Sarah Spann (who now goes by her first/middle name Sarah Grace) was the 2010 3A Cross Country Finals state champion running 17:50.43 for 5k. Spann graduated from Fort Myers High School and attended the University of Florida. Since graduating she has been working on a book titled Chasing Freedom. We caught up with her to talk about it's release and what she's been up to since her high school days.
Flrunners,com: After running at Florida you became versed in sports nutrition starting your own website and social media platforms. As a runner, how important was it to share those healthy tips with others?
Sarah Spann: Since running for UF, I created a health and fitness website and instagram, Fresh Fit n Healthy, in order to help others also live a healthier life and to show (through all the yummy recipes I share) that healthy eating doesn't have to be boring or tasteless! Even though it was just for fun and as an outlet to share my recipes I loved to make, it turned into something bigger than I could have ever imagined. I'm also in the middle of completing my masters in Sports Nutrition and my dietetic internship, in pursuit of becoming a Registered Dietitian in 2017. My heart is in sports nutrition, helping athletes like you all reach your peak performance and full potential through nutrition!
FLR: Everything wasn't perfection though. The book is called Chasing Freedom and deals with some of your struggles and the road to get rid of them. What was the driving force behind writing this?
SS: Despite being busy in my masters program, in volunteering with the student-athletes here at Florida State University, and in my own personal work on Fresh Fit n Healthy, I have had a feeling deep down for quite some time to write a book on my story. See, in high school, because of experiencing some unfortunate events and going through some very dark valleys in life, I began to feel out of control completely of my life. That is when I began seeking control in all of the wrong places, which ultimately led to an eating disorder as I controlled the food I ate. Finally, I was able to find and overcome, to get off of this destructive path I was on, to begin LOVING myself and feeding my body again, and most importantly, to find the freedom I was chasing in all of the wrong places for so long.
As I began looking back as a conqueror, remembering this dark past of mine, I knew I had a story to tell. I knew my heart yearned to help others out there. To help them avoid such a deep valley of despair I had gone through, or to help them be a conqueror as well. I want every person out there to experience the freedom that I have found. Whether it be an eating disorder, or any other life circumstance that you are feeling chained down to, my heart behind writing this book is to help you find the KEYS to unlock those chains, so that you too can live totally free.
This book journeys through my high school years, as I experience some very deep valleys of hopelessness, leading me to chase freedom in all the wrong places. But this book doesn't end in the valley. This book, my journey, ends on the mountain top of victory, after finding the keys to unlock my prison I was stuck in for so long. Only God can turn a MESS into a MESSAGE, a TEST into a TESTIMONY, and a VICTIM into a VICTOR...and that is exactly what He did for me.
FLR: What do you hope readers get out of the book and how can they get a copy?
SS: My heart and prayer for this book is that it will help you or a friend unlock your chains, and find the freedom that I am blessed to have found and get to live in every single day. Here's the link to view the back cover and purchase! http://bit.ly/1Y3vbcq
Sarah Spann (who now goes by her first/middle name Sarah Grace) was the 2010 3A Cross Country Finals state champion running 17:50.43 for 5k. Spann graduated from Fort Myers High School and attended the University of Florida. Since graduating she has been working on a book titled Chasing Freedom. We caught up with her to talk about it's release and what she's been up to since her high school days.
Flrunners,com: After running at Florida you became versed in sports nutrition starting your own website and social media platforms. As a runner, how important was it to share those healthy tips with others?
