Dec 18, 2020
Alya Alghamdi is a track and field athlete from Saudi Arabia.
Growing up in a place where girls couldn’t participate in sports,
she never imagined she would be on the way to try and represent her
country in the Olympics as a female runner.
In this episode, Alya shares about fleeing her country and going
into hiding in Europe because she didn’t want to conform to the
cultural traditions of arranged marriage. But it was during her
time abroad where she became fascinated with sports like surfing,
swimming, cycling, and running. It was through running that she
found solace because it was the one thing she could do by
herself.
Alya’s unique story is one of resilience, of persisting through
hardship even though the future doesn’t look promising. Having
faced setbacks like not being able to return to her country for
fear of her life, she dedicated herself to studying the law until
she found a gap that let her prove she could opt to not have an
arranged marriage. Or when she spent years training for the 2016
Olympics and was denied likely because she was older than the
others. but while the younger athletes stopped training after their
races, Alya kept going. She still keeps going.
Alya’s spirit is one that is determined to keep breaking barriers.
Her story isn’t over yet and she’s still training and building
herself up for the 2021 Olympics and record settings in the
60/100/200 meters. She is striving to have Saudi Arabia honor women
equally as men in sports, and her dream is to carry the Saudi flag
at the Olympic games. As a symbol that women athletes deserve it
just as much.
Lessons
-
Turn your phone off while in a workout. Aim for that feeling where
nothing else matters except what you’re immersing yourself into at
that moment.
-
Whatever you give, you get back. Whether in sport, school, or
education, whatever you sacrifice or invest in, will be returned to
you. It can be relationships, family, hobbies. But you have to give
up something in order to make room for what you
want.
-
Allow yourself to be inspired by other’s stories, but remember
everyone’s story is different and yours is unique too. So choose
things that resonate with your own goals and life.
Highlight
-
“Everyone is born with a gift. You just have to be fearless about
it.”
—Alya
Resources
Thank you to my wonderful sponsor Metpro, Generation UCAN, and
Alaffia for sponsoring this episode of the Running for Real
Podcast.
I am very pleased to have MetPro as a sponsor
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Thank you to Alya, I look forward to hearing your thoughts on
the show.