By Shannon Martin Morehouse

Residing in Boulder, CO up until January of this year, Sara Slattery and her husband Steve Slattery had been coaching themselves. Looking at Sara Slattery’s accomplishments, one would conclude that she was successful at coaching herself—she has achieved PRs of 15:08 for 5000 meters and 31:57 for 10,000 meters. This past summer, she won the 10,000 in the Pan American Games, in the record-breaking time of 32:54.41, and she placed sixth in the highly competitive Cigna Falmouth Road Race (7 miles) in a time of 37:28. In 2006, Slattery placed second in the 10,000 meters at the USATF Outdoor Track and Field Championships. In 2005, she was the Bolder Boulder champion.

For Slattery, 26, her professional career is about to get even better. After over three years of self-coaching, she and her husband have joined Team Running USA, based in Mammoth Lakes, CA. There, Terrence Mahon coaches them. Slattery will be competing in the USA Cross Country Championships on February 16 in San Diego, CA. In her rust-buster race at the University of Washington Invitational on February 2, Slattery won the 5000 meters in a time of 15:32.28.

New York Road Runners: Why don’t you start out by telling me a bit about your weekend? I know you had quite the busy weekend of travels and in the midst of that you won the 5000 meters at the University Of Washington Invitational.