Dad on the Run: Raziq Rauf on "This Is Running
Plus a few thoughts on the Emma Bates sponsorship fallout, some trail running good news & a "mom review on the run!"
Welcome to New Mom Run Club! If you missed last week’s edition, where I questioned how long one can be called a “new mom,” you can catch up here.
New Mom Run Club also meets for monthly IRL runs in Brooklyn, NY, every second Saturday. The next one is April 11, so if you’re keen, we’d love to have you join us. RSVP here!
Before we jump into this week’s interview with Raz, I just wanted to add my two cents on the big pregnancy and brand sponsorship story from this week.
On Tuesday, the running world erupted in full support of pro-runner Emma Bates, who recently announced she was pregnant. Emma made a video sharing a batch of new gels she’d paid good money to try in the hopes that something more could come of it. What “more” came of it was a massive outpouring of support, because, in the intro to the video, she said she’d been dropped by her sponsor (UCAN) when she told them she was pregnant.
There were more videos, made in response – some of them here and here, and of course Laura Green, who nailed it with her comedic genius. Much has been said about the decision, which UCAN has stated was made before they knew about Emma’s pregnancy. They repeated the same thing to me, when I requested an official comment. But perception is everything, and right now, it looks like UCAN doesn’t care about mother-runners-to-be. And that has, understandably, struck a nerve.
The details of the partnership remain somewhat unclear publicly, and like many athlete-brand relationships, there are NDAs and private negotiations that make it difficult to know the full picture. But what is clear is how it has been received. For many moms in running, the perception that an athlete could lose sponsorship after announcing a pregnancy was enough to spark a visceral reaction.
The journalist in me is naturally interested in the structure behind situations like this: how athlete contracts are written, what protections exist (or don’t), and how pregnancy is handled within professional sports partnerships. Women’s sports, in general, has made huge strides. We have growing audiences, stellar performances, and cool merch but contract structures still lag behind. Especially when it comes to pregnancy and motherhood.
Just last week, I was writing here about how great it was to see Salomon actively sign Grayson Murphy during the middle of her pregnancy, and not afterwards — something that likely would not have been the case in the past. But even Grayson herself notes, in response to a Long Run Labs take on the situation, that while things can work out, they don’t always, and there is still a lot of work to be done.
So what does this mean for new moms running?
It means we’re very vocal about the brands we love and adore, but even more so about the women we love and adore. The comments have been fierce, and I’ve noticed that the reaction hasn’t required people to fully understand the contractual details. For many, the visible outcome is enough to shape how they feel about a brand. If an athlete appears to be distanced from a sponsor at a moment like this, that perception alone can carry weight.
Nike has also been brought into the conversation, given its history with athletes like Allyson Felix, Alysia Montaño and Kara Goucher. Over time, they have made changes to their maternity policies and public positioning. Initiatives like the maternity ward they’re building with Faith Kipyegon suggest an attempt, at least in part, to engage more meaningfully with women athletes.
As someone who has had a complicated relationship with the brand myself, I find this interesting. I don’t think the expectation is perfection. But I do think there is room for an ongoing process of brands being evaluated over time, and being given the opportunity to show they’ve heard the criticism and they can change. As a mom, I pay attention to that. It raises a broader question, of whether brands are redeemable, and how do we decide when they are? It’s worth noting that Kara said on Instagram she’s never been apologized to for the way she was treated. But all of that is for another time (we have Raz to get to!).
One thing’s for sure: we need more women agents to help broker these contracts, better guidance from governing bodies, and stronger infrastructure and protection for women athletes across all stages of life. Now, more than ever.
Now, onto Raz!
In Conversation: Raziq Rauf
New Mom Run Club is all about cheering on moms on their path to running, whether that’s finding a way back in or starting up a new practice. But we care about dads, too! And this dad in particular has been a staunch advocate for the power of running beyond just miles and movement itself.
Raziq Rauf, who has two children, has been writing the Running Sucks newsletter for three years, and out of it comes his book, This Is Running, which releases next week.
The book covers so many branches of running life, from its past to its present and future. And bonus — the opening photo in the book features NMRC friend, Swathi Ghanta! I thought I’d chat to Raz about how his life as a runner intersects with his life as a dad.
Portions of our chat follow, in edited excerpts, below.
Can you take me back to when you first started running? You’ve been running for many years. When you had your kids, what was it like balancing running and caregiving?
Yeah, when you think about it as a self care, running is something that became really important, especially in those very early moments — the first three months to a year, let’s say. I found it to be a form of practicing self care so that you are actually in a good state to look after your kids and your spouse. It's a really important thing to do for yourself and for your family.
Is your partner a runner as well? How did she feel about your running?
She encouraged it. Because — and this is true for so many runners — we’re better people after a run, right? And she understands that. So she encouraged it from the start. It was never a point of contention or anything like that. I know it can be. I’ve heard that from some of my friends, where there is kind of jealousy between partners, that the other one is doing something for themselves, but we don’t have that issue.
Are you more of a morning runner or an evening one?
Before kids, I was a whenever-I-had-time runner, and much more of an evening runner. A lot of the run clubs that I used to run with were evening run crews. But then with kids, I became more of a morning runner. With the kids being awake in the morning anyway, I naturally started being awake in the morning all the time, and so I became a quote, unquote, morning person. My hours shifted earlier.
I also don’t want to go for a run in the middle of the day and leave my wife with the kids. So it is better if I get up out of bed, out of the house, before anyone needs anything from me, so I can get that bit of me time first thing in the morning. I’m now an evangelist for morning running, because a day is never as good as when you’ve had a morning run or even a walk.
I’m still working on becoming a morning runner…
What advice would you give to partners on supporting their spouse’s running or exercising?
I’ve got a lot of friends where both partners are runners. I’d say, work out a schedule — you go one day, they go the other day. I think it’s really important to encourage your partner to make time for themselves. Really important. Because you want to be living with the best person, right? So it’s incumbent on you to help that person be the best person they can be. So encourage them to do that thing for themselves.
Often, that involves openly communicating, and letting them know, I’ve got things here, you go for your run, or go do your exercise class, whatever it is. It really helps. I don’t think I’m saying anything that’s too difficult to do. But still, it doesn’t always come naturally to have those open lines of communication.
If you see your partner in a slump, just say, like, what’s missing? If it is the exercise, if they’ve not been exercising for whatever reason — and there are so many reasons, especially in the early months of parenthood — say, Hey, go for a walk, go for a run.
Do you feel that running has changed you as a parent? Has it had a big impact in some way?
No, not really. But I’ve never followed the quote, unquote, classic running pathway. I’d say the normal pathway is for people to go from couch-to-5K and then sign up for 10K and then a half marathon, then a marathon. I’ve never run a marathon. So the people that take the normal pathway, they find it difficult to relate to me just running because I enjoy running, rather than because I’m trying to achieve something. The thing I’m trying to achieve is that daily feeling of having gone for a run, because I just enjoy running.
[Training for longer races is] too time consuming. If you’re thinking big picture about your life, what is worthwhile? Is it putting your husband or wife out for the day, and saying, You look after the kids, I’ve got to go run for three hours? That sounds selfish, to me. So I try not to do that. If you’ve haven’t got a big support network, which we don’t and didn’t have, you’ve got to think about how to balance things in terms of what is enough, when it’s just the two of you [doing the caregiving]. So, no, it hasn’t really impacted my running.
Sometimes we can get caught up in trying to do these “big things” around it — it’s always good to be reminded of the different ways running can look like.
I have zero desire to be a headline in Runner’s World. I don’t want to be an extraordinary person, because that usually means something extraordinarily bad has happened to me, and I’ve had to overcome something. But then there’s also the desire to push yourself, for example, to do a marathon. There’s a lot of value in that. I’ve done marathon training schedules multiple times, and as the boys grow older, I’m able to be out on a Saturday or Sunday morning for two or three hours with my friends. But I also have no desire to be in a race situation. That’s also just a personal hang up about needing to queue to run a race for three hours before starting…
There are other things we could be doing with our time, haha!
In the course of writing the book, and being around other parents who run, what do you think we’re still not seeing enough of?
Being a parent is a very normal thing; everyone is born with two of them. But there is a lot of stuff people don’t talk about willfully. Our first birth was quite traumatic — via emergency C section. And nobody talked about that beforehand. Nobody talked about the possibility of it, whether that’s wrapped up in superstition and bad luck or or just PTSD, or whatever, people don’t want to talk about it. But then afterwards, Stella, my wife, got loads of other mothers talking about and sharing their horror stories. But she went into it with no warning, and so I think we need a bit more open communication.
Just tell honest stories to people, to your friends. To me, that’s good friendship. With your friends, give them true advice, good advice. I’d say to someone, This is going to be difficult, but these are the ways to navigate it. So I think there are a lot of stories like that, but people don’t want to talk about them, for whatever reason. But I think it’s good to.
My thanks to Raz! If you’re not already following him, he’s here.
Footnotes
In trail running news, UTMB has expanded its Path to Parenthood Policy to now include deferrals that cover different forms of parenthood — so over and above pregnancy, they’re including IVF and other fertility treatments, adoption, and surrogacy. And this also applies to all parents. It’s amazing to see that since 2023, over 400 people have made use of the policy. No doubt that number will stretch due to this extended version of it. They’re also freezing an athlete’s ranking for five years while they’re on “the parenthood path.” Kudos to all involved in making this happen!
Ultrarunner and conservationist Clare Gallagher, who won Western States 100 and Leadville 100 (twice!), shared how her friends’ support was the biggest surprise gift of her pregnancy in an essay for Outside Magazine. And you can see said friends in the Patagonia-backed short film, Coming to Term, about how Clare’s pregnancy impacted her running. I really enjoyed seeing how someone who’s so dependent on running for all that it gives her deals with not being able to do as much of it during this time.
Speaking of friendship, a quick #MomReviewOnTheRun: Project Hail Mary is a sure-fire hit if you’re looking to be transported to outer space and fall in love with a Rock-like alien figure. The friendship at the heart of the film, Ryan Gosling’s solo antics, The Anatomy of a Fall’s Sandra Hüller, the “Pata Pata” needle drop, and more make it worth using your me time for this one.
Thank you so much for reading!
New Mom Run Club is a space to share the triumphs and trials of running after having a baby. Know anyone I should reach out to? Please drop me a line: NadiaNeo@gmail.com. Or, just hit reply to this email!
Because postpartum is forever.