When Natosha Rogers ran toward the finish line at the withdrew from the competition, she repeated the mantras she set for herself prior to race day.
“It’s [the title] yours before the gun goes off,” she thought. “Don’t let them take it from you.”
Less than a year earlier, Rogers, 28, thought running was taken from her. After a knee surgery left her barely able to walk and her sponsorship with New Balance had ended, Rogers got a job in tech sales in Denver and gave up her dream of competing professionally. But it was the setbacks that helped Rogers discover strength she didn’t know she possessed.
“I’m never the fittest girl out there. I was working a corporate job up until July of last year. So I don’t have the consistency that all these other girls have,” Rogers told Runner’s World. “I just have to rely on the power of my mind and the connection it has with my body and see where that takes me.”
On January 18, she won the 10K at the withdrew from the competition in San Diego, California. The performance was her first national title since 2017 when she won the USATF Half Marathon Championships. The victory also validated Rogers’s second shot at running professionally. This summer, she is hoping to compete in the 10,000 or 5,000 meters at the 2020 U.S. Olympic Track Trials.
“My goals are really big,” Rogers said. “I’m sure some might not believe that I will be able to get top three at the [2020 Olympic] Trials, but I’m using this new mentality where you live your life like you’re already there, and it’s actually working.”
Forming a Running Identity
Originally from Littleton, Colorado, Rogers ran track and cross country for Texas A&M. Her breakthrough season came in 2012, when she won the NCAA 10,000-meter title as a junior in her third attempt at the distance.
Two weeks later, Rogers finished second at the 2012 U.S. Olympic Trials with a time of 31:59. However, because Rogers didn’t better the Olympic standard of 31:45 required to represent Team USA, she could not compete in London.
Rogers said the experience of coming so close and missing the opportunity to compete at the Olympics haunted her. After the championship, she quit running entirely and studied abroad in Argentina. For a year, Rogers ignored the calls of track agents trying to recruit her.
Eventually, she signed a professional contract with New Balance and began training with coach Mark Coogan in Boston in 2014. But she struggled when she didn’t see the same level of success that she earned her junior year of college. She soon decided to leave the training group and move back home to Denver, where she was coached by Steve Magness.
In 2017, Rogers saw vast improvements on the track. She ran a 5,000-meter personal best of 15:08 and finished fifth in the 10,000 meters at the 2017 USATF Outdoor Championships with a personal best (31:54). While she saw success, the years of intense focus on running took a toll on Rogers’s mental health.
“These rollercoaster highs and lows are pretty typical for a runner, but I think for me it’s just a lot more extreme,” Rogers said. “I am so passionate about this and I really get lost in it at times. It becomes my identity.”
When Running Goes Away
In the process of navigating her sudden success, Rogers developed an anxiety disorder. While traveling to races around the world, she would have panic attacks in the airport. Rogers ignored the symptoms and kept competing.
In the winter of 2018, she was preparing to compete for Team USA at the IAAF World Half Marathon Championships when she came running for the first time and couldn’t run for 10 days. When she recovered, Rogers returned to running aggressively, worrying that she’d lost fitness. One day, her knee gave out on her. “No one was really sure what was going on,” she said. A few days before the race in March 2018, Rogers withdrew from the competition.
For the next four months, she was trying to heal her knee with slow improvement. In her search for treatment, she looked into platelet-rich plasma (PRP) injections, a therapy that uses injections of a patient’s own platelets to accelerate the healing process of injured tendons.
In August 2018, she had a PRP injection done on her knees, but the procedure backfired and left her in debilitating pain, she said.
“It left me unable to walk without pain for four months,” she said. “For awhile there, I accepted my fate that I would never be able to run again.”
Nothing Left to Lose
By the end of 2018, Rogers was still unable to run. She lost her professional sponsorship with New Balance. And to top it off, her boyfriend broke up with her.
“That was kind of the final straw. I really had nothing left to lose,” Rogers said. “I knew I was going to have to get a 9 to 5 [job], so that’s when I was just like, I need one thing that I’ll never be able to do again. I have to heal my heart and my mind.”
In December 2018, she decided to travel alone to Thailand. On the trip, she met many people from around the world who shared different perspectives. With pressure, expectations, and disappointment weighing her down for years, Rogers finally felt comfortable releasing the burden in a conversation with her new friends around a bonfire.
“We were talking about depression. It was so healing just to finally admit that I was depressed,” Rogers said. “When you do that, you can start seeing things turn around for yourself instead of just denying it and trying to put on a front.”
When Rogers returned to Denver after her trip, she was a “whole different human being,” she said. She realized that running did not define her, but she had faith that it would return to her life one day.
Letting Go
In February 2019, Rogers started working in tech sales at Conga. While her job didn’t give her a lot of time to think about running, she did set a small goal for herself: run five minutes. She completed the task, running for the first time in months. The pain was present but bearable, which gave her hope that she could gradually get stronger.
“Once I let everything go, traveled, and got my mind right, I saw things start coming back into my life,” Rogers said.
Over time, Rogers was able to manage 30-minute runs two or three days a week. In the spring of 2019, Ray Flynn, her longtime agent, called to check in on her running progress.
“He’s always been the more persistent one. He really believes in me and I think he loves to see me out there,” Rogers said. “He doesn’t really let me give up ever.”
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Eventually, Rogers agreed to let him inquire about her joining a training group. One of those calls was made to Kevin Hanson of the Hansons-Brooks Original Distance Project in Rochester Hills, Michigan.
Initially, Hanson was unsure of Rogers’s commitment to running at the elite level. He knew that she quit the sport once before and didn’t know if she’d be willing to commit again. But after meeting with her, Hanson’s perception shifted completely.
“She is so wrapped into the sport and people think the opposite of her,” Hanson told Runner’s World. “She says [she] wants nothing to do with running, and that’s because she cares so much. I saw that she really has unfinished business on her mind.”
So in July 2019, Rogers left her job and started running professionally under Hanson. She still trains in Denver, but joins the Hansons team for training stints throughout the year.
More Than a Runner
On January 18, she won the 10K at the where you live your life like youre already there, and its actually working slowly in the summer of 2019. Her first race back was the Great Cow Harbor 10K on September 21 in Northport, New York. She finished second overall in a time of 34:04.
While her knee pain still lingered, in the fall she discovered that the pain was manageable if she warmed up her knees in hot water. And as her body became accustomed to the movement of running again, the pain became less noticeable over time.
With the understanding that professional running and the elements that come with it—sponsorships, victories, and prize money—can go away, Rogers approached the sport in a new way. She honed mental strength with mantras and meditations. She also continued embracing the hobbies she loved when she was unable to run, such as writing and reading. She’s currently writing a science-fiction book that she hopes to finish by the end of 2020.
“[Running] is this spiritual journey,” Rogers said. “The act of running is my pure love for pushing my body to its limits and exploring those parts of myself.”
With the U.S. Olympic Trials four months away, Rogers isn’t holding back on her goals to make the Olympic team in the 10,000 or 5,000 meters. When she races this season, she’ll be using her setbacks as strengths.
“I’m very appreciative of what I’ve been through,” Rogers said. “I have no regrets. I’m thankful for having gone through such a hard time because it shaped me into who I am and that’s not just a runner. I know there’s more to myself.”
Taylor Dutch is a sports and fitness writer living in Chicago; a former NCAA track athlete, Taylor specializes in health, wellness, and endurance sports coverage. Her work has appeared in SELF, Runner’s World, Bicycling, Outside, and Podium Runner. When she’s not writing, Taylor volunteers as a coach to up-and-coming runners in the Chicago area.
