of WalkB4URun. I loved working with new runners because I could relate to what they were experiencing and was excited to celebrate their progress.
During a break to rehab from ankle surgery, I decided to learn more about running to coach myself and have a foundation when I met new runners. I passed the Road Runners of America coach certification test and became an RRCA certified coach in 2016 to have a foundation to work with new runners. Since then, I’ve been running and looking for new adventures.
