Gabrielle Wilkinson

Road to Atlanta Track Club Elite

With a grandfather who was a quarter-miler, a mother and sister who competed for Cornell University and a father who was a hurdler, Gabby has been running for as long as she can remember, even though soccer was her first love. ("I wasn't that good, but I was fast; I would get the ball and that was that.") She was only 8 years old when she joined her first track team, United Stars Track Club in Philadelphia, and 11 when she set a still-standing 800-meter record for her age group at the Colgate Women's Games of 2:18.80. Running for Friends' Central School in Wynnewood, Gabby set nine individual school records, earned eight state titles and won the 2018 Millrose Games Junior Mile. She also broke AAU Junior Olympics records at 800 and 1,500 meters before heading for the University of Florida, where she became a six-time All-American.

Track-Talking Family

Gabby looked up to her older sister, Elyse, who was already one of the top middle-distance runners on the East Coast before going on to a stellar career at Cornell. "She was who I wanted to be when I grew up," Gabby recalls. "How can I be fast just like her?" Her whole family, she says, "eats, sleeps and breathes track. My mom and aunt [who was a sprinter and middle-distance runner, and they've both run marathons] should have their own podcast, because they know every meet, every athlete, all the facts." Plus, she says, "I wouldn't have gotten this far without my parents driving me across the country to meets or taking time to drive me to practice after school at 6 p.m. and not getting home until 9."

"You've Got It in You"

Starting around the age of 5, Gabby loved competing at the Colgate Women's Games, a series of events open to girls and young women in which the top performers are awarded education grants. In her first race there - which she says may have been her first race, ever - she waved to her parents in the middle of a 200m sprint when she heard them cheering for her. Then in fifth grade she was in Colgate's 800m finals in Madison Square Garden, with scholarship money on the line, when she fell soon after the gun. "I was just like, I'm not ending like this. I picked up my glasses, put them back on and went from dead last to getting second. I think that's when I thought, 'OK, Gab, you've got it in you.'"

Millrose Memories

Gabby says that her upset win at the 2018 Millrose Junior Mile is "something I will never forget. All eyes were on Katelynn Tuohy [who was on such a hot streak that she'd been offered a spot in the professional mile]. My goal was to run with those ladies, get a PR, to keep moving. No matter who's in that race, anything can happen. So that race was really a testimony: Don't doubt yourself. You can do this." Watch her post-race interview here.

Double Surprise

Also unforgettable was winning the 1,500m at the 2021 SECs, despite - or rather, because - it wasn't her main event. "I was doubling to score points for my team but ended up winning it. I shocked myself." Gabby says that scoring points for the Gators as part of their first NCAA team title in 30 years is also among the highlights of her collegiate career.

What Brought Her to Atlanta Track Club

With her bachelor's degree in kinesiology and exercise science and her master's in health education behavior, the Club's mission to make Atlanta healthier plays to one of Gabby's passions: finding ways to give people the tools and resources to lead healthier lives. "Atlanta is such a diverse community, I feel this is a place where I can definitely grow and help. I'm all about community, so that's important to me. Plus great, great teammates, and being under Coach Tommy's guidance is really something I'm excited about."

An Issue Close to Her Heart

Gabby was visiting her grandmother in Arizona when an incident sent the older woman to the hospital. After eight hours in the emergency room, they still hadn't seen a doctor. Witnessing that, Gabby recalls, was something of an epiphany of two fronts: "This should not be happening," but also "How can we administer health information so that people know how to take care of themselves?"

The City of Trees

"The nature. There are so many trees and so much greenery even though it's the city. I love that. Piedmont Park is my favorite so far; I love to run there. You see so many people out. It reminds me of Central Park."

How She Knows She's Ready to Race

"You just get that feeling, that instinct. In training, you know 'that feels good, this feels easy.' For me, I get butterflies. If I wake up and I'm excited and smiling, I'm ready to race."