Middle-distance runner Elle St. Pierre loves to win—and often she does. So when the Tokyo Olympian failed to reach the finals in the 1,500 meters at the 2022 World Indoor Championships, she told reporters she “didn’t feel like herself.”
It was only later that she’d reveal the reason: She was eight weeks pregnant with her son, Ivan.
“It was something I knew in my heart I always wanted,” the New Balance–sponsored runner tells SELF. And thanks to athletes before her, she didn’t feel like she needed to wait until her running career was over to make it happen.
After Ivan was born in March 2023, St. Pierre became one of a swelling group of professional runners returning to the sport postpartum, including Olympians Molly Huddle, Rachel Smith, and Brenda Martinez. Many have become friends and confidantes, including fellow New Balance runner Abby (D’Agostino) Cooper, who had a baby a month earlier.
The two connected more deeply while attending a high-altitude training camp in Flagstaff, Arizona. “We were on the same schedule, wanting to get back to our babies quickly after a workout while other people would normally go out to dinner,” St. Pierre says. En route, they’d trade tales about life as both a competitor and a mom, helping St. Pierre feel less alone and also more confident in her choices and her future.
She also credits her family for their role in her busy day-to-day. When she travels from her home—a working dairy farm in Vermont—to camp, St. Pierre brings extra hands with her to help with Ivan, including, at times, a babysitter, her husband Jamie, her mother, and her mother-in-law. That way, she can focus on training when she’s on the track or roads, but still have him nearby when she’s done with her sessions.
Thanks in part to the firm foundation beneath her and her different avenues of support, St. Pierre is back on track (literally). She returned to racing at the 5th Avenue Mile last September, running a time of 4:23 to place seventh. At the Millrose Games in February, she ran 4:16.41 to break her own record in the indoor mile; in March, two days before Ivan’s first birthday, she won a gold medal and set a new American record of 8:20.87 in the 3,000 meters at the 2024 World Indoor Championships.
Afterward, she gave an interview to NBC’s Lewis Johnson, Ivan in her arms. The race hurt, but not as bad as her 12-hour labor, she said. When he asked what it meant for her to be there with her husband, son, and the rest of her family, she beamed.
“It’s a win for all of us. They’re the ones that got me here,” she said. And their support was about more than babysitting or handling chores around the farm—it was also about confidence in her athletic ability. “When I told them I was pregnant, they just didn’t blink an eye; they knew I would be back. I needed that.”
Related: