From PRs to PR: How Claire Manley Turns Athletes Into Brands
THE RUNNING EFFECT PODCAST
Dominic Schlueter
4.9 • 821 Ratings
🗓️ 21 October 2025
⏱️ 40 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Claire Manley went from chasing PRs on the track to building a storytelling engine for athletes and running brands.
She is the co-founder of Meet @ 7 Studios, a women-led social media and personal branding agency designed for professional runners and endurance athletes.
Her work focuses on giving athletes Fortune 500-level strategy and visibility while helping them own their stories and reach new audiences.
Before becoming a strategist and agency founder, Claire carved out her own story on the track.
A walk-on at Gonzaga University, she battled her way to captaincy and scholarship status while setting a 5000m personal best of 16:31.06 at the Oxy Invitational (in May of 2019), along with collegiate bests of 10:04 for 3000m and 4:47 for 1500m, and qualifying for the NCAA West Preliminary Round that year.
Her career timeline includes stops at Nike-sponsored Bowerman Track Club, where she built global community programs and launched the BTC Summer Training Program that drew participants from across 40 states and eight countries.
Today, she runs Claire Manley Consulting in Brooklyn, continuing that momentum through her independent strategy work.
Most recently, Claire has been active in Gonzaga’s alumni ecosystem, engaging with career treks that connect current students to NYC’s marketing and branding scene.
While she may not be lining up for NCAA championships anymore, her presence in the endurance space remains sharp, shaping the way athletes connect, communicate, and thrive in an increasingly digital sport.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | And so I think brands are taking more and more awareness of this, even like primary, like, |
| 0:04.0 | even their primary sponsors, but also secondary partnerships. |
| 0:07.0 | And yet athletes were born to run fast, not necessarily to create content, you know. |
| 0:13.0 | And so they are, I think a lot of athletes are struggling on knowing how to keep up. |
| 0:17.8 | Like, you know, now they're being asked to be, okay, I'm being a social strategist, I'm managing my community, I'm posting at the right times, I'm getting content. |
| 0:25.9 | Like, that's a lot to ask of someone who already has a full-time job and might not have the |
| 0:30.5 | marketing background. So basically, like, one of the major aspects of Meet at Seven is providing |
| 0:37.3 | social media and personal branding support for these athletes. |
| 0:41.0 | And then that also can lend itself to like secondary partnerships. |
| 0:49.8 | That was Claire Manley today on the Running Effect podcast. |
| 0:52.3 | She is the co-founder of a brand new company called Meet at Seven Studios. A woman-led social media and personal branding agency designed for professional runners and endurance athletes. Her work focuses on giving athletes fortune 500 level strategy and visibility while helping them with their own stories and reach new audiences in the process. |
| 1:11.4 | Today's conversation dives into Claire's background in the sports. |
| 1:14.5 | She ran for Gonzaga, Gunzaga. |
| 1:17.1 | I'm honestly not sure how to pronounce it. |
| 1:19.1 | Back in the day, as a D1 athlete, and then spent time with the Bowerman Track Club and |
| 1:24.4 | many other outlets before helping to co-found this agency. I really enjoyed |
| 1:28.8 | this conversation. We dive deep into the weeds of starting new business, staying within the |
| 1:33.6 | sport. A lot of advice for people out there. If your legs can't propel you to a professional |
| 1:38.3 | career in the sport of running, how you can make a path for yourself, carve a path for yourself |
| 1:42.4 | in this sport, whether it's through starting a company like her or podcast like me or something else. I really enjoyed this honest conversation. And it was cool to document her journey of starting Meet at Seven Studios the week of her launch. If you guys enjoy this one, pass it along the easiest way in which we can grow is word of mouth marketing. Give us a five star review. It takes five seconds and make sure you are following or subscribe to the podcast wherever you listen so that you never miss another episode. |
| 2:05.0 | And with all those notes aside, I hope you all enjoy this conversation with the one and only Claire Manley. |
| 2:13.2 | Claire Manley, welcome to the Running Effect podcast. |
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