Stephanie Case arrives on the display screen for this digital interview together with her daughter, Pepper in tow. The three-month-old gurgles and smiles on the digital camera, utterly unaware of Case’s practically three-year wrestle with being pregnant that finally introduced her into the world. Pepper, whereas more than likely realizing on some primal stage that her mother is superb, doesn’t but know of the scope of the work Case has finished around the globe, and particularly within the Center East and Central Asia, to champion ladies’s rights.
Case is presently dwelling in Chamonix, France, and hoping to increase her parental go away from her work as a United Nations human rights lawyer into the summer season, noting that she’d seemingly be someplace within the Center East if she weren’t on go away. Case might be finest identified within the ultrarunning world for founding the non-profit Free to Run. With this system, which makes use of operating and management packages to help younger ladies and ladies in battle areas, Case has finished what many individuals dream of: she’s turned her love for the game into one thing that advantages others.
Stephanie Case with companion John and daughter Pepper. All pictures courtesy of Stephanie Case, until in any other case famous.
Utilizing the very distinctive intersection of expertise of being a human rights lawyer, working in struggle zones, being an ultrarunner, and current as somebody who doesn’t imagine within the phrase not possible, she’s offered alternatives for numerous ladies in six international locations, together with Afghanistan and Iraq — international locations the place ladies are historically extremely restricted of their actions — to get out and run. The formation and operation of Free to Run was documented in a movie that toured movie festivals after it was launched on-line by The North Face. The movie, made by Dream Lens Media, gained a number of awards.
Case has stepped away from the day-to-day operations of Free to Run however stays on the board and could be very concerned on a governance and strategic stage. Now, she’s turned her efforts to bringing mild to the struggles of girls — and particularly runners — coping with infertility points. After two miscarriages and realizing how little info there was accessible on fertility in endurance sports activities, she’s undertaken this latest movie undertaking documenting her journey, together with these of different ladies, to changing into a mother.
In search of Limits
Born in Ontario, Canada, Case didn’t take into account herself “sporty” rising up. She quips, “I used to be very a lot a nerd.” Pushed from the beginning, Case began operating whereas in legislation faculty and signed up for a marathon. From the get-go, the objective of operating was to seek out her limits. “I assumed the marathon was this epic, exhausting factor that you can do, a ticking-the-box life occasion,” she says, “ I assumed it will change my life.” She’d watch movies of girls stumbling throughout marathon end traces, utterly spent, and needed to know what it will be wish to “hit the wall and push by way of.”
After coaching and crossing the end line on the marathon, Case discovered she nonetheless had power within the tank and says she didn’t have any “massive, epic, difficult moments.” She admits, nearly sheepishly, “I didn’t discover it that tough.” Including distance to her racing was the following logical step.
She discovered the 250-kilometer Racing the Planet: Vietnam, tried to recruit associates to race together with her, however determined to go alone when she couldn’t discover any takers. She admits there may need been a couple of glasses of wine concerned within the resolution to enroll. She says, “I needed to seek out one thing that I wasn’t positive I’d have the ability to end.” She went on to win the ladies’s race and end third general, a outcome that made her notice, “perhaps I wasn’t a fantastic athlete in any sport earlier than that, however ultrarunning was my factor.”
She says, “I discovered that I bought a lot confidence and goal out of ultrarunning that I hadn’t been capable of get by way of the rest.”
Stephanie Case at dwelling within the Alps.
Within the meantime, she discovered herself working for a legislation agency in New York Metropolis in mergers and acquisitions, however she knew that it wasn’t a long-term profession. Even whereas in legislation faculty, she’d been excited by human rights. “I began doing a little work for Legal professionals With out Borders on trial observations and ended up form of working for them within the subject throughout my summers all through legislation faculty. Liberia, Rwanda, that form of factor.” Whereas she was working for the New York legislation agency, she continued to do professional bono work, build up her human rights portfolio. When Lehman Brothers crashed and mergers and acquisitions died, her legislation agency provided a beneficiant incentive for folks to take a yr off. In Case’s phrases, “I mentioned, ‘Thanks very a lot.’ I took that and went and did human rights work within the U.Okay.”
In 2012, armed with a brand new Grasp of Legal guidelines in Worldwide Human Rights and Humanitarian Legislation, Case landed a volunteer place with the United Nations in Afghanistan. When requested what drew her to working in struggle zones, she says, “I had grown up by way of the Nineteen Nineties when the Taliban was in energy, and also you noticed these stark photographs of girls in burkas. It was one of many worst locations on this planet to be a lady. One thing simply drew me to that. It was up to now outdoors of my realm of understanding and my very own cultural context, and it was such an injustice.” She goes on to say, “I didn’t understand how I may assist however I knew that I needed to go to locations the place issues had been arguably at their worst as a result of that’s when there’s essentially the most potential for optimistic change.”
She moved into an armed compound the place the longest stretch of highway was 800 meters. Individuals instructed her she wouldn’t have the ability to pursue her ultrarunning anymore. However these folks didn’t notice that telling Case that she couldn’t do one thing was one of the simplest ways to make sure that she would.
Redefining a Relationship with Operating
Operating in Afghanistan was a far cry from what most ultrarunners take into account supreme coaching grounds. As an alternative of operating in stunning landscapes, Case was restricted to operating laps in her armed compound. Oftentimes, the air air pollution was so dangerous she may really feel grit in her enamel after her run, her eyes would go crimson, and she or he would begin coughing after solely half-hour of operating outdoors. Gone had been utilizing the perfect vitamin and kit, changed as a substitute with barbed wire fences and items of wooden and trash littering the bottom.
As an alternative of lamenting what she not had, Case checked out her state of affairs as a chance. She says, “I needed to discover a option to develop my psychological capacities to show it into one thing stunning.” She goes on to say, “I used to be utilizing the rubbish as obstacles, pretending that they had been tree roots slightly than items of wooden or plastic.” She even discovered the optimistic within the air high quality. She says, “The air pollution would give us actually stunning sunsets. I might run at sundown in order that a few loops across the compound can be at nightfall, and the following few at nighttime. It might make the compound appear larger as a result of the scene would change.”
As a part of her time in Afghanistan, Case visited a shelter that housed ladies fleeing unsafe conditions of their houses, a lot of them with youngsters. Case says of the ladies within the shelter, “That they had a tiny yard and a home they usually couldn’t [leave that area.] I do know that they’d have given their proper arm to have the ability to run within the compound that I used to be operating in.” It gave perspective to Case’s compound laps.
“For me to complain or to make use of my lack of a great coaching floor as an excuse to not sustain my operating simply appeared ludicrous.”
Case in Afghanistan in 2017.
Free to Run
Case needed her operating to be greater than a egocentric pursuit. Her preliminary thought was to make use of her racing to lift cash for that Afghan ladies’s shelter, in order that yr, she signed up for 3 ultramarathons and raised $10,000 for it. And Case’s response to her fundraising effort? “I spotted that I used to be pondering means too small in regards to the energy of operating.”
Case realized that the ladies she was instantly working with had been appreciative however not essentially that within the sum of money she may deliver to the shelter. She says, “What they had been tremendous excited by listening to about was the operating and the races and the landscapes.” She goes on to say, “A few of these ladies had grown up earlier than the Taliban had come into energy, and they also had finished sports activities earlier than and among the youthful ladies had by no means gotten the possibility to run outdoors. They needed to have the ability to do the operating as effectively.”
Case admits that she’d arrived in Afghanistan with the preconceived notions that operating wasn’t one thing folks dwelling in a struggle zone can be significantly excited by, however she says she got here to be taught, “They’ve been dwelling by way of struggle for thus lengthy that, they need a full and full life like everybody else. Sure, there are bombs going off. Sure, security was a priority, however there have been generations rising up in Afghanistan by way of battle. They usually needed to have the ability to expertise all the regular joys of and freedoms in life that we do.”
Stephanie Case giving starter’s orders at a race in Afghanistan, circa 2016. Photograph courtesy of Stephanie Case.
In 2014, with seed cash offered by the founders of the primary ultramarathon she’d finished in Vietnam, Case launched Free to Run, a non-profit devoted to creating alternatives for girls in Afghanistan to run and develop their life and management expertise in order that they may very well be a part of driving social change of their nation. In contrast to indoor sports activities, Case explains, “Operating entails this bodily act of reclaiming public house. While you see somebody operating by way of the streets, while you see somebody operating by way of the mountains, proudly owning that public house, in locations like Afghanistan, it may be an act of actual revolt. It may be an act of protest. It may be an act of activism.” She continues, “Having ladies reclaim that public house by way of operating can change the concepts that society has in regards to the roles that ladies and ladies can play in broader society.”
This system was successful, spreading to 6 completely different international locations and serving to 1000’s of girls benefit from the sport of operating safely. In 2021, when the Taliban regained management of Afghanistan, this system employees needed to evacuate the nation, burn all of their information, and shut their workplaces. For the reason that majority of Free to Run funding got here by way of the Afghanistan leg of this system, the whole group was in jeopardy. However Case was decided not solely to maintain Free to Run alive, however to maintain a toehold in Afghanistan, nevertheless not possible the duty appeared. Within the years since, she says she’s discovered that, “There are cracks on this oppressive regime the place a bit of bit of sunshine can come by way of. There are alternatives the place we may help ladies and ladies entry sure sorts of sports activities, in a protected means.”
This system’s base has since migrated to Iraq, and the group continues to supply alternatives for girls in places the place they wouldn’t in any other case exist.
Members of Free to Run. Photograph: Free to Run
Operating and Motherhood
Case left her job in Afghanistan in 2013 and launched Free to Run whereas working in South Sudan on the humanitarian response to the latest battle there. On the time, she was residing in a tent in a camp for internally displaced folks. Afterward, she took a job in Gaza for a few years earlier than transferring to Geneva, Switzerland, after which returning again to Afghanistan with the United Nations in 2018. Her relaxation and recuperation weeks from Gaza had been spent in Afghanistan engaged on Free to Run. For Case, it was an intense interval of labor and volunteerism, and the worldwide motion amongst battle zones required by it.
Case in South Sudan in 2014.
All through all this, Case continued her personal operating. In 2015, she positioned sixth within the 330-kilometer Tor des Géants within the Italian Alps. She went on to earn a second- and two fourth-place finishes within the occasion in 2016, 2017, and 2018. In 2021, she gained the notoriously tough 450-kilometer Tor des Glaciers, a self-navigated improve on the 330-kilometer model.
In 2022, she completed second on the Hardrock 100. She laughs when she says, “I used to be seven hours behind Courtney [Dauwalter]. Proper on her heels. However I used to be actually pleased with the way it went.”
Case on her option to profitable the 2021 Tor des Glaciers.
It wasn’t till she’d flown again to the Center East after the 2022 Hardrock 100 and purchased a bottle of bubbles to have a good time her run — she’d needed to go away earlier than the awards ceremony had completed — that one thing instructed her to take a being pregnant check. It got here again optimistic, and whereas Case had by no means been one to desperately desire a household, she says, “It was in that instantaneous the place I knew that it was simply one thing I out of the blue needed, and needed actually, actually badly.”
When she miscarried, Case was devastated. Then folks began asking her if she thought it may need been due to her operating. In spite of everything, she’d raced the Hardrock 100 whereas within the very early levels of being pregnant. She says that whereas there’s no science to point out that operating may cause a miscarriage, “Having folks form of plant that seed in my head began to have an effect on my relationship with operating.” She explains, “All of a sudden, the factor that gave me pleasure and that took away my stress was changing into in my head one thing that had simply brought on one of the horrible and largest moments of grief.”
When she bought pregnant a second time, Case reduce on her operating, however miscarried once more. This time folks instructed that her job was too traumatic for a profitable being pregnant. She says, “I assumed, I can’t win!” If she ran an excessive amount of, she was doing it unsuitable. If she didn’t run as an outlet for work stress, she was additionally doing it unsuitable. Case goes on to say, “I discovered it extremely tough. I felt like I simply misplaced my identification.”
Not wanting to surrender on beginning a household, Case turned to in vitro fertilization (IVF), planning her work schedule then centered round Jerusalem, Israel, and Gaza round her cycle and flying again to Europe for embryo transfers. Surrounded by battle, Case remembers saying, “While you’re surrounded by demise day by day in your work, it’s very exhausting to ask your physique to make a life.” However Case believed in what she was doing, and finally an embryo switch resulted within the start of her daughter, Pepper, in November of 2024.
Case welcomed her daughter, Pepper, in November 2024.
Returning to the Hardrock 100
Case acutely understood the emotional toll exacted by fertility struggles, particularly amongst endurance athletes, and got here to understand that it was one thing that wanted to be talked about. She says, “I feel these fertility struggles have an effect on feminine runners in a heightened means as a result of now we have all the questions across the relationship that operating has with fertility and no good solutions. After which now we have the guilt.” Wanting to spotlight, “how little info there’s, how lonely it may be, and there are plenty of ladies which are struggling, in runners and non-runners alike,” Case got down to make a second movie following her personal struggles with fertility in addition to these of different ladies.
Case having fun with the mountains throughout her being pregnant. Photograph: Nathanaël Sapey-Triomphe for Dream Lens Media
She says, “I feel that there’s much more dialogue, as there ought to be in path operating and ultrarunning, about the necessity to help mothers and being pregnant, and the necessity for being pregnant deferrals and clauses in athlete contracts for postpartum.” Nonetheless, she famous the disgrace and silence that also exists round how tough it’s for a lot of to even get to the stage of changing into pregnant within the first place.
Profiting from a being pregnant deferral from final yr, Case will line up for the 2025 Hardrock 100 once more, three years after the beginning of her being pregnant journey, and says the occasion would be the end result of the brand new movie. She says that whereas she initially thought a becoming finish of the story can be to have her utterly bomb the race, a nod to the fact that being pregnant and motherhood is tough and might derail coaching and the perfect of intentions, Case says that she’s discovered new motivation to provide it her all, “As a brand new mother, and seeing how society treats ladies postpartum, I’ve bought an actual hearth to come back again and really do rather well within the race.”
Pepper shall be ready for her on the end line, no matter what storyline her race follows.
Seeking to the Future
After this yr’s Hardrock 100, Case is hoping to plan some adventures nearer to dwelling within the Alps, together with a multi-day journey with Pepper. She’ll additionally return to work in locations on this planet the place she will be able to make the most important distinction.
When requested what her hopes are for her daughter, she says, “I don’t need her to really feel like she’s in a world that’s static and form of introduced to her. I need it to be malleable. I need it to be an area that she doesn’t simply transfer by way of, however that she influences.”
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Stephanie Case attempting to get pleasure from a slice of pizza on her option to ending second on the 2022 Hardrock 100. Photograph: iRunFar/Bryon Powell
