How to do Colleen Quigley-style fast braids

As everyone knows, braiding your hair makes you fast on the track. About a year ago, Bowerman Babe, US indoor mile champion and Instagram queen Colleen Quigley started posting hair-braiding styles every Friday, using the hashtag #fastbraidfriday. This week Quigley thought her training partner, triathlon-champion-turned-marathoner Gwen Jorgensen (who recently had foot surgery) could use a little cheering up, so she gave Jorgensen a fast braid and videotaped the session.

Quigley got a lot of experience braiding her teammates’ hair on the bus on the way to meets during high school. This continued into college, and Quigley is the go-to braider for the Bowerman Track Club.

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Jorgensen gets a “headband” braid, and the video also contains clips of Quigley braiding teammate Shelby Houlihan’s hair. She even takes credit for Shalane Flanagan’s fast braids at the Olympics in 2016. Flanagan finished sixth, so there’s proof–fast braids make you fast. (And considering the top two finishers have now been busted for doping, that means Flanagan actually finished fourth.)

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Quigley also gives a shout-out to the Instagram account Runnerbraids by the New York braider and runner Carly, who braids Quigley’s hair whenever she’s in New York for a race (though Quigley also braids her own hair).

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Near the end, Quigley demonstrates the Dutch braid (as opposed to the French braid), where the side strands go under instead of over the middle strand, and explains there are many different styles (all of which are uniformly fast).

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