Public Employee Press

MELS lawyer Lisa Daley
World Champion

Running is a lifetime love for Lisa Daley, a staff attorney at DC 37’s Municipal Employees Legal Services.

As a toddler in her native Jamaica, she relished racing her friends. And now, past the age of most Olympic competitors, she’s a top-rated runner nationally and worldwide in the older Masters category.

Throughout her schooling on the island before she came to the United States with her parents as a teen, Daley loved Sports Day, when studies are set aside for track and field events. On an athletic scholarship at Manhattan College, Daley competed in Division 1 National Collegiate Athletic Association meets.

But when Daley entered law school, she said she “couldn’t run and study at the same time. So, I decided to take a break.”

Now her break is over — and she’s come roaring back. With renewed commitment, she has become a U.S. and international Masters champion in the 200-meter and 400-meter races. She now holds the highest ranking in the 35-year-old Masters women’s group of the USA Track & Field Association.

“I missed running,” Daley said. “It’s been my backbone forever, even when I was young. And it always kept me in shape.”

Daley decided to run again after law school as she worked for the city Administration for Children’s Services. She has grown even more dedicated and competitive since joining the staff at MELS in 2002.

In the last two years, she has won her races at the World Masters Championship in San Sabastian, Spain, and at the U.S. championships in Hawaii and in Charlotte, N.C., where she also placed second in the 100-meter race. “I decided to try something new,” she said with a smile. “What the heck!”

Daley has stepped up her training to prepare for the 2007 World Masters Championship in Riccione, Italy, where she will be the defending champion. Each week, she spends threes days on the track doing distance and sprint work, two days lifting weights. She competes on Saturdays and rests on Sundays.

“I eat, sleep and drink track and field,” Daley said. “I’m having a lot of fun. I know people around the country, and in Spain, I met people from all over the world. And I am still the same size I was in college!”

— Gregory N. Heires