Senior steeplechaser Phoebe Brown will graduate this spring with a 3.91 cumulative GPA from the Urban Honors College. A 12-time Academic All-Big Sky, she plans to enter the Physical Therapy doctoral program at Pacific University next fall.
 
From Tillamook High School, she'll likely finish her PSU career ranked fifth all time at Portland State in the 3k Steeplechase and second in the 2k. She and her teammates rank as the fourth-best women's steeplechase squad in the nation, according to the USTFCCCA. She also was active outside of athletics, serving on the department's executive committee and as President of PSU's Student-Athlete Advisory Committee.
 
This week's Big Sky Outdoor Championships will likely mark the end of Brown's Portland State career. Her story on how she got to this point is quite compelling and best told in her own words.
 
John Wykoff
 
Do you come from an athletic family?
 
My parents encouraged team sports when my siblings and I were younger, but they are not sports fans. When I said I wanted to run in college, they actually thought it would be a waste of time. Thankfully my high school coach, Pat Zweifel, encouraged me to reach out to college coaches and see what was possible.
 
When did you start sports...which ones?
 
I'd played soccer since 3rd grade. I ran sprints in track during middle school and my freshman year of high school to "stay in shape" for fall soccer. I also played softball and basketball for a couple of seasons, but they didn't stick. I swam in high school, but, 
I really loved soccer.
 
My first coach ever, Berto Maciel (soccer), was a great influence on me. He was the first adult in my life who got excited about what I could do. He really paid attention to the kids and treated them like athletes even though we were so young. He wouldn't let anyone apologize for messing up. He would always say "Push-ups if you say sorry! Say 'Next time coach!'." He wouldn't let you quit or give up, but he let you try until you got it right. It was just a different mindset than I was used to at home. He was my coach until high school. He passed away last year. I wish he could have seen this season.
 
I was the only freshman on the soccer team, and most of the other players graduated that year, so I was the only one showing up to practice the following summer. The new coach wanted me to be a goalie, and as a midfielder I was not excited about that. 
 
I remember the long-distance kids convincing me to run an 800m race, which I considered to be incredibly long at the time. At the finish line, the cross country coach, Pat Zweifel, was handing out place markers on popsicle sticks. He said, "You should run cross country" and I said, "I can barely run 2 laps, you think I can run 3 miles?" and he just nodded and walked away. 
 
Why did you choose distance running?
 
The summer before my sophomore year I was working at the Tillamook Cheese Factory scooping ice cream when the cross country team walked in. They had just finished a long hill workout and Pat was buying them cones. I just remember thinking, "Their coach is buying them ice cream, and I don't even have teammates right now."
 
Pat really wanted me to think about running cross, and he would bribe me with old unclaimed hoodies from previous athletes. That summer he told me I could go to his running camp (Ultimook) for free if I even thought about running cross. I really didn't want to give up soccer, but I didn't think we would have enough people for a team that year, so I went to camp.
 
Pat really wanted to create a culture of cross country running in Tillamook. He set up his flower farm for cross country workouts with a mile loop gravel road, 1k loop wood chip trail, and a 400m gravel track. His farm is right next to a river and a gravel logging road follows it for 20 miles through the woods. There is a hilly, 12-mile trail run that loops over a ridge. We called it the Top of the World run for its views of town and the bay.
 
The first time I ran it, it was just me and the boys team. Every mile or so I could hear them call out directions. I really thought I would get lost, and running alone for that long when I'd never run more than five miles was a life-changing experience. All I could do was keep running and hope it ended eventually.
 
I imagined running for days without stopping, and it felt peaceful to me. I had never felt like that about anything before, and it really sold the sport for me. Running along through the woods is like a reset; nothing else seems so bad after.
 
Once a season, Pat would drive us 10 miles up the river road and have us run back for a fundraiser, a pledge-per-mile situation. After people graduate from the team, Pat likes to name a workout after them. He named that 10-mile run after me, which is probably the sweetest gift I've ever been given.
 
Pat really emphasized listening to our bodies, creating relationships with our teammates, and creating a culture of "excellence" on the team, by which he meant having pride in our work, in each other, and our passion for the sport. "Act like a champion," he would say. 
 
We had a really close team, and we ended up winning state twice before I graduated. Our town is really small, and it was cool to see everyone excited about us. We got a police escort to fro-yo (frozen yogurt) when we came back with the trophy for the second time. I thought that was ridiculous, but it was still kind of cool. It showed how the sport really brings everyone together, even if they don't run.
 
Pat let me go to his summer running camp for free every year, and he paid for me to go to Steens Mountain Running Camp (I'm a summer counselor at both camps) as well. He bought me spikes to race in, too. Without Pat, I never would have run. For me, running is more about the community and human connections created by pursuing a common goal than about winning. I am competitive, but competitiveness is not sustainable on its own (at least not for me).
 
Pat made sure we learned where sustenance for a competitive spirit came from: our relationships with one another, our ambition to do the little things right, our confidence in ourselves, and our cumulative work.
 
Plus, he made sure we had fun. He drove us to "adventure runs" every week, took us to Crater Lake and the Redwoods for team camp, and let us do some stupid stuff once in a while, pretending not to see.
 
Before joining the team, I knew how to work hard, but Pat showed me how to love work so much that it makes your day. Doing hard things is a gift and not a chore if it leads towards a goal you actually care about. Pat is another person who showed me life could be much different than I had previously experienced. 
 
The end of my senior year, he said, "You know, you could run in college," and I laughed. Unfortunately, I had a lot of imposter syndrome in the sport. I felt like I had come in late, and I was just trying to play catch up every season. I actually felt like that until just recently, like I was still wearing someone else's hoodie.
 
What is it about running distances (and steeplechase) that attracts you? What is the hardest part?
 
I just love to run. Going for a run (either with teammates or by myself) is a calming, sort of moving meditation for me. Training is a safe place that only takes what I can give.
Competitively, I like to be tough. Running is a unique sport that requires you to be the toughest, not necessarily the most talented, person on the track in order to win. Plus, you don't have teammates to save your ass if you give up.
 
Be tough or get off the track. It brings me back to Berto's "Don't say sorry" system. I never really know just how fast the people next to me are going to run. I don't know what they do for their workouts or recovery. But I do know that I can decide to be tougher than them, or at least make it really hard for them to beat me. Running is also unique in that we don't hate someone for kicking our butts. 
 
What is your favorite distance and why?
 
I don't know if I have a favorite distance, but my favorite race is definitely the steeple. I think that the people who run steeple get that they have to be a little bit more than just fast. You don't have to be particularly pretty going over the barriers, but you do have to be gritty and not let them bother you (especially when it doesn't go well). I think there are a lot of people in running who like things to be pristine and aesthetic (perfect splits, perfect routines, etc.), but the steeple doesn't let those people win. The steeple lets the gritty f***ers win. Those are the types of people I want to race, because you know you are getting 100% from them. No one is just letting you beat them that day, or leaning on natural talent to drag them through.
 
Why did you choose Portland State? Did you hear from other universities? 
 
I reached out to a couple of coaches, but no one seemed very excited about me joining their teams. I knew I wanted to be around people who were excited to run, and it felt wrong talking to coaches who acted as though I should be over the moon just to have a conversation with them.
 
I didn't know anything about college running. In a way, ignorance was bliss because I just operated off of vibes and didn't have any qualms about being a walk-on. I knew I would get faster, I just needed someone who was excited about it.
 
When I was on a tour of PSU, I asked former assistant coach Josh Seitz if I could chat. He said he had 10 minutes. He showed me maps of the nearby trails and his sheets of pace charts and workouts. I remember thinking he was organized and liked to leave the city, so maybe we could make something work. He also said the program was in an early phase (changing from emphasizing sprints to emphasizing distances), and he needed people who wanted to help build the team. I felt like my high school team was a good example of that, so I handed him a letter from Pat (to this day I don't know what it said), and I left his office. I never even met the team.
 
On a practical note, I chose PSU because I couldn't afford anything else financially and my favorite color is green. I didn't have much else to go off.
 
Now that I know more, I realize I was extremely lucky that running here worked out for me. I could have very easily ended up with a team that hated training or had a lot of serious injuries. 
 
Not to say that the team didn't have any problems. The difference in culture and community has changed significantly since that first year. 
 
You've had a chance to help change the emphasis of the PSU program. Has that been interesting?
 
To be honest, I don't feel like I changed it much. The team certainly changed, but it didn't feel like it was due to anything specific I'd done. Coaches did a good job recruiting balanced people who had interests outside of running. Kaila Gibson was a great team captain. She was a lot faster than anyone else on the team, but she wasn't prideful. She would run her easy runs with me, which I know would not have happened on many other teams. I think over the years we have accumulated people who are willing to work, but also can keep the perspective that our teammates matter more than our races or egos. Having a group of people that truly believe that and practice that is really what changes a program.
 
You've moved into the all-time top five at PSU in the 2k and 3k steeplechase this year. How do you think you've grown to reach that point?
 
This is going to sound really self-centered and prideful, but I always knew I could be fast. I had people around me telling me I wouldn't make it, or that I would only get a little bit faster. But I just felt differently, and it was really frustrating that I didn't have a race time to back it up. I wasn't getting much faster season to season.
 
Last track season I was injured and couldn't run the steeplechase at all, so the 2K steeple at Oregon Preview this year was my first time running a steeple in two years. The last race I did on a track outdoors was a 5K that I didn't finish because of my injury, so coming back, especially after being sick in December, felt pretty intimidating. 
 
This year with Coach Dan (assistant coach Daniel Goetz) is the first time I've been able to back up that feeling that I could get a lot faster. I am not the fastest person on the team, but that was never my goal. I just knew that I could be much faster, and I couldn't figure out why I wasn't improving…and I was running out of time.
 
Dan came on staff this January, and I was slow to trust him. Getting a new coach halfway through my last year could have been difficult.
 
I had been sick all of December 2022, and my worst fear was that a new coach would underestimate me and hesitate to run me hard. But I was also afraid that I would get run too hard and burn out. My first race back was so slow and painful, and I feared the rest of my season would be written off. I don't usually cry in front of people (especially people I don't know very well), but I cried in front of all the new coaches after that race. I was just so afraid after believing so hard that I could run fast and then not having a season reflect it. 
 
Once I got a bit of my baseline fitness back, things started to come together really well. Dan has been a great coach. I didn't know how great training could feel until he came on staff. He really listens to his athletes on and off the track, as does (Head Track & Field) Coach Hepburn, and encourages us to be whole people not just athletes.
 
What has it been like to be part of a nationally ranked steeplechase crew? 
 
I was shocked when we first heard that (PSU's steeplechase team is ranked fourth nationally and were ranked third earlier in the season). I had no idea we were that good. Obviously, I'm the slowest steepler in our group, but being ranked like that really put it in perspective for me. I'd just gotten over my imposter syndrome in the sport, so I wasn't even thinking about being a part of something so impressive. 
 
I think it also gave me another measurable goal to aim for. While I don't really put much thought into national rankings, I know that I have the most time to shave off on our squad, and maybe I can help get us higher up on that ranking. Of course, I want to run quickly for myself, but the ranking adds an extra fun little bonus experience. 
 
Has there been a particular highlight for you in running while at PSU?
 
For me, training is really where the big moments have happened. For example, one winter break Monica Salazar and I had a long hard workout at Springwater (a paved path next to the river on the southeast side). We weren't sure if we could hit pace, which was unusual for us.
 
We went out there and just decided to get 'er done. In a couple of miles right when it was getting hard, we were so in sync and were flying down the path. We were too out of breath to talk, but we could feel each other sending encouragement. We finished the workout, looked at each other, and didn't say anything for a few minutes. We had run so much faster than we thought we could, and we had felt great doing it.
 
We called it our magic workout because we were just floating the whole time, in a bubble by ourselves, running through the world. The rawest human thing we could do. Ever since then, when we've had a long hard workout, we'd say "Let's just make it like the Magic Workout." And we did. 
 
Academically, I would say the parts I appreciate the most are PSU's partnership with OHSU and the Urban Honors College. I got to write a thesis as my senior project for Honors and that was a really great experience.
 
How do you feel you've developed as an athlete and as a person while at PSU?
 
As an athlete, the biggest thing has been "going back to my roots" in a way. The team I joined five years ago was afraid to try hard, and most teammates didn't seem excited to race. I used to try to pump people up and get a little crazy before races, but that made most of my teammates really uncomfortable and eventually I stopped doing it. I got a reputation for being a "try hard", perfectionist, intense athlete which I didn't identify with, personally. I was just trying to keep the culture that I had developed with Pat because I knew it worked. 
 
After a couple of years, the team culture improved and coming back from COVID, I again embraced getting psyched for races, I saw people getting excited with me. 
 
As a person, I am so much different than when I first got here. A lot of that is just living the first five years of my adult life, but there were some key moments at PSU. I didn't actually graduate high school, so I was intimidated by academics coming in. I figured it out eventually, and slowly became less stressed about school.
 
I really like that PSU emphasizes community and providing access to support without judgment. I joined the Honors college my second term here, and it was the best thing for me. The class sizes were smaller and the faculty were so passionate about what they were teaching. I got amazing feedback on my papers, which I had never had before, and I really learned how to be patient with myself and my own learning process through that experience. 
 
Finally, being a part of a large team (track & field) with a lot of passionate people can be a tricky balance, and I am so thankful that I have had teammates who can keep perspective through hard times. There's nothing quite like having a team of 60 adults spending 30+ hours a week together to teach you a lot about yourself and healthy relationships. I realized I needed to accept that people I cared about and respected might just think very differently from me, and that doesn't change much in the relationship if you don't let it. 
 
Have you enjoyed your time at PSU? What have been the rewards and challenges of being a student-athlete here?
 
My freshman year I almost transferred. Every year since, though, I have become more and more happy I didn't leave. Every year just brought so many blessings, friendships, and learning curves that I never would have expected. I think we like to assume we would be who we are regardless of who we are around or what school we go to, but I know I am who I am because of my life here. 
 
The biggest challenge I faced was learning to trust myself and learn to relax even in unpredictable situations. Being part of a team during COVID was a huge blessing. I was camping on Pat's farm for a few weeks right after the shutdown, just running and going to zoom university. Running gave me a team, a community, a whole network of people that wanted the best for me, and honestly what else could a person ask for? 
 
Phoebe Brown