Hannah Clark: So, I’m going to kick it off. This is an oral history interview for the South Carolina Honors College thesis project, More than the Mileage: Finding Community and a Sense of Place through Recreational Distance Running, documenting the perspectives and experiences of recreational distance runners. This is Hannah Clark, the date is March 11th, 2024, and today I’m interviewing Caroline Yell virtually via Zoom. I am in Columbia, South Carolina, and Caroline is in Clemson, South Carolina. Would you start by giving me your full name and spelling it for me?

CY: Okay. My name is Caroline, C-A-R-O-L-I-N-E, Staffen, S-T-A-F-F-E-N, Yell, YELL.

HC: Perfect. We’re going to start with a little background. First, how old are you?

CY: I’m 20.

HC: Okay, perfect. Where were you born, and if different, where do you currently reside?

CY: I was born in Pittsboro, or actually I was born in Chapel Hill, North Carolina at UNC, and what was the other question?

HC: Where do you currently reside?

CY: I currently live in Pittsboro, but I go to college in Clemson, so I guess I’m in Clemson.

HC: Perfect. If you don’t mind, tell me a little bit about your family.

CY: I have a sister, she’s 17 months older. She’s studying abroad right now. And then I have a brother, he’s in seventh grade, he’s 13. And then I have two parents, a little dog. A classic, classic family.

HC: Perfect. What is your current role or occupation?

CY: I’m a student. I’m in my second year at Clemson, but I’m also in the South Carolina National Guard. So that’s a part-time job.

HC: Yeah, definitely. Okay, so now into the running. How long have you been a runner?

CY: I’ve been running since fifth grade, so, eight years, I think.

HC: Okay, nice. What or who inspired or spurred your start into running?

CY: I guess my sister, she started running in middle school when she was in sixth grade, I think. And seeing her do well with cross country kind of inspired me to do it too.

HC: Cool. Can you describe to me a particular memory from your early experiences with running?

CY: My middle school didn’t have a cross country team, so we would do club cross country, and it would be like an hour drive three days a week, and we hated the drive there ’cause we were always so nervous for our workouts. But then the drive back, it was like a group of girls, we would carpool together, but on the drive back we would always have our protein chocolate milks, and it was so much fun. And we did that club routine for three or four years and then we finally got to do high school cross country and track. But yeah, that was fun. The drives.

HC: Nice. If you have one, can you tell me about the group that you currently run with or a group that you ran with in the past?

CY: So I’ve done the club, cross country and track throughout middle school, and then I did high school, just my high school team. And now at Clemson, I’m in ROTC, Army ROTC, so I run with a group of girls from that, and then sometimes I run with the Clemson Experimental Forest trail running team, so they meet on Tuesdays and Friday afternoons to run, so I run with that group, and that’s about it.

HC: Nice. Can you tell me a little more about that trail running group? That sounds cool.

CY: Yeah, so Clemson has- I don’t know the exact number, but all around Clemson we have the Experimental Forest, which is owned by the university, so it’s just a bunch of land, and there’s a great trail system out there. So the trail club just meets twice a week, and runs on the trails, and they usually do about three to six miles. But it’s fun if you like trail running.

HC: Right. Can you describe to me how you feel when you run?

CY: I love it. Well, I either love it or I hate it, but most of the time I love it. It’s nice not having to race track meets and cross country meets because it takes away the pressure. I like doing it on my own time, just going out there and running. But it makes me less stressed, more happy. Runner’s high is nice, obviously, but I enjoy it. It’s a great way to see new things too. Whenever I travel, I like to run, see new things.

HC: Yeah, definitely. And going off of that last point, how do you feel connected to your surroundings when you run?

CY: (Pauses at 5:20). I’m not sure. I guess I feel more grounded, because I’m like- I can feel my feet hitting the pavement or whatever surface I’m on. I can feel the air moving my hair, I can smell the fresh air, so I feel more grounded, I guess, if that makes sense.

HC: Yeah, totally. Does this emotion, or just how you feel when you’re running in general, change when you run in a different place?

CY: Definitely. So when I run in the same place around campus, or around my apartment complex, it gets boring, just ’cause I’m so used to it. But running in a new place is exciting ’cause everything’s new, everything’s different, and you get to see new things, smell new things, hear new sounds. So it’s definitely exciting running in new places.

HC: Can you- oh, wait one second. Oh. Walk me through your feelings when you run alone compared to running in a group.

CY: When I run alone, sometimes I enjoy it. Well, actually I enjoy it a lot, just because I don’t have to talk to people, and I can just think and go through my day. But sometimes, the Hannah, I mean, not the Hannah- the Laken Riley thing in Georgia [the student who got murdered while running on the University of Georgia campus during February of 2024], I don’t know if you heard about that, I haven’t run by myself since then just because I’ve been scared.

HC: Right.

CY: But, I do enjoy running by myself. It’s a nice break, but I like running with people too, especially if it’s a long run, you know, it helps the miles go by quicker.

HC: For sure. And you’ve talked a little bit about the trail running, but can you talk to me about some of the routes that you run, whether it’s in a group or alone, or at home, whatever it might be.

CY: Could you repeat that?

HC: Oh yeah. I know you touched on it with the trail running group a little bit, but can you tell me about the routes that you run, whether it’s alone or with a group?

CY: Yeah. So usually I do a lot of, when I’m at school, I run around campus. There’s a road that goes around Clemson, it’s like four and a half miles around the entire university. It’s called Perimeter Road, so sometimes I’ll do that. And then also, I like to go- my apartment is exactly three and a half miles to this architecture studio, which is where most of my classes are, so sometimes I’ll run the three and a half miles here, and run back just on the sidewalks, and then I go out on the trails, in the Experimental Forest. Back home, I usually just go to my neighborhood. It’s pretty hilly, but there’s 20 miles of road, so it’s a good place to run. And there’s a golf course, I like to run on the golf course sidewalks, so yeah.

HC: Yeah. Perfect. Thanks for that. How has your relationship with running, or distance running, changed throughout your time participating?

CY: I’ve definitely- regarding distance running, I used to be a shorter-distance girl, like with track I would do the 800 or the 400, but now I’ve fallen in love with the longer distance stuff, so I’m actually doing my first marathon this Saturday.

HC: Okay, cool.

CY: Yeah, but I don’t know, I just feel like I am stronger the longer I go, which is something I used to not think, I used to just be like, ‘I’m going to do my half mile, or my 800, and be finished.’ But now I enjoy working up to it, I feel better at mile five than I do at mile one, which is really cool. But, I don’t know.

HC: No, that makes sense. What marathon are you running this weekend?

CY: It’s called the Bataan Memorial Death March. It’s in White Sands National Park, and most people- it’s like a ruck, which it’s where you carry a big weighted backpack, and you run/walk, but my team is just doing the running marathon, so no weight.

HC: Okay, cool.

CY: Yeah.

HC: And then again, going off of that, can you walk me through the experience of training for an event? So in your case, either this marathon, or something else that you’ve trained for.

CY: Yeah, so it’s really hard to train for something long distance when you’re in college. I didn’t realize, my sister warned me, ’cause she’s done three marathons now. She warned me, she was like, ‘you might not want to start training, you might want to wait until the summer to do-‘ ’cause It’s just so hard to get your long runs in, with school, and life, and everything. But having a group of girls with ROTC, and then the trail running club, to support me and motivate me to get those long runs in, it really helps a lot. And then, I don’t know. For me, the easy runs are not hard to get in, just ’cause I like- a 30 minute run is not hard for me to just go out there and do, like I can always find time for that. So, it’s really the long runs, but like I said, having that group to support and get out there and do the long runs helps a lot. Yeah.

HC: Yeah, for sure. How did the pandemic affect your running journey?

CY: I don’t really know, it didn’t really change it to be honest. I mean, we weren’t racing with high school, but that didn’t really bother me ’cause I’ve never been a huge fan of track meets and stuff, but I still ran by myself, I was able to do that. I didn’t really do any structured races, I just would run. So it didn’t affect my running, it just affected high school racing, but that’s fine.

HC: Yeah. If you have one, and if you feel comfortable talking about it, is there a time where you didn’t feel any purpose or benefit from running throughout your time within the sport?

CY: Yeah. In my junior year of high school, my coach and I, my cross country coach and I, would like, have a bunch of disagreements, so I actually took a season off and just ran by myself. But I kind of hated running then, and so I wasn’t running as much, and I guess that was just my time away from the sport. But then when I got out of high school, I was fine. Yeah, I don’t know.

HC: Did you have any main takeaways from that time that you spent away from the sport? Or was it more just something that had happened and had to happen?

CY: Well, not running- during that time I wasn’t running as much, I was kind of just, not running, but I missed it. When I came back, I realized how much I missed it. And also, I’ve been injured a couple times and whenever you’re injured you realize how much you miss it. But takeaways, besides realizing how impactful running is to your life, I feel like there’s no other big takeaways. So, yeah.

HC: How has running, or distance running in particular, impacted your mental health, if at all?

CY: Definitely improved it. You feel better about yourself, feel more accomplished. It gives you a way to socialize, especially if you have a group of people. So it improves mental health, definitely.

HC: Can you tell me about a time that you felt proud to participate in a running group or organization?

CY: I guess right now with this Bataan race, the marathon that I’m doing on Saturday, the group of girls I’m doing it with, we’re all in Army ROTC here at Clemson. And Clemson always sends a group of guys to do it, but this is the first time that we’re sending an all-female team out to New Mexico to do it, so I guess this is a time that I’m proud to be a runner.

HC: Yeah, that’s really cool.

CY: Yeah.

HC: What advice would you give to a runner just starting out?

CY: Don’t put pressure on yourself, because I realized whenever I give myself standards, I perform worse, and whenever I just go out there and run, I always do better. So don’t put pressure on yourself, just have fun. Just take it day by day and just get out the door.

HC: And then moving on to my last couple of questions.

CY: Yeah.

HC: How do you foresee your running journey progressing as you move into the future?

CY: I definitely want to do more longer-distance stuff. So I’ve done a couple ultramarathons, I did a Ragnar [a trail running relay race] two years ago, if you know what that is, but I want to do more longer stuff. So after the marathon, maybe I’m going to take a couple-month break and then train for maybe a 30-mile, or something more than that. So, [I] definitely want to keep it up and do more ultramarathons.

HC: Well, good for you. And then overall, how has running impacted your life?

CY: It has impacted it greatly, like I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t a runner, and it’s also like, people know me for running, which is kind of good and bad, but it’s been part of my life for so long. And even before I started racing in fifth grade, I remember in third grade I ran the Monster Dash in my elementary school, and I had never run before that- my mom signed me up for the Monster Dash, ’cause that’s what you do. But I placed, and then the newspaper interviewed me and I was like, ‘oh my gosh, this is actually something I could be good at.’ And I’m not fast anymore, but I still enjoy it and I still- I like to do it. So yeah, it’s been a big part of my life, for so many years, and I can’t imagine not doing it. So, yeah.

HC: Yeah. I love it. Well, I guess that’s all I have for you, thank you for your time and answering these questions for me. I really appreciate it.

CY: Uh-huh.

HC: And good luck with your marathon on…

CY: Thank you!

HC: …this weekend. That’s so exciting.

CY: Yes, I’m excited. Thank you.