I think one of the coolest things about running is the fact that we can all start from different backgrounds, athletic abilities, and ages but end up at the same level with hard work. Running is a sport that doesn't always require talent. Through my running journey, I have heard some really cool stories about how runners got their start in the sport. One story even led to a really cool creative campaign I made for my internship at the P3R and can be viewed on my LinkedIn. It also stems from an article I read on Active about how runners live different lifestyles from other athletes. I decided to use this as my inspiration for my final project on telling a narrative in a unique way. I have written narratives previously on this blog but knew this one would be unique. I also knew the only way I could gather multiple stories like this is to use my teammates and work with them to tell their stories. I tried to keep the stories general to relate to a larger audience. This is where my idea came from and I ran with it from here.
(P3R is the parent company to the PGH Marathon. They have been the biggest inspiration for writing my blog.)
I chose a website because I knew this could be a great way to share multiple stories. I thought a website is the most visually appealing for the type of content I was trying to create. Thanks to my classmates, I added a submission tab where runners can feel free to share their story. My hope is that the website will be built out to over 20 stories to inspire regular people to get involved in this sport.
I incorporated three components to this story. The first being it is a collaborative piece where I worked with runners to tell their story and also share their story via the submission page. Second, the story is non-linear because viewers may choose to view any story at any time. I have no particular order for the stories and have chosen to leave it to the viewer on where to start. This would also fall into the category of an interactive narrative. The final component I added was internal linking stories with similarities through hypertext.
I broke each runners page out into four sections with some multimedia elements on the side. The first section is titled athletic background where I asked my teammates to tell me about their background in sports growing up. I was not surprised to find that most had some sort of athletic ability prior to beginning a running career, but some didn't which is great too. I'm hoping by having stories one both, it would appeal to a greater audience.
The next piece I believe is the most crucial and was challenging when I asked each runner. I told them to tell me about the first time they set out for a run. We found this to be a bit difficult because most of us have been running for at least 6 years. They were able to tell some interesting stories about where their first run took place. This ended up being my favorite part of the site because this piece helps showcase the progression of the runners.
The third component of the page is a section on where the runner is at today with their career. I planned on using this part to internally link the pages with similarities. This happened to be another suggestion from one of my classmates.
The fourth section included future plans for the athletes running career. It will be composed of races they plan on running in the future with hyperlinks to the websites of those races, running groups they may join, and overall plans for training. Next to this I plan on showcasing the athletes career-best times with a progression over the past 5 years. Other elements will include images of the athlete running, videos of races, and photos of their favorite place to run.
I really enjoyed this process and have to say that this was my favorite final project. It was awesome seeing my teammates laugh about funny memories they had when talking about their first run. Please view the final product here.