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Kaleigh Mahaney moved to Missoula 10 months ago from Salt Lake City, and she dove right into all things Missoula. She joined Run Wild Missoula in January 2026 with the motivation to participate in the Missoula Marathon Training Class, “I had no idea where to start – not even Chat GPT could write up a good training plan for me.” She works remotely as a Client Success Manager for a financial tech company. Growing up she trained as a competitive gymnast with an Olympic level coach. It was intense and eventually deterred her away from training.
In the last 2 years, Kaleigh has been on a health journey, and training for the half marathon has become a significant piece of it. She felt she was in a good place to get back into healthy training habits. Since joining RWM and the Missoula Marathon training class, running and training has become so much more approachable. “Sandy and Amber are so nice and chill, and they want you to enjoy the training. They teach you to like to run. I’ve learned a lot and have a lot less pressure on myself. I am happy to be there, and I am excited to have and want the goal of finishing the half marathon.” The RWM membership felt worth it to Kaleigh when she got to the first day of training class and experienced people being present and consistent in the community, “people are so nice, and it’s been so easy to meet new people.”
Over the past few months, Kaleigh’s involvement with RWM has been nothing short of inspiring. She believes she was given a specific personality to love people and show up for people as a positive and authentic force. In March, she volunteered at Run for the Luck of It bib pick up. The combination of being present in the community and her welcoming spirit led her to raise her hand enthusiastically to lead RWM’s newest monthly program, Sole Mates. “I love love, and people meeting people that are life giving to them, and those connections need to be in person. I want to make a space for that to be experienced.” Sole Mates is an opportunity to have a low pressure space off social media and apps to make friends or date. It’s designed to be an, “in person hangout without making anyone nervous or feel like they have to show up in a certain way. If you leave with a new friend, or a date and someone’s phone number you do, but at the end of the day it’s an opportunity to meet new people in an organic way.”
Kaleigh loves connection and building relationships. If you see her out and about the best topic to get a conversation going is history. She studied sociology and anthropology. Historic Underground Missoula is her must read and she’ll talk about Missoula’s underground tunnels any day. A recent win for Kaleigh worth celebrating is sticking to the half marathon training, “I am so proud of myself for even starting training and the classes. Formal training is never something I saw myself getting back into and I’m really excited about it.” So when you see Kaleigh, celebrate her win and give her some much deserved kudos!
A message Kaleigh would like to give her fellow Run Wild Missoula members is, “Stay friendly, stay kind, and stay approachable. Running and athleticism is so scary for so many people, and it can hold people back from something they could really love.”
