Q&A: How Personal Coach Montana DePasquale is Running the Show

Coach Montana DePasquale helps runners meet their personal goals. Courtesy of Montana DePasquale.

Montana DePasquale started running her own show when was just thirteen years old. Back then, she focused on long-distance cross-country and indoor and outdoor track, continuing to develop her skills throughout high school and eventually being recruited for the Division I track team at Bucknell University. 

“I was always a student of the sport since I was in high school,” DePasquale says. “My coaches would give me clips of studies and articles from magazines that they thought I would like to learn how to become a better, faster, smarter runner.” At Bucknell, she majored in psychology with an emphasis in sports psychology. She gained experience through internships with a goal of becoming a Division 1 cross-country coach out of college. After graduation, she headed to Michigan State University to do just that. 

While she loved the gig, it was a year-round grind and she ended up looking into other career options. She moved to Rhode Island to pursue a marketing career, but the drive to connect with a running community was still there. When the pandemic set in, gyms closed and more people took to the streets to run.

DePasquale saw a need. 

“I started online coaching and took on a very small handful of clients,” she says. “It was part-time, without any ambition of making it my full-time career. But it just blossomed and blossomed.”

In 2021, she founded Coach Montana DePasquale, and officially became a personal running coach. 

“I love working with runners regardless of their ability level. I don’t care if you are a brand-new runner/walker, or if you are a multi-time Boston [Marathon] qualifier; I also work with people training for the Olympic trials,” she says. “If you have a desire to do things the right way — you want to learn how to train smart, how to feel the best from your running — then that’s my ideal client.”

She has worked with high school clients aiming for college recruitment, first-time runners looking to improve their form and avoid injury, and people hoping to qualify for the Boston Marathon as well as people striving to run their first or best five-K, half-marathon or marathon. DePasquale offers both one-on-one and group coaching. 

This spring, she’s offering a program tailored for mothers, and will hold a “Road to Boston” camp in the fall to help runners on the cusp of Boston qualifier times reach their goals. coachmontanadepasquale.com

Run Smart

Lace up with DePasquale’s running tips.

Your shoes are your best piece of equipment. Don’t rely on whatever looks good. Go to a running store and get fitted properly.

Start gradually. “The biggest mistake I see people make, is they go out way too hard, and do too much way too soon,” she says. Start conservatively, especially for new runners. The majority need to start with running/walking.

There’s no specific number of miles you need to run each week. “I’ve had people run as few as three days and I’ve had people run seven days a week and still run great marathons.” 

As a mom, early mornings are her best time to run. “I think every mom can relate; you shut it off at a certain point and something incidentally comes up, so it’s better to get it done first thing in the morning,” she says.

For running during dark early mornings, DePasquale wears a light up reflective vest. “It has reflective strips in front and back and I wear a bright headlamp on my head which lights up the path in front of me.”