MADISON, Wis. — Just a year removed from an injury that held her out of her 2018 outdoor season, Wisconsin women's track and field junior Amy Davis is heading to Austin, Texas, for the 2019 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships in the 10,000 meter race — the same city where her mother, Nan (Doak) Davis won the same race in 1985.
"In the back of my mind I always think about how cool it would be to win in the same city where my mom won," Davis said.
Austin is just one of the many places her mom was victorious. A nine-time All-American at Iowa, Nan Davis capped her collegiate career with an NCAA 10,000 meter national championship in 1985 before winning U.S. titles in the 10,000 meter (1986 and 1989), 5,000 meter (1987) and marathon (1989). Nan Davis put together a resume that earned her the honor of Iowa's Female Athlete of the 1980s.
But, even with all of her mother's success as a distance runner, Nan Davis' youngest daughter, Amy, never felt pressured to follow in her mom's fast-moving footsteps.
"There was never any pressure from my parents to do distance running," Amy said. "Any pressure with running was pressure that I put on myself. My mom just told me she thought it's something I should try."
"Amy didn't start running until about fifth grade," Nan said. "And to be honest, we didn't go into it expecting anything out of her."
"All of a sudden we said 'Oh! We think she has some talent with this'."
Nan and her husband, Barry Davis, another former standout college athlete as a wrestler at Iowa, as well as an Olympic wrestler, started to notice some serious potential as Amy moved on into high school.
Even though there wasn't any push towards distance running, Amy's career has been littered with stories and lessons from her parents about finding success, in addition to anecdotes from their days as collegiate and professional athletes that helped motivate her running.
There's one story that Amy remembers to this day.
She had just finished runner-up for the second-straight year at the state cross country meet. Crying, Amy pleaded with her dad about how much she deserved to win on account of all her hard work.
"He looks at me," Amy recalled, sitting up.
"Straight-faced and he goes, 'You don't deserve anything, you earn everything'."
It was a lesson that Amy would take with her into this most recent season as she recovered from injury. To motivate herself back, she's used the word 'push' as motivation: to push through her injury to get back to running, to push through the difficulties of three separate seasons that come over the course of a school year, to push herself to get to the outdoor championships on June 6.
While Amy learned a valuable lesson from her dad, the former wrestling head coach at UW, distance running wasn't his area of expertise. But Amy said she's never got much coaching from her mom either with regards to running. Nan says she'll give Amy advice if she wants it, but won't go out of her way to impede on what she's learned thus far.
"If there was any advice I gave to Amy throughout high school, or anytime, it was that you need to be coachable," Nan pointed out.
But, it's more than just advice about coachability that Amy has picked up from her mom; she's inherited her race-day demeanor as well.
Davis is a bright spot in the Wisconsin locker room, described by teammates as 'bubbly', 'sparkly', 'energetic and loving'. But at the starting line, she's a reflection of Nan.
"People tell me when I get on the start line, all of a sudden, this thing comes over me like I'm possessed," Amy said. "That's just my race mode."
"I think Amy and I are the same in that way," Nan confirmed. "We get to the start line, try to socialize and take the edge off of it. Then, the gun goes off and you're on."
Now that Amy is heading to the NCAA Outdoor Championships, she'll have to channel that intensity again, just has she's done every race throughout her career. Going into a new level of competition, one that her mom is very familiar with, Amy's open to all the advice she can get competing on a national stage.
"She's kind of sprinkled in things here and there," Amy said when asked about her mom's advice leading up to race day. "She's pretty reserved and doesn't talk about what she did — it's actually been more so my dad bragging about her leading up to this."
Over the years, Nan hasn't let her successes overshadow her daughters accomplishments. But
Barry Davis won't hesitate to brag about his wife's accomplishments to her.
"We're walking around Sacramento," Amy remembered. "My dad goes 'Amy, did you know your mom won the marathon here? It was her first marathon and she won it.' "
Amy looked at her mom and asked, "Mom, are you serious?"
A faint, "oh, yeah I did", is all she got in response.
"So now, going into Austin," Amy continued. "My dad goes 'You know, your mom won in Austin'."
"Mom, you won in Austin?", she reenacted, almost angry at her mom's humility of winning in 1985.
A humble, "yeah, I did that too."
Now, it's Amy's turn to replicate the success at Wisconsin that her mom found with Iowa.
Even though Nan and Barry had met at the University of Iowa, there was never any push by her parents for Amy to attend their alma mater, even if a young Amy dreamt of it.
"When I was younger," Amy laughed, "my dream was that I was going to go to Iowa, and I was going to be a runner, and I would marry a wrestler, and then we'd be just like my parents."
"I sat at the Big Ten conference meet a couple weeks ago in Iowa City," Nan added. "I thought 'Wow, Amy would've looked nice in a Hawkeye uniform."
But Amy would eventually fall in love with Wisconsin's program and cherish the coaching staff, especially head women's cross country coach
Jill Miller, putting an end to her childhood fantasy. And after seeing how Amy felt after her visit with Wisconsin, the former Hawkeyes didn't make her go on any additional recruiting trips after that.
"She's paved her own path and is doing a lot of things that we're very proud of," Nan said. "And she's touched a lot of people's lives in a positive way and I think we're even more joyful about that."
With a community and nonprofit leadership degree, a certificate in education policies, and love for people,
Amy Davis can see herself continuing down any number of paths in the future. She expressed interest in grad school, interning with Athletes in Action, and even working in an athletic department in a student-athlete development role.
Whatever path she chooses,
Amy Davis will continue to push forward with that same inherited intensity she got from her mom. And while 'push' has been the word of the season for Amy, the lack of push from her mom, whether towards a certain sport, a certain way of running, or even a certain school, has led Amy to where she is now, with a shot at a national title.
But, on the night of June 6,
Amy Davis will push to be like her mom once again, as a national champion.
