“I’m a runner due to Jeff Galloway.” It’s a sentence that Chris Twiggsa longtime good friend and co-worker of Galloway, says he’s heard from hundreds of runners since working with him over the previous 16 years.
On February 25, 2026, Galloway, whom iRunFar founder Bryon Powell considers one of many prime 5 most influential runners of the previous half-century, handed away at age 80 as a consequence of problems from a mind bleed. It was with deep unhappiness that I realized this information final week, however I’m sure that, whereas gone in individual, Galloway will proceed to dwell in working lore for his racing, together with the ten,000-meter occasion on the 1972 Olympic Video games, his race directing, and his run-walk teaching technique. However maybe what he will likely be most remembered for is his means to encourage folks to do excess of they thought they may.
Jeff Galloway: runner, coach, race director. All images: Chris Twiggs
A number of days after Galloway’s demise, I caught up with Twiggs, an 17-time Hardrock 100 finisher and a stalwart of the path working and ultrarunning group. Twiggs has been an integral a part of the Galloway teaching staff for 16 years, and he instructed me he owes a lot of his success to the teachings he realized alongside the best way from Galloway. “The primary time I heard Jeff discuss was in 1995. He spoke the evening earlier than a marathon my spouse and I have been working. He instructed us to take stroll breaks. We thought he was loopy, however we gave it a strive, and my spouse certified for the Boston Marathon. We have been prompt followers of ‘Jeffing.’”
Galloway popularized a run-walk coaching and racing protocol, and “Jeffing” quickly grew to become a worldwide phenomenon. “Think about having your title grow to be a verb!” exclaimed Twiggs in enthusiastic about Galloway. Having labored for Galloway for a few years, Twiggs had infinite experiences with him as a co-worker, runner, and good friend. “Jeff helped me qualify for the Boston Marathon a number of occasions, run distances I assumed unattainable, and luxuriate in working on a degree I by no means would have believed. Extra importantly, Jeff confirmed me tips on how to take heed to, imagine in, and empower different runners to attain their desires, one run-walk-run at a time.”
Studying the Sport from Galloway
I personally grew to become a Galloway fan early on in my working profession. In September of 1989, a couple of week shy of my twenty second birthday, I ran my first street race: the Philadelphia Distance Run half marathon. I had not too long ago graduated from school and was beginning my first educating job on the William Penn Constitution Faculty. A tad obese and anticipating a brand new problem, I signed up for the race on a dare to myself, to see if I might do it, and to see — if I did handle to do it — what it might do for me.
I crossed the end line on that late September day about an hour and 50 minutes after I began, and I used to be wrecked. My quads have been screaming in ache, and my respiratory felt like I used to be inhaling and exhaling by way of a straw. In brief, for the primary time in my younger life, I had turned myself inside out. At that second, I used to be impressed to do it once more — and to do it higher. I simply wanted some recommendation.
Galloway impressed hundreds of runners to get out and transfer.
Once I returned to high school the next Monday, I sought out Penn Constitution’s legendary monitor and subject coach, Steve Bonniewho was a 15-time defending Inter-Tutorial Monitor and Discipline Championships coach on the time. As we shared fried hen and biscuits over lunch that day, he requested me how my race went and nodded knowingly as I rehashed the regular and inexorable decline into distress that characterised my expertise on the Philadelphia Distance Run.
Arriving at college the following morning, I used to be greeted at my mailbox with the standard scribbled cellphone messages and stacks of report playing cards, in addition to a e-book, “Galloway’s E book on Working,” accompanied by a handwritten be aware from Coach Bonnie: “Wilkie, learn this e-book and comply with this recommendation, you’ve got potential on this sport.”
Over the following week, throughout each free interval, and at residence within the evenings, as a substitute of writing lesson plans and grading papers, I devoured Galloway’s knowledge. His theories on pacing, vitamin, coaching quantity, and particularly his walk-run technique all spoke to me, and as a wannabe runner, made working appear so accessible, exceedingly easy, and simply plain enjoyable. It was the beginning of one thing that may redirect my life.
Offering Inspiration
I’ve a deep appreciation for Galloway and all the things he did and represented. Having impressed three generations of runners similar to me, Galloway was a man who motivated us all to only get on the market, whether or not working or strolling. Galloway was, in his coronary heart, a believer within the energy of motion, a believer in working as one thing peaceable, pleasurable, and playful. Working was one thing to be savored and loved for a lifetime.
In line with Twiggs, my Galloway expertise isn’t distinctive. “The tales folks inform are of empowerment. They didn’t assume they could possibly be runners; then Jeff instructed them they may do it, so that they did it: a 5k, a half marathon, a marathon, an extremely. Whether or not your aim was to complete a Disney race in entrance of the Balloon Girls (if you already know, you already know) or to qualify for Boston, Jeff believed in you. Greater than that, he had a way, a run-walk ratio, that may get you there.” Twiggs sums it up effectively, saying, “Jeff Galloway had a much bigger influence on my life than any individual outdoors of my circle of relatives, and a whole bunch of hundreds of individuals can say the identical factor, a lot of whom by no means even met him.”
He will likely be missed.
Bottoms up!
Jeff Galloway (proper) finishes a Disney race and appears for the Balloon Girls together with runner Chris Twiggs.
