“Smaller equals faster.” This was the sophomore year mantra that led me to lose tens of pounds that I shouldn’t have. I thought that I was helping myself, and everywhere I looked, my addiction to dropping numbers was reaffirmed as discipline.

A few weeks into my first varsity cross country season, Coach Kaczor asked to speak with me after practice. On a wooden bench in the athletic wing, he said the words that propelled me into recovery — “I’m worried about you.”

Him telling me that my weightloss was becoming detrimental to my well-being completely cracked the foundation that I had built my eating disorder upon. Here was someone whose job it was to make me a better runner, who was also wanting me to gain weight.

It seemed like an oxymoron. But I took it to heart anyway.

The following season, we both had high hopes for what I could achieve while actually being healthy. He was pushing me, assigning faster paces than I thought I was capable of. Sometimes I hit them, but with others, I panicked under my fear of failing. Regardless of the situation, he always knew when to push and when to back off.

It’s not an easy job to train teenagers to run, but he excels at it by taking a holistic approach to coaching. He understands that in order to perform at our best, our mental and physical health must be a priority.

Coach Kaczor made this clear by encouraging the team to communicate anything holding us back from running our best, even though this meant a lot of pre-practice and post-practice conversations.

Although it meant overtime for him, Coach made every chat feel important and somehow always offered the right response. Many afternoons he eased my anxiety about upcoming races with personalized advice and race strategy. Sometimes he just pulled me out of my head with the words, “Lexie, it’s running. You do it everyday.”

Prior to my best race of my senior year he said my favorite line of all: “Run the race that we both know you’re capable of.”

I didn’t get an all-time personal record that day, but I ran the whole 5K smiling and managed a season personal record. Coach Kaczor greeted me at the finish like I ran an Olympic trial’s qualifying time: “You did it! You were amazing!”

He has always been there to celebrate the wins of everyone on the team, no matter how small.

It wouldn’t be fair to talk about Coach Kaczor without also mentioning his other commitments as a third grade science teacher and a dad to two little girls. Occasionally, his daughters would accompany him on our Saturday morning practices, and for the past two years they hand-picked apples for the whole team to enjoy. Naturally, we’re all their biggest fans and get almost as excited as Coach when one of them has an assist to the winning goal of their soccer game.

I’m so grateful to have trained with such a thoughtful, inspiring coach for the past three years. In addition to showing me what it takes to be a great runner, Coach Kaczor taught me to believe in myself. I hope that everyone gets the opportunity to meet such an outstanding role model in their lifetime.