Going the Distance: Pollee Hruby Brookings ’02

The only hint of Pollee’s future as a competitive ultramarathoner at Fay was the joy she found in excelling at the annual Founders’ Day 400m running event. “I would anticipate it for months because that was my time to shine, and it felt like such a big deal,” she recalls with a chuckle. A stand-out athlete in soccer, basketball, and lacrosse, Pollee never ran competitively in high school but loved going for a daily run. She sustained a year-round running habit through college, grad school, and a move to Bangor, Maine, where only the most dedicated runners can make it through the long winters.

 

When Pollee and her husband, Dave, moved to Portland, Oregon, in 2014, she ran her first marathon and hated it so much that she took a year off from running, burned out by the experience. However, discovering the incredible trails around Portland with her dog and the vibrant trail-running community transformed her perspective. She started running trails, enjoying the beautiful scenery of her new home.

 

“Then it just blew up,” she says, “because as soon as you start trail running, you start getting into ultra running because trail and ultra just go together.”

 

Pollee’s first trail race was in 2018, a 15-miler in the Tillamook State Forest with trails that ran straight up and down and long stretches by herself in the woods. It was hard, but she came in fourth and fell in love with the experience. She started to educate herself about how to fuel for long races, which took the mystery out of running ultra distances. “You start to understand

what's possible because you hear people talk about and normalize these distances.” Pollee signed up for her first ultra distance, a 50k in Smith Rock State Park, a stunning miniature Grand Canyon-like site in Oregon, and loved it. Six weeks later, she unexpectedly got into a 50- miler at Mt. Hood and finished fourth.

 

“I felt amazing the whole day,” says recalls. “My husband was there, and friends were high-fiving me and running snacks out to me along the way. It was a beautiful day in the mountains, and I just loved the camaraderie and community feeling.”

 

Pollee’s passion for the sport is still growing. Just last month, she ran a 62- mile qualifying race to get into TDS UTMB Mont-Blanc, a 90-mile race that starts in Courmayeur, Italy, and ends in Chamonix, France. “It’s a huge bucket list race for me,” she notes. Pollee took first place for female runners in the qualifying race, cheered on by her sister Emily Hruby Halpern ’98 P’32, who crewed for her.

 

When she’s not running, Pollee works as a pediatric nurse practitioner at Children’s Hospital in Portland in the orthopedics department. She credits her natural optimism with her ability to keep going during long, grueling distances. “I get overwhelmed with gratitude to be able to do this,” she says. “I think about who I am and the friends and family who have gotten me here, and even when I feel terrible, I'm grateful to be out in nature and to see the things that I'm seeing because not everyone can go do these things.”