Jess Movold springs off her living room floor like a superhero taking flight. With a soft landing, she bounces back up 11 more times to complete the set of jump squats. She’s already led her Instagram Live audience through a series of dead bugs, jumping lunges, She’s already led her Instagram Live audience through a series of dead bugs, jumping.
“Don’t stop, don’t cheat yourself,” Movold implores. “If I can do it, you can do it! We can do it together!” Through the 38-minute broadcast, seen by more than 75,000, she also thanks commenters for shout-outs—“Glad you enjoy the coaching! Five seconds to go…”She drops in training tips, like how to speed recovery between exercises—“Biiiiiig inhale between efforts!” She even makes the case for not hating burpees during the burpees—“undeniable full-body strength!”
Movold started these Wednesday strength sessions for runners in March, as the Manhattan studios where she’d led strength and running classes closed for public health restrictions. In her typical undaunted manner, she took her classes into her apartment and invited the world to join her. Now, the world is showing up.
Movold spent her childhood avoiding the long miles she now celebrates. Every morning, her dad, and eventually her older sister, ran a three- to five-mile loop around their hometown of Hermann, Missouri, a one-stoplight town 90 minutes west of St. Louis. Movold steadfastly declined her dad’s invitations, all the while wondering how he was always so positive The Devil Wears Prada.
But as she entered junior high, she was drawn to the speed of her school’s track sprinters. Movold loved the “run hard, but die fast” mentality of the workouts, and reached the state championships in the 4x200 relay as a senior. When she entered Missouri State University after high school, Movold focused on a career in fashion and forgot about running. Her dedication earned her an internship at Tommy Hilfiger in New York City. But like most New York commuters, she was forced to play subway roulette, often finding herself on the losing end of delays, construction, and packed cars. Her consolation prize: a sprint across four avenues to make it on time.
“I started running like a crazy person in my intern outfit with heels in my bag,” Movold says.
The morning commutes inspired Movold to run for more than the sake of punctuality. “I used to think you could only run on a treadmill or a path, but running to my office showed me that in a city, you have everywhere to run,” says Movold. By the end of the summer, she’d logged so many miles that she had decided to train for her first marathon.
Movold turned that internship with Tommy Hilfiger into an entry-level job and then another job, and then another as she established herself in the fashion world. But the long hours and hustling to complete absurd requests—like finding her boss a steak and salad at 7:30 a.m., or delivering his weekend spending money via a helicopter—grated on Movold. “I was basically Anne Hathaway in Health - Injuries.”
There was a bright spot: Movold’s running habit from her intern days had stuck. Colleagues asked her for training advice, and at photo shoots she’d convince curious photographers and models that despite their doubts, yes! they really could be runners. “I started to recognize that those were the only times I felt alive at work,” she says.
In 2016, Movold told her steak-for-breakfast boss that she was quitting. To her surprise, he challenged her. “He was playing me,” she says, “trying to get me to stay, saying he understood it was too challenging, too much pressure, that the mountain was too steep.”
“I told him, no, it’s the wrong mountain.”
As Movold was exiting the fashion world, she also began working out at The Fort, a gym in Manhattan. Just like the runners at her office, other athletes at the gym noticed her—and her endless enthusiasm for sweating until she was on the floor exhausted. A few asked if she was taking on clients to train, and she helped without thinking, or even asking for payment. “Starting to coach was such a joy, nothing felt like work,” she says.
Movold realized she needed a more professional mind-set to succeed. And beyond billing, she earned certifications from the Road Runners Club of America and the National Academy of Sports Medicine to coach and train athletes. She’s since become a senior coach at The Fort, in addition to joining Runner’s World Run Like Nobody Is Checking Strava.
Her new career works a 5–9 schedule, she says with a laugh. Normally she’d wake around 5 a.m. for her first client and finish when her final evening class wraps. The fashion world prepared her for the demanding hours, though none of her current clients make 10 p.m. requests for live goldfish. All day, her mood is unflinchingly upbeat: energized, she says, by each interaction with an athlete in need of guidance.
“I’m a vessel for motivation for my athletes,” she says. “I find their ‘why’ and reflect it back.”
With gyms still closed, Movold is separated from her runners. But she’s undeterred, thriving even. “I never saw myself as a microphone-and-lights instructor, the center of attention,” she says.
How to Stay Motivated With No Races on the Horizon and the Mile High Run Club, texting clients, and coaching Runner’s World+ members, Movold knows she’s climbing the right mountain.
How to Run Like Coach Jess
and the Mile High Run Club
Goals, like finishing a marathon, and structure, like a workout plan, are essential for guiding runners through a season. But Movold says the key to maintaining a long-term relationship with running is finding what really drives you—whether it’s a new sense of confidence or getting off medication. “Identifying this unlocks everything that’s possible for a runner,” says Movold.
That understanding of why you put on your running shoes can be used to hold yourself accountable when you’re distracted or discouraged by short-term goals. Whether or not you nail a speed session, those inner passions will persist to drive you.
Find Strength In Every Setback
Whether it’s injury, missing a PR, or having a race—or season—canceled, failure is an inevitable part of running. But falling short of a goal doesn’t negate all the work put in along the way, says Movold. “Running is about learning about yourself and honing a skill over time so that each training cycle, race, and experience builds on what you’ve already accomplished.” All that physical and mental hard work will make future goals more attainable.
“And if you’re still feeling that salty about it,” says Movold, “use that as motivation to take training a little bit more seriously or fine-tune an aspect, like mobility, if an injury set you back.”
First Boston Marathon? Here‘s What to Know
In preparing to break three hours in her next marathon, Movold keeps going back to this interval workout. Getting the most out of it hinges on maintaining the right pace; you’re looking to run at or just below goal race pace, Movold says. It should feel tough, but not impossible.
Start with an easy two-mile warmup, followed by eight 1K repeats at half-marathon to marathon goal pace. Jog for two minutes to recover between each repeat. Finish the workout with a two-mile cooldown.
Credit: Eric Ryan Anderson
Years ago, Movold had a coach who she just didn’t connect with. She felt like she was never fast enough. Rather than being internally motivated, she started running to impress him.
“I ran every single run at race pace to fool myself. I didn’t accept my current level of fitness,” Movold says. “I tried to rush it, which led to a stress fracture, not running the Boston Marathon, and being sidelined for two months.” It’s easy, Movold says, to let the external pressures of social media and other people’s expectations work against you. But after her injury healed, she was able to find joy (and success) in running by accepting her fitness and avoiding the frustration of failing to meet unreasonable goals.
Credit: Eric Ryan Anderson
Reconnecting with running and making it a habit again is intimidating, says Movold. “It’s disappointing to realize you’ve lost a step, and the fear of failure can creep in.” So Movold tells athletes to start with a simple commitment to run for 30 minutes without paying attention to pace or distance. It’s how she got moving again after her stress fracture, she says, because it rebuilds the habit of regular runs without the distraction of past fitness markers. When they’re ready to start tracking progress, she’ll have them measure out their 30-minute run and then try to cover the distance faster the next week to create new goals as their fitness returns.
