An escape and space to heal: Gail Taylor found a home in Alaska’s mountain running community

At first, Gail Taylor ran to escape.

Escape the sorrow from the loss of her husband Kendall, who died in December 2006. And escape from the pressures of her new life as a single mother raising their five children on her own.

She was 41.

“I was grief-stricken,” Taylor said. “I just started jogging in the snow in the winter in my jeans or whatever (I was wearing) on the road at night. It was usually at night after they were in bed or later in the evening.”

What started as long runs on the streets of Wasilla or indoor tracks evolved into mountain running and racing.

And what started as an escape — a place to separate — became a place of community. It’s also a place where she celebrates family. Her son Josh is among the state’s best runners and has competed and coached on the international level.

However, her initial introduction to mountain running came from David Johnston. Johnston, himself a legendary Alaska distance runner, occasionally noticed Taylor on those late-night runs.

“He stopped a few times, and one time when he stopped, he gave me the Alaska Mountain Runners calendar that they printed every year,” Taylor said. “He said, ‘You have to run a race.’ ”

Taylor initially resisted. She’d never run competitively or had been an athlete in high school. She said even though she was running 20-30 miles a day, at that point, she didn’t even know what a marathon was.

“That may sound very ignorant, but I knew it was a long race,” she admitted. “That’s about all I knew.”

But after a few more discussions with Johnston, including some talks on long runs, Taylor found herself racing in the mountains. She ran the Government Peak Climb in 2007, the first year the race was contested. She won her age division and finished sixth overall.

Later that summer, she ran Crow Pass Crossing, finishing second in the women’s division. For about five years, Taylor was a staple on the leaderboards of Alaska’s summer mountain and long-distance trail races and even ran the Boston Marathon.

While she never considered herself a competitor, Taylor said the competitions gave her an objective to focus on.

“I think that David sort of led me into these races with the idea that it gave me a goal, and then I would keep running, and that got me through the difficult times,” she said.

She won the Matanuska Peak Challenge in 2009, setting a new women’s record of three hours, 36 minutes, 44 seconds. Taylor is also one of only a few dozen people to complete the Chugach Mountain Front Range Linkup of 13 summits. She earned other race victories but was mostly nonchalant about her success.

“She’d take the day to do a race and then she’d be back in the afternoon and back to being mom,” Josh Taylor said. “She didn’t feel like it was a big deal. But then as you look back and it slowly builds over the years and everything, it’s like, ‘Wow, it’s more impressive as time goes on.’ ”

Eventually running became less of a solitary pursuit and Taylor, now 57, was welcomed into the larger community.

“The people in the running community that I have met through these years, getting through my husband dying and raising my children on my own and all that have just been the most wonderful, understanding, supportive people,” she said. “That’s what I love about this group.”

It was around this time that Josh started joining her on training runs.

“He was six at the time I started racing and would just tag along behind me on these trails,” she said.

After taking a hiatus from competition until about four years ago, Taylor has returned in recent years. Over the winter, Gail and Josh planned to complete all nine Alaska Mountain Runners Grand Prix races. Gail was the only runner in the state to complete all nine. Josh made eight but was racing in Europe and a flight delay forced him to miss Mount Marathon in Seward on the Fourth of July.

And as Gail returned to racing, Josh wasn’t on her tail but blasting up to the front of the pack.

Josh Taylor finished second in the overall Grand Prix points race this year, winning the Government Peak race and bagging two other runner-up finishes.

“I just feel blessed,” she said. “Just go to be able to run it together and to watch him grow from tagging along behind me, to where I can’t keep up with him, is an amazing experience.”

Josh’s first race in 2012 was the Matanuska Peak Challenge. The 12-year-old was inspired by his mom to compete in his first big race, but midway through the incredibly taxing race, Josh was ready to give up.

“She kind of had to put on her mom voice and say, ‘No, this is something you wanted to do. We’re gonna push through and we’re gonna finish it. We have to get back to the end anyway. There’s no quitting out here. You have to keep toughing it out,’” he recalled. “She pushed me through the whole thing, basically carrying me mentally and emotionally.”

She was given InSpurrational Award following the season, tying for second place in the women’s rankings. And, after being welcomed into the fold during her early years running, the Taylors are veterans and part of the welcoming committee.

“There’s more of a sense of camaraderie, of we’re all here just to try to finish and survive against the mountain and then racing against each other is almost secondary,” Josh Taylor said. “The biggest motivation for me was probably that aspect and just the positive environment kept bringing me back.”

Josh Taylor continues to tackle bigger races, heading to Spain this weekend for the 2024 Skyrunning World Championships.

While Gail Taylor started running as a solo pursuit, being able to run with her son has turned into one of her life’s greatest joys.

“I just feel blessed, I guess, because some of the happiest times in my life are to be able to go run with him,” she said.

And while she’s likely to dial down her racing next summer, Taylor will still be in the mountains, a return to her roots as a runner.

“I never wore a watch,” she said. “I never looked up how fast was a good time in a race. I just went out there and ran it as hard as I could run, for me to just run.”