The Women's Running Podcast

In this episode I speak to Carla Molinaro. Carla is a runner and adventurer of epic proportions – and even more importantly, if you read the magazine, you might remember her adorning the cover of our April issue this year. She first came to my attention in 2020 when she smashed the Land’s End to John O’Groats record by about 10 hours during lockdown. Turns out this wasn’t her first adventure by a very long chalk. She tells me about her start in running, which actually came from triathlon, and how she found her running ‘niche’. She has loads of running advice for us here too, as happily she’s also a running coach who has a passionate belief in strength and conditioning for runners, and in fact runs a course that does exactly that – details below. She also tells me some of her adventuring stories, such as her ridiculous tapering plan before the Comrades, taking on the Lejog challenge with just 3 months training, and attempting an ultramarathon with a quiche tucked in her pocket. She also bigs up hill training - if you want to run faster, she says, run up hills, it’s the perfect way to become a better runner. Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts – these reviews mean the WORLD to us, and really help us to keep this podcast going. And as we’re firm friends now, so I think you should join us. If you become a member of Women’s Running right now, you’ll get a FREE base layer from Zerofit, worth £40. Just enter X21WRPOD at the checkout.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode we’re talking gear. And there’s a reason for this – We’ve just stumbled past Halloween, and you interrupt us having a giggle about that, and then next up it’s firework night, and before you know it, it’ll be Christmas. Don’t hate me for saying that. So if you’ve got some favours to pull in, it’s worth thinking about those big ticket items first, so you get exactly what you want on Christmas Day. And by that, I mean shoes and jackets. So this is us having a chat about the shoes we’re currently running in, and the jackets we’re wearing to keep the wind and rain away. Both these things are equally important right now – we need shoes that enable us to keep our mileage up during the winter, and jackets have suddenly become indispensable overnight. Like, what’s going on with the weather? Holly chats about her favourites and I talk about mine, and all the things we discuss are good – promise. We’ve run in everything, and really tested them to their limits, which is what we like to do here at Women’s Running. So if you’re on the lookout for that perfect running jacket that keeps you protected from downpours without making you clammy, then listen in!Here are all the things we talk about:New Balance Fresh Foam 1080v11, London edition £145Brooks Hyperion Tempo, £140Brooks Ghost 14, £120HOKA ONE ONE Rincon 3, £105Inov-8 Trailshell waterproof jacket, £127.50Inov-8 Thermoshell Pro Insulated jacket, £210Montane Spine waterproof jacket, £250Showers Pass Cloudburst jacket, £175 Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts – these reviews mean the WORLD to us, and really help us to keep this podcast going. And as we’re firm friends now, so I think you should join us. If you become a member of Women’s Running right now, you’ll get a FREE base layer from Zerofit, worth £40. Just enter X21WRPOD at the checkout for your exclusive Podcast shaped deal.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to Episode 63 of the Women’s Running Podcast. This is one of our hybrid episodes – it’s part workshop chat with me and Holly, and part chat with one of our favourite people to give us some advice. Our expert this week is the very lovely Anna Harding from the Running Channel. She’s been on here before – way back in the mists of time in episode 8. Check that out to hear all about how she started running in the first place, and her journey from non-runner to running expert. In this episode it’s a game of two halves. I wanted to talk to her about her recent efforts to achieve a Boston Qualifying time, which was documented on the Running Channel – links to that are in the show notes, you must watch it. She definitely went on one of those journeys we talk about here so often, but has survived to tell the tale, and here she is to tell us all about it. And here’s a treat for you, I’ve asked Anna to tell us all about it in the January issue of Women’s Running, so remember to pick up that issue, when it’s out just before Christmas to read her story in full. It’s a perfect stocking filler fyi.And then Holly and I want to pick her brains about winter running and how we motivate ourselves to get out there – and her tips here are nothing short of genius. Pants on the radiator for the win. This, and more super top tips are right this way. Just to forewarn you, Anna has a very beautiful dog called Ralph (who has his own Insta page by the way), who introduces himself to us fairly early on, and enjoys keeping us on our toes - I decided to keep all his little barks in because he’s a beauty and deserves our support and affection.Watch Anna’s attempt to Boston Qualify – be warned, it’s a weeper.Follow Anna and Ralph! Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts – these reviews mean the WORLD to us, and really help us to keep this podcast going. And as we’re firm friends now, so I think you should join us. If you become a member of Women’s Running right now, you’ll get a FREE base layer from Zerofit, worth £40. Just enter X21WRPOD at the checkout.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Holly and I are talking about parkrun. Yes, we actually went after talking about it for months. After a bit of an early start, and some not inconsiderable nerves, we got Holly through her very first parkrun – and only my second since lockdown lifted, so it felt very new to both of us. We talk about our experiences, but most specifically Holly’s – how she found the course, the experience itself, and how she feels now. It turns out she was quite overwhelmed by it, in a good way, and loved the marshalls around the course, who cheered us on in such a lovely way that by the halfway point, she’d decided to volunteer herself! We talk about the caring nature of the volunteer team, getting lots of special claps (not a euphemism), Holly feeling “glowy”, and meeting an actual podcast listener at the end, which made it all feel very special indeed. We then have a bit of a chat about running more visibly now that the days are shorter – along with our own safety, we really need to be mindful of pedestrians as it can be a bit of a nasty shock if someone passes you unexpectedly, especially if they’re wearing dark clothing. Ban the black leggings till February! Coming up in a future episode, we’ll talk about the best winter kit to make sure you’re seen and warm This episode is sponsored by Marcy. The Marcy ME-702 upright bike is the deserving winner of the Women’s Running Editor’s Choice award in the cardio training category. With 13 different programs and 4 user settings, it’s perfect for every kind of gym bunny. You can pick one up today from Costco or Exercise.co.uk for only £399, where it’s also available on 0% finance. And if you love this podcast, you’ll totally love our brilliant magazine. If you become a member of Women’s Running right now, you’ll get a FREE base layer from Zerofit, worth £40 as well as our gorgeous mag delivered to your door once a month, all for just 39.99. Just enter X21WRPOD at the checkout for your exclusive offer.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, I speak to Nikki Love, runner, adventurer and menopause goddess. I love talking to women who speak frankly about their bodies and their experiences of the weirdnesses being female can throw at us, and Nikki does all of that and then some. We pile straight into the menopause, as Nikki’s experience is pretty grim listening, but also incredibly inspiring for those of us staring menopause in the face. She talks about the stuff that she had to push for with her GP, as traditional HRT wasn’t working for her, and she also talks about the link between nutrition and menopause, which is fascinating. Now you might be wondering what all this has to do with running – and the thing here is that Nikki isn’t just your average plodder. When she runs, she really runs. She pretty much went from couch to 63 marathons in 63 days, and since that epic adventure, she has just tried to find more ways to push herself to the limits of her endurance. Those limits were tested earlier this year when she attempted 100 marathons in 100 days and ended up with a gruesome injury as a result. But, as optimistic as ever, Nikki picked herself up and adjusted her training to suit. She talks to me about how she found out she was good at all this endurance stuff, how she’s being kinder to herself these days -and certainly pragmatic, and the adventures she has up her sleeve. She’s just a superwoman. This episode is sponsored by Marcy, winners in the Best Strength Category for their Inspire FTX Trainer in this year’s Women’s Running Product Awards. The FTX Trainer is a fantastic home gym that’s perfect for the whole family. It comes with two independent pulley systems, quick adjust sliders and 30 positions, giving you the freedom of doing practically any exercise you want. The FTX Trainer is available for £2,199, or with 0% finance. If you become a member of Women’s Running right now, you’ll get a FREE base layer from Zerofit, worth £40. Just enter X21WRPOD at the checkout for your exclusive offer.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It’s the 60th episode of the Women’s Running Podcast, and our 22nd Workshop. Goodness we’ve done a lot of podcasts! In this episode Holly and I have a lot to catch up on. We’re talking the day after the London Marathon and we have had ALL the feels about that iconic race, particularly because I didn’t get to run it as planned. We talk about how inspiring it is, how weepy it is, how nerve-wracking it is, and how – sort of secretly – we’d both like to take it on next year. We also talk about the races that we have signed up to, or would like to – including a lovely trail run in April that we’re hoping to sign up for. And then we’re on to the really big news in Esther and Holly Land: our trip to Club La Santa a fortnight ago, which didn’t quite go as planned. Spoiler: I went on my own and Holly stayed at home, staring mournfully at a PCR test. So the latter half of this episode is all about me and my trip to Lanzarote to a place that is essentially a Runners’ Paradise. And, much like Women’s Running, it’s a place for all kinds of runners too – perfect for those who love a bit of track running, those who want to push their pace, lonely goats who want to beat their own path, or social runners who want to head out in a chatty gang. They’re all there. And you can do so many other things to support your running too: you can book yourself into hundreds of exercise classes, you can take on bouldering, you can cycle up volcanoes, you can learn how to windsurf, you can have a running analysis, you can eat and drink the most incredible food, and you can even just eat ice cream. It’s all up for grabs. Stick with me for a bit of autumnal sunshine. Club La Santa deetsFind out more about holidays at Club La Santa on the Club La Santa website, and stay in touch on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Running week at Club La Santa 21st – 27th January 2022Join experienced coaches for a week filled with training, education and sore legs. They will challenge you to improve your fitness as you build your winter training towards your running goals of 2022. Find out more at Club La Santa.Sponsor messageThis episode of the Women’s Running Podcast is sponsored by Marcy, the winner of three awards in the 2021 Women’s Running Product Awards. The Inspire IC1.5 Indoor Cycle Bike won the Women’s Running Best Cardio award. Check it out at Costco today for only £879.99.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode I speak to Elise Downing. I first heard of Elise when her brilliant book Coasting landed on my doormat. Elise is the youngest person ever to run the coast of Britain, and she has written a masterful memoir of that experience, detailing the literal and figurative ups and downs in the kind of voice that makes you want to go for a pint with her. What makes that feat even more remarkable, as I discover during this discussion, is that she set out with very little preparation and absolutely no idea about what such a thing would entail. She tells me about that, about the enthusiasm of her mentor Anna McNuff (but also Anna’s horror at how little planning Elise had done beforehand), how she trained “on the job”, on becoming a fully paid up member of the Yes Tribe, and the problem with cows…Find out more about what Elise has been getting up to, and buy her book. Like, now! Be inspired to take on your own adventure…Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! Just enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 58 of the Women’s Running Podcast, and the 21st Workshop. This time, Holly and I have an actual guest. And this has been a long time coming: Kate Percy has worked with Women’s running loads, she’s the utterly lovely brains behind Go Bites, those beautiful balls of loveliness that keep us going on long runs. I wanted us to talk to her, as I thought both Holy and I could do with a bit of guidance when it came to our nutrition. What’s lovely about Kate is that she’s a realist and she loves food: so she’s not going to tell us what not to eat, she’s only going to gently guide us towards the sorts of food that will be helpful in terms of supporting our running. We talk about the food that we should be eating, bearing in mind the chasm between our ages, and the sorts of food we enjoy eating – happily enough, some of these things are the same. It’s so useful to find out what Holly (25) needs to be thinking about, and what I (47) should be thinking about. Spoiler: I need to eat more edamame beans, but happily it doesn’t matter if it’s the salted kind from Wagamamas (not sponsored, but happy to take sponsorship from our Favourite Take out Ever). And there are a couple of things that have blown our minds – firstly that it’s fine to have breakfast later in the day. And secondly, we discover the Magic Window! And in the Magic Window you can essentially eat anything you like, or at least that’s what I decided to hear. Oh, and check out Kate’s recipe kits here too, while you’re waiting for the episode to start… Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! Just enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 57 in which I speak to Sue Anstiss. Sue is one of the most passionate champions of women’s sport I think I’ve ever spoken to – and I’ve spoken to a lot of women who are passionate about it! As a founding trustee of the Women’s Sport Trust, co-founder of the Women’s Sport Collective, and CEO of Fearless Women, her over-arching ambition is to forge forward in terms of equality in sport: whether that be representation in the actual sports themselves, or through representation in the media. As host of the Game Changers podcast, she talks to trailblazing women in sport, and she talks to me here about what a brilliant medium this is – and I agree. She also talks to me about her book, Game On: the Unstoppable Rise of Women’s Sport. Launched in September, this is a book we all need on our shelves, in which Sue investigates why women have been excluded from the world of sport for centuries, and why we are now witnessing positive change as never before. It’s a celebratory book, as much as a rallying cry, and is testament to Sue’s positivity and passion for all women’s sport, including running. She also talks to me here about the sport that she loves to do, including her newfound passion for open water swimming. She’s a total inspiration, and a complete force of nature – by the end of our conversation I had one of those “oh my god, women are amazing” moments. Be inspired! Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love. Just enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 56 of the Women’s Running podcast, and our 20th workshop. So in the spirit of full disclosure, this week it just wasn’t all about the running. If you’ve been following our workshops, you’ll know that it’s been a chequered summer in terms of our training, so this week we’re having a tiny bit of a break. Welcome, my lovelies, to the booze cast. Or the plonkcast. Or the booze pod – we couldn’t decide on an appropriate name. Here we are, drinking a cool glass of wine – at a very appropriate time, so don’t @ us – to celebrate ourselves and having got the podcast to where we are.A lot of this is quite random, but we do have a bit of running chat, you’ll be pleased to know - Holly is continuing to tootle, but is in a far happier place doing so. I’m recovering (I may even have recovered!) from injuries. So we talk about the JOY of running mainly. And for once I’m pragmatic about races and dates and goals, and I don’t even cry about deferring my London Marathon place. We also talk about organising our first parkrun, being efficient on our periods, we swear quite a bit, and we must have been a bit jolly because I had to edit out 15 minutes of chat about supermarkets that don’t exist anymore. Run with us, or have a glass of wine with us, but just do please stick with us!Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like kit, nutrition and class memberships. Just enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 55 of the Women’s Running podcast. I’m Esther Newman, editor of Women’s Running, and in this episode I speak to Rachel Ann Cullen. I was originally due to chat with Rachel two years ago at RunFestRun, but she was struck down with a nasty chest infection and it wasn’t meant to be. Rachel is a runner, writer and author: her bestselling debut book, Running For My Life, describes her journey to discover a better version of herself through running following years of mental and physical struggle. Rachel has since run 12 marathons and has completed the London Marathon five times. She ran the Boston Marathon in 2018 and in addition to her running, she has cycled 480km across Costa Rica on a mountain bike.As you’ll hear, she discovered running at a complicated stage in her life, but now considers it a fundamental part of her mental health toolbox, as many of us do. Rachel has lived with body dysmorphia and bipolar disorder, and talks about both of these things frankly – and how taking up running offered relief, acceptance and support. As many of us will know, the path to mental wellness is not necessarily a linear one, and she talks about that particular road, and how she has been determined to get well for the sake of her daughter. Rachel has transformed her running with the help of Polar’s Vantage M2 GPS watch. Rachel utilises Polar’s unique, innovative technologies in her fitness and sleep routines to enhance her training. And it’s so interesting to chat to Rachel here about that after having talked to Eilish McColgan about how she uses Polar a couple of weeks ago: they’re very different runners, but as you’ll hear, Polar supports them both equally.Rachel is currently writing her third book, due out next year, so do watch this space for that. Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like kit, nutrition and class memberships. Just enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to our 19th Workshop. I’m back chatting with Holly, digital editor of Women’s Running. We have some very big things to talk about in this workshop. Holly has had a grim time of it, but in true Holly style, was more than happy to talk about everything with me here. Obviously it’s not all grimness, because we do tend to stagger off at very peculiar tangents, so we start by chatting about the crap emails we receive and by banging on about Duran Duran. We also talk about other good things to run to, including – and this is a new and exciting one for me - running to musicals. Then we fess up that neither of us made it to the start line of our race that we’d booked in for mid-August, and we explain why that is. For me, it’s mundane injury stuff, very blah blah blah. For Holly, though, it was an altogether different experience that stemmed from her mental health taking an almighty (and scary) plunge. So we talk about that here: what her experience was, how she bolstered herself, what she’s done to bring herself upwards again, and – joyously – how the methodical nature of running has been one of her valuable tools during this period. We also talk a lot about yoga: how we both furtively say “namaste” like imposters, how we like a sweaty session, whether Haribo would be a good yoga fuel, and that while we love it, we actually haven’t done any yoga for blooming ages and we need to get our collective arses in gear. Now let’s get to it, and give Holly a collective cuddle.You’ll be really pleased to know that this podcast was recorded almost two weeks ago now, and that in that time Holly has continued to look after herself and assures me that she is feeling better every day, thanks to all the tools she has at her disposal. If you’re feeling any similar symptoms to Holly, please have a look at useful websites such as the NHS and Mind, both of which have lots of brilliant information, helpful practical advice and ideas on where to go if you need more support.Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. Simply enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Happy running.Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode I speak to running royalty and three-time Olympian Eilish McColgan. Eilish is an Olympic, World and Commonwealth Finalist who has just returned from her third Olympics in Tokyo where she competed in the 5000 metre and 10,000 metre races. Eilish is an avid user of Polar, the world leader in wearable sports and heart rate technology. Polar are pioneers in wearable sports technology, helping athletes and coaches at all levels to improve their health, performance, and overall wellbeing. Renowned for an unparalleled dedication to scientific accuracy, reliability, and a superior user experience, Polar has cemented itself globally within the industry as the go-to partner for anyone looking to discover their true potential. I chatted to Eilish while she was in her training camp in France a couple of weeks before she flew out to Tokyo, and I was beyond excited to see how she was going to do, particularly as she had recently smashed Paula Radcliffe’s long-standing British 5000 metre record. In the event, she came 9th in the 10,000 metres and was typically pragmatic about that result, saying “This Olympics might not have gone quite as perfectly as I'd have liked, but I left every ounce on the track!” And she clearly enjoyed every minute of it. I speak to her about smashing Paula’s record, training for the Olympics, what it’s like being trained by your super famous mum AND your boyfriend, and how her training – and the distances she trains for – have changed since breaking her foot. Eilish is already a track legend, we’ve been watching her intently since London 2021, and we cannot wait to see what she does next. Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like kit, nutrition and class memberships. Just enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My partner in running crime Holly is on holiday this week so in a small change to the advertised programme I talk to Kate Sellers, our digital assistant. Kate has been part of the women’s running team since January. She is a fitness enthusiast, a keen runner, a yoga teacher and an F45 instructor, so she’s pretty mega. But her journey with running and fitness has not been entirely smooth. Two years ago she was diagnosed with adrenal fatigue after she presented with a number of symptoms, including chronic fatigue, losing her periods and changing her appetite. She talks to me about how that happened, how she was diagnosed, and her road back to recovering and running again. She also introduces the concept of different types of stress: physical and mental – all adding up to the same thing, which I find pretty mind blowing. We also talk about training differently according to your menstrual cycle, which I promise you I’m going to start doing right now. This episode is sponsored by Brooks, and they have a treat for you! Hurrah! We love our Brooks, and we *love* the new Brooks Cascadia 16. This beautiful trail shoe enables runners to explore any trail thanks to its superior grip and stability. Softer and lighter than ever due to its new DNA LOFT V2 midsole, the Cascadia adapts, flexes and protects the foot, no matter how unpredictable the trail gets. And, get this, we’ve got a fab competition right here for you to win one of TWO pairs of Cascadia 16s. All you need to do is go here, and answer a very simple question. And that’s it! Find out more about the Cascadia here. Also remember that you chaps get the best discount for Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! Just enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Happy running!Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In episode 51 I’m speaking to the legend that is Nicky Spinks. Nicky was a cover star for Women’s Running on the issue before I started, so for me she has always been the one that got away. Not any more! Here she is chatting about her incredible running career so far. Nicky is one of the greatest fell runners of all time, if not the greatest. She set women’s records for the Ramsay Round (that’s 58 miles in Scotland including Ben Nevis), The Paddy Buckley Round (that’s 65 miles in Snowdonia with 47 summits) and the Bob Graham Round (this is the Lake District one, and is 66 miles). She is the holder of the overall record for the double Bob Graham round and is the only person ever to complete doubles of the other two Rounds. She talks to me about how she got into running in the first place, how she trains for those crazy distances, and her experiences running those unheard-of challenges (pre-Nicky). She also talks about her experiences running the terrifying Barkley Marathons, and it sounds like she has some unfinished business there, so watch this space. And because along with being a farmer and running incredible distances, she’s also a coach, I ask her opinion on how we can all run well on the trails, and – crucially – I ask her what the best food to eat on an ultra is – spoiler: there’s a lot of pork pies. And I get her opinion on why she thinks women make such incredible ultra runners, and there’s a lot more running chat besides Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like kit, nutrition and class memberships. Simply enter WRPOD at the checkoutfor your discount. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We’re celebrating our 50th episode by chatting about random stuff with a bit of running thrown in, as ever. We’re a couple of weeks away from our 10K and half marathon races in the middle of August. Along with some highly relevant content about nice mugs to drink tea from, what we mainly talk about is race day nerves, and all the various worries we have that constitute that. So that’s worrying about our sluggish pace, and also worrying about what other people might think, as well as our concerns about actually going the distance. We talk about how to combat those nerves, how to be confident in our own training, and how to dampen down our inner negative voices. Also, as we both agree, when we see other runners we think they’re brilliant – so surely, surely, other people think we’re brilliant too when they see us? I think this is true. We also talk about my many visits to the physio, ignoring his lovely and brilliant advice and somehow surviving anyway, I describe sciatica to Holly who is too young and flexible to understand what back pain is yet. And we also talk about love bites. Again, Holly is far too young to understand this very 80s phenomenon. Lucky her.This episode is sponsored by Brooks, which is rather brilliant. Why? Cos not only have Brooks created Holly’s favourite running shoe, the Ghost 14, but they’re also giving us two pairs of Ghost 14s to give away! To you guys! The newly launched Ghost 14 now benefits from 100% DNA Loft cushioning for a super smooth ride, a segmented crash pad for seamless transitions, and 3D fit print technology in the upper, so the fit is absolutely spot on. All that means that they’re soft, responsive, smooth and fit like a glove. The Ghost 14 is also, get this, Brooks’ very first carbon neutral shoe, so it’s a very special thing indeed. To be in with a chance of winning one of two pairs, just answer a very silly question here. Find out more about the Ghost 14 here. Please hit like and subscribe – that way you won’t miss the next episode. Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like kit, nutrition and class memberships. Just enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Happy running!Brooks Running Brooks Running is sponsoring this episode of the Women's Running podcastSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode I speak to Jess Judd, British 5000m champion and soon-to-be Olympian. Jess is on the plane to Tokyo any minute now, I think, and I’m so excited about watching her race while she’s there – she’s due to be running the double: the 5000 metres and the 10,000 metres. She talks to me here about her modest start with running, her dad’s love of the sport, and how his enthusiasm was infectious. How she took to it like a duck to water, falling in love with both track and cross country. I ask her what it’s like to be picked for the Olympics, and how she trains for it given the demands of a very busy schedule: she’s also currently studying for a PhD, and she has the not insignificant task of planning a wedding alongside that. She tells me about that, about her thoughts on equality in cross country, how she gets used to race day nerves and performing in front of crowds, and what it was like to meet her hero Jo Pavey. Jess is sponsored by HOKA, so I also ask how that came about, and what kit she enjoys running in the most. She’s an extremely talented runner, and we can’t wait to see what happens in the next couple of weeks. Fingers crossed for Jess!Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like kit, nutrition and class memberships. Enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Holly has a bit of a confession to make. So we start off by talking about shifting our expectations with our running, and how that is perfectly okay – what’s not okay is pushing yourself so that you’re uncomfortable with your goals: these goals are supposed to be rewards for our training, not a stick to beat ourselves up with. We also talk about the bits of cross training we’re doing, and the wonderful Yoga with Adrienne. Then the big topic this episode is mental health. We chat about what running means to us both, in terms of supporting our mental health, and how it has helped us in the past. We also talk about how women can have a complex relationship with sport. For both of us, our love of running and exercise wasn’t fostered at school, and we both have bad memories of team sports in our teenage years, which I think can have a damning effect on many young (and older) women, preventing them from continuing sport after finishing school. We managed to find our love for sport, but many don’t – many are still trapped inside that little girl who was always picked last for netball. She is still very much part of me, so it’s joyful to be able to share that experience and realise that we’re not the only ones, and that one of running’s most meaningful benefits is in eradicating the sadness of those PE days: because us slow runners, us wheezy people at the back, it turns out we can run, and you know what? We’re good at it too. Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like kit, nutrition and class memberships. Enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode I talk to Natasha Acres, the founder of Earth Runs. There are several brilliant things about Tash. First off, she’s the brains behind Earth Runs; this virtual running initiative plants trees according to the number of miles you run. And, if you wish, you can further reward yourself with one of her truly original, and very magnificent seed bomb medals. Secondly, because this initiative is truly awesome, and because she managed to cobble together an entry at the very last minute, Tash is the hugely surprised recipient of the first Brooks Run Fund, which was launched earlier this year. This global initiative was set up to celebrate the power of running, with a fund to reward big ideas that benefit our communities and our environment. Something which Earth Runs literally does in spades. The fund that Tash won is $100,000. Obviously she is giddy with it. And she talks to me here about how and why she set up Earth Runs, what she’s going to do with the cash, and how she wants to continue spreading her very achievable message that we can all make a little bit of difference, that we can combine making those differences with our running, and that those differences all add up to a very big change. She is an inspiration.And I do so love talking to women who have very appropriate names, don’t you? We’ve had Sophie Power, Mel Bound, Holly Rush – and now Tash Acres, with her brilliantly tree-focussed name. Not quite sure how I can top that – if you can think of anyone from the world of running that has a name that fits what they do, then let me know so I can add to my Mr Biff the Boxer list.Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like kit, nutrition and class memberships. Enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 46 of the Women’s Running podcast, and our 15th Workshop. We kick off this one by talking about Holly’s concerns about our upcoming half marathon. I do my best to allay her fears about coming last, and general anxiety about a smaller race, in terms of runner numbers. On the one hand it’s a bit of a relief not to have the pressure of so many people, but both of us are concerned about feeling a bit exposed. But we are determined to enjoy it, to take it slow, and to keep hydrated properly! We go off on a tangent (standard) and have a giggle about sweat and where exactly we all sweat from, which makes me go a bit pink, and then for some reason we go off on a mega tangent about tights. I really have no idea why.But the main part of this podcast is to discuss periods: how the hormones, the mental upheaval and the sheer presence of them can affect our running, and what we do to combat those things. Holly is venturing back into the world of periods after having been on a contraceptive pill that meant she’s not actually had a period for some years now. So knowing this, I wanted to talk about that – and about our experience of hormonal contraception and how that has affected us and our running over the past years. And then what I really wanted to talk about was the practical side of things: what can people who have periods do to manage symptoms while out on a run. So we chat about some of the options available, and the things we prefer to do.We also talk about how to run on a period while keeping an eye on the environment, and we talk about some of our favourite brands– not sponsored at all, just the ones we like, so I’ve listed those below. Hey GirlMooncupDameBP3 pantsAnd if you’re at all interested in the thing I was blathering on about with the prostitute and the flowers, there’s this thing here.(you see, I didn’t make it up!)Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like kit, nutrition and class memberships. Enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode I speak to Catherine Foster. Now, not many of you will know who Catherine is, but I bet a million quid that LOADS of you have enjoyed running in her race. Catherine works for the Great Run Company, and the flagship event that they organise is the biggest half marathon in the world, the Great North Run.Pre-lockdown, I think a great deal of us took running events for granted – they were a fixture on our calendars, and something to look forward to and to motivate us. It never occurred to us how it might feel if they were taken away. Catherine talks to me here about how it felt from the other side of things: the uncertainty of the pandemic, the real struggle to keep the company going and to motivate the thousands of runners it supports. And events aren’t purely about us runners: events such as the Great North Run are vital in supporting charities through fundraising, and through supporting local businesses. So we chat about all of that, what Covid has done and how it’s changed the face of events forever. And we also talk about the launch of mass events too – the Great North Run was started up 40 years ago by Catherine’s dad, the legendary runner Brendan Foster. So running is literally in her blood, and her passion for the races they organise, the runners who do them, and the wider community is huge and palpable. Be inspired and listen in…Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like kit, nutrition and class memberships. Enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 44 of the Women’s Running Podcast and our 14th workshop. This episode is our virtual Vitality 10K debrief: we’ve got a LOT to unpack here. We talk about our 10K, and annoyingly listening back to this I say that we “failed”. We didn’t fail, we did the damn thing, but we didn’t do what we promised ourselves we would do. So we chat about that and tactics to avoid lying to ourselves in the future. The big discussion point here is that we’ve got a half marathon coming up on 15th August and we need to give ourselves a big talking to, and we need to prep properly for what will be a warm race. So I introduce training using heart rates: specifically training in zone 2 of our heart rates. And this makes us both feel better, because – basically – it sounds easier, but clever science means it’ll make us better runners! Hurrah! Here’s the science bit. The common calculation used to determine your maximum heart rate (MHR) is 220 minus your age. So a 35-year-old runner would have a MHR of 185. A more recent equation is [208 – (0.7 x age)]. For a 35-year-old runner, this works out as 183.5.Once you have your maximum heart rate, you can use this to determine the training zones you should be trying to stay within on your runs. ● Zone 1: Very light, 50% to 60% of MHR - Recovery runs● Zone 2: Light, 60% to 70% of MHR - Easy runs● Zone 3: Moderate, 70% to 80% of MHR - Longer tempo runs● Zone 4: Hard, 80% to 90% of MHR - Interval training● Zone 5: Very hard, 90% to 100% of MHR - Very short intervalsA well-rounded training programme should see runners working in all training zones at different points in their week, but with the majority of their training done in zones 1 and 2. Zone 2 runs use predominantly slow twitch muscle fibres whereas a faster run will start to use fast twitch fibres. Slow twitch muscle fibres are full of mitochondria (your cell power banks) and capillaries, this means that the muscle gets a better blood flow and with training becomes more efficient at using this extra oxygen supply as energy. Plus it reduces chances of injury. A fitness tracker or smart watch should help you immeasurably here, if you have one. Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like lovely kit, nutrition and class memberships. Enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode I speak to Becca Burns, otherwise known as This Bunny Runs. Becca is an ASICS FrontRunner and an all-round running ambassador. I first met Becca way back in 2019 at RunFit in Liverpool, but everything has changed since then – including all the things she loves. Back then she was an ardent road runner, and was just about to take on the Liverpool marathon. Shortly after I spoke to her there, however, she made the move into diversifying her sporting loves, embracing both trail running and triathlon with her trademark enthusiasm. She talks to me here about her giant bunny, and how she fell in love with running twice. She talks about how her motivations have changed, how she got into cycling and then into triathlon, and she discusses her nail-biting attempt to nab a sub-4hr marathon time. She also tells me how she made the move from road to trail – I love her quote here: “if you think running is good, trail is next level”. I also ask her to persuade me – the coldest woman in the world™ – to take up cold water swimming, something that so far eludes me. Apparently it’s all about the hot chocolate afterwards. What Becca does best is to joyfully celebrate what her body is capable of, and in turn encourage us to do the same. What an awesome woman. You should totally become a member of Women’s Running. For one thing, Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like lovely kit, nutrition and class memberships. And, more than that, you’ll be one of us, which is priceless. Enter WRPOD at the checkout for your brilliant discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is our 13th workshop, and in this one Holly and I talk about one of our favourite subjects: running kit! I wanted to chat about what we’re going to be wearing for the virtual Vitality 10K, and in the course of that discussion just chat about our favourite bits and pieces, and what we’re going to be investing in next. We’ve both learned so much over the last few years in terms of the kit and shoes that work for us – in a surprise move even for her, Holly comes out and confesses that she actually needs support shoes, only just realising that she’s been running in that type for the past year. Both of us talk about running in old favourites, so while I’ve added everything here that we’re running in that I can – some of them are things we’ve been running in for ages, so the links are to newer things and not the exact items that we have now. I can’t eulogise enough about my Brooks top, which is ancient, but everything about it – the softness, the arm length, the collar - is aces. However we’re going to be running in the sun unexpectedly this week, so I may need a rethink on the top front. We also talk – at length, this is us after all – about how running pants are now a thing, and more important than you might think. We discuss the true evil of the cotton knicker (Holly has the scars to show for why running in those is not a good idea). And we chat about running commando, which neither of us have ever done, neither of us like the sound of, and both of us revert to children in this part of the discussion, rather than the mature adults we’re supposed to be. You should totally become a member of Women’s Running. For one thing, Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like lovely kit, nutrition and class memberships. And, more than that, you’ll be one of us, which is priceless. Enter WRPOD at at the checkout for your brilliant discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us! The kit we mentioned here are:Saucony Endorphin SpeedSuperfeet inner soles10L Hydration packPrecision HydrationBP3 pantsRunderwear braBrooks Adrenalin GTS 21Decathlon running leggings(And they are made with 87% recycled polyester as I suspected!)Kalenji Run Dry T-shirtHydration packMaaree BraSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode I speak to Anna McNuff. Again. This is a bit of an anniversary episode as Anna was our very first podcast guest in May 2020 – check that out in episode 1. I’d interviewed her then a few months previously at the National Running Show in person, when life was very, very different, when I didn’t even know how to spell coronavirus. And here she is after having quite an epic year. Not content with just surviving the pandemic and lockdown, she also decided to get pregnant, buy her first house, write a brilliant book, and have a baby at the same time. So she’s had rather a lot on. We have a chat about pregnancy, and what it was like being pregnant and giving birth during that oddest of years. She talks about her newest love, cold water swimming, and how that became one of the great positives of both lockdown and pregnancy. She also talks very frankly about postnatal pelvic health, and introduces the concept of dumb-bells for your down below. Yes, you heard that right. She also talks about her running during pregnancy, and after – and how, in both cases, she is sensibly listening to her body and carefully adapting her ambitions to ensure she nurtures and strengthens herself in the best possible way. But as you might expect, she cannot WAIT to get her trail shoes back on.This episode is sponsored by Decathlon. Decathlon sells clothing and equipment for over 70 sports online and in 47 stores across the UK. Thanks to their in-house brands, such as road running brand Kiprun, they're able to create expertly designed products offering unbeatable value for money, making running accessible for everyone. And we know you love Decathlon too, because you awarded them Retailer of the Year in our Women’s Running Reader’s Choice 2020 awards. So pick up a pair of Decathlon shoes and run more this summer!Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like fab kit, nutrition and class memberships. Enter WRPOD at the checkout for your brilliant discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Decathlon Decathlon is sponsoring this episode of the Women's Running podcastSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the 12th Women’s Running Workshop with me, Esther Newman, and Holly Taylor. It’s a fortnight, or thereabouts, off from our virtual Vitality 10K (and I believe there is still time to enter if you’d like to join us. And please DO join us, because we’ve been chivvying each other along as best we can, but nothing supports us as runners more than the knowledge that there’s loads of us everywhere all doing the same thing! So we talk about that, and about how our training has been going. We’ve both been trialling our newfangled pyramid session, and we both completely forgot to do the threshold session. Meanwhile, Holly’s been doing some actual cross training, and neither of us did our yoga. It’s a mixed bag, really. So we talk about all of that, we talk about tapering for the 10K and general preparations, and then I bring in the double whammy: first, that our beloved Bath Half has been cancelled, which was due to take place in September. And second that I’ve found a new half marathon for us to do in August. I’m excited! Holly is too (I think). We’re both going to sign up to that, although Holly is clearly more keen on doing the Colourburst run. And probably the one thing of value to come out of the whole chat is that I lecture her – quite rightly – on proper hydration, as she’s a nightmare with it, and I have instructed her to purchase a hydration pack and practice practice practice. With a half marathon in August, it’s crucial that she doesn’t rely on a quick swig of water beforehand. And as I point out to her, lots of races at the moment ask runners to be self-supporting because of coronavirus restrictions, so without knowing the details of the race we’re entering, it’s worth investing in a hydration pack and practicing drinking while running now. Lecture over, it’s time for us to carry on wanging on about family camping trips, wild pooing, and cans of gin and tonic. Standard.You should totally become a member of Women’s Running. For one thing, Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like lovely kit, nutrition and class memberships. And, more than that, you’ll be one of us, which is priceless. Enter WRPOD at at the checkout for your brilliant discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!If you’d like to run the Vitality 10k, you’ve still got time to sign up. It really is one of the most joyful, inclusive experiences, even as a virtual race. It only costs £19, you get a race bib number, and then a really nice medal after you’ve done it, and you can enter right up until 4pm on Friday 28th May. Please run with us, we need the mutual support! More half marathon training nonsense next time.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode I speak to Dr Juliet McGrattan. Juliet has written for Women’s Running for YEARS, lending her considerable medical expertise to our conversations about women’s physical and mental health. She’s basically our go-to expert on pretty much everything. She’s a doctor, as well as a writer, and is also a director of Fearless 261 here in the UK. She’s written two books – the latest of which, Run Well, is every runner’s complete guide to healthcare, from shin splints to menopause, it’s all in there. I decided I wanted to talk to Juliet about the menopause and periods and all things hormonal for this episode – although I could happily have talked to her about pretty much any medical concern under the sun. But because in our last episode, Holly and I were talking about periods a little bit, I thought it best to bring an expert in rather than rely on our own somewhat shaky knowledge. So in this episode, I ask Juliet about period health, and ask her to explain the period cycle from start to finish, and how we can perhaps train better depending on where we are. We talk a LOT about menopause (you have been warned) and my own personal worry, osteoporosis. We also talk about the things we can achieve as runners and women as we age, the red flags we should look out for in ourselves and others in terms of our reproductive health, and how we can better manage and care for our mental health as we hurdle over perimenopause and beyond.You should totally become a member of Women’s Running. For one thing, Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like lovely kit, nutrition and class memberships. And, more than that, you’ll be one of us, which is priceless. Enter WRPOD at the checkout at for your brilliant discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Get hold of Juliet’s brilliant books right here:Run WellSorted: The Active Woman’s Guide to HealthSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In episode 11 of our Women’s Running workshop, Holly and I are building up to our virtual Vitality 10K at the end of May. You join us in the middle of a heated debate about recycling – so you may want to gloss over that. I talk about my 20-mile run/walk that I completed the weekend before (spoiler: it was LOVELY) and show off my medal (tricky on a podcast), and Holly talks about her improved running since recovering from not-Covid. I then try to include a bit of structure into the remaining weeks before our 10K, with a couple of pick-and-mix training sessions. These two types of runs are a threshold run and a pyramid run. If you want to try them out during your training, here are the details. Briefly speaking, a threshold run is running a little bit faster, while a pyramid session is a bit more complex and a bit more fun, with some more resting bits. With a threshold, you want the meat of your run to be 80% of your highest perceived effort, although I find it hard to work out what that is precisely, so for Holly and I we’re just going to run a little bit faster in the middle of our weekly run. So if we’re running for 30 minutes in total, we’ll include a 15-20 minute section in the middle where we’re just going to be running a bit faster than we normally do. This is not Chariots of Fire.With a pyramid run, you start with a little warm up of at least five minutes easy running. Then you alternate intervals of faster running with 60 seconds of easy running, climbing up and down a pyramid of intervals, starting with 30 seconds, then 45, 60, 75 and 90, before going back down to 75, 60, 45 and 30, each with 60 seconds easy running in between. This is almost GUARANTEED to make our 10K easier, and it sounds super fun, so I’m looking forward to it.We then talk about calves of steel (Holly) and hamstrings of balsa wood (me), and how we both need one session a week of yoga or pilates to stretch out our poor overworked bodies.We have a quick pop at men who just HAVE to overtake us on a run, and I remind Holly of the best advice I’ve heard this year, which is: don’t measure yourself by someone else’s ruler. I want us all to take that on board. You should totally become a member of Women’s Running. For one thing, Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like lovely kit, nutrition and class memberships. And, more than that, you’ll be one of us, which is priceless. Enter WRPOD at the checkout for your brilliant discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In episode 37 of the Women’s Running podcast we’re talking about recovery with Linda Jaros, a breathing and wellness coach. Linda has been passionate about caring for athletes for her entire career – and that’s more than 30 years now. The thing that made me immediately warm to her was her statement that “we don’t run with just our legs”. It can be borderline dangerous if you seek professional help for a running issue, and they only focus on that one bit. Linda, as all the best professionals in running do, looks holistically at each of us, at our whole bodies. She talks, for instance, about the importance of good nutrition in our recovery, and also ways in which we can minimise stress and improve the quality of our sleep. She also explores concepts such as conscious breathing, and at the end of the podcast gives us a very simple technique that she uses as part of her focus on athlete recovery; a simple bit of breathwork that will help you relax, and to recover. If you’re sceptical about meditation, this is not what you might think – it’s a couple of minutes doing something very very simple, with an almost instantaneous calming and relaxing effect. Magic. Linda now works for Oofos, the recovery footwear company, whose ethos closely matches her own. She talks here about how recovery footwear such as this can help your body recover from training - and remember, if your body recovers efficiently, you will get fitter and stronger faster, and reduce your chances of injury. This podcast was a revelation to me: the box breath technique that she explains is incredibly relaxing, and she’s really made me think about what I wear on my feet and what I do after a run, which is possibly more important than what I do during a run! You should totally become a member of Women’s Running. For one thing, Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running, which is 35% off. That’s less than £2.95 a month! And for that you get our brilliant magazine, and you also get loads of money off the sorts of stuff you love, like lovely kit, nutrition and class memberships. And, more than that, you’ll be one of us, which is priceless. Enter WRPOD at the checkout for your brilliant discount. Come and join Women’s Running – we’d love to have you with us!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Episode 36 of the Women’s Running podcast is our 10th Workshop. In this episode Holly and I are talking easy running. We have the virtual Vitality 10K at the end of May to train for, but after 2020 and also us training for our virtual half in March, I want us both to take this easy. We begin by talking about imposter syndrome, which it turns out both of us suffer from without explicitly mentioning it, in terms of team sports at school. And how our lacklustre performances at which have lead to us embracing a sport that focusses less on competition (if you don’t want it to). We also talk vaguely and ridiculously about covid testing, not doing our strength training, and the take aways that we have employed as a result of our hip strength training in episode 9 of the Women’s Running Workshop. We also talk about not taking that 10K distance for granted – so yes, while I don’t want us to bust a gut in training beforehand, everyone that’s doing the vitality 10K with us should be respectful of that distance. If, like us, you’re not doing a huge amount of training but still want to do it, then take it slowly and at a pace you’re comfortable with: this could mean walking the whole way, or parts of it – and it’s the perfect opportunity to catch up with a running buddy. But whatever you do, learn from my mistakes and don’t do it three times over and end up with a stress fracture. So there’s a bit of easy training advice on that 10K distance at the end, if you can bear to put up with Hol and I cackling about audiobooks that make us snot-cry while we run.Please join us at the virtual vitality London 10,000 this May half term. You can walk, jog or run your 10K – time is not an issue. Go to vitalitylondon10000.co.uk to sign up, and if you choose Women’s Running as where you’ve heard about it, you’ll be entered into a competition to win a pair of New Balance shoes, too. Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running: honest, it’s better than anything anywhere else. Go to our Shop and enter WRPOD at the checkout to get a whopping 35% off. Come and join Women’s Running - we’d love to have you with us!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 35! This week I’m chatting to Bryony Gordon. Author, columnist, podcaster, founder of Mental Health Mates, underwear marathon runner and champion of body positivity, Bryony has always been firmly on our radar. I first met Bryony just over a year ago, before our first lockdown and the world tipped off its axis. We met as part of the Celebrate You crew, a bunch of women all running the Vitality 10,000 or the London Marathon with the ambition of encouraging more women to do the same, and to feel confident and empowered by their own bodies. Since launching Mental Health Mates a few years ago, Bryony also encouraged the event directors of the Vitality 10,000 to make mental health a focus of the run too, and last year we all ran the virtual Vitality 10,000 for our heads as well as our hearts. We’re about to do the same this May too – if you’d like to join us, there’s plenty of time to sign up here. It costs just £19 to enter, and for that you’ll get a beautiful medal and technical tee. You can run at any time in the May half term, and you’ll be part of our 10K community – it would be lovely to have you with us! Holly and I are doing it too, and we’ll be talking about our training in next week’s podcast, so listen in for that.Bryony talks to me here about founding Mental Health Mates when she realised that that community didn’t exist already, and she talks frankly about her own mental health. She also talks about running, and changing the reason why she ran – for the gains, and not for the losses. She’s a joy and an inspiration. Enjoy.Please join us at the virtual Vitality London 10,000 this May half term. Go here and sign up, and if you choose Women’s Running as where you’ve heard about it, you’ll be automatically entered into a competition to win a gorgeous pair of New Balance shoes, too. What’s not to love?Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running. Go to Women’s Running and enter WRPOD at the checkout to get a whopping 35% off as well as access to loads of discounts and freebies. Happy running!This episode sponsored by Decathlon Second Life. Second Life is a new sustainability initiative helping us to recycle, repair and reuse sports equipment. Decathlon wanted to reduce the number of products going to waste, so their team of expert technicians refurbish used products, such as bikes and treadmills, before offering them to you with the same guarantees and returns policy as a brand new product. Every product comes with a minimum 10% discount, meaning Second Life works for our planet and your pocket! Give a product a Second Life. Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of the Women’s Running Workshop, Holly and I have something different for you. Ever since her first half marathon in 2020, Holly has complained that she’s had a little bit of a hip niggle, and knowing that hip injuries are frighteningly common in runners we thought we’d track down someone to help with that and dedicate this episode to hip injuries and hip strength for runners. So here we are chatting with Victoria Smith a physio who specialises in hips and hip strength for runners. Victoria is a runner herself, and also suffers from hip niggles, so she’s a bit of a find for us. She patiently listens to all our various running woes and then offers sage advice on the strength moves we need to do to combat the niggles, and also the things we need to do in our everyday lives to stop the pain in its tracks. Turns out we sit wrong, we walk wrong, we do EVERYTHING wrong, so this is little short of revelatory. What’s very wonderful about Victoria is that she is realistic; she understands that strength training is boring for runners, so she says that she’ll ask us to do them every single day on the understanding that if we do them three times a week, then we’re winning. I love that. Listen in to find out how to fix your hips.If you want more advice from Victoria on any hip pain you might have, join her facebook group, @fixyourhips for helpful tips and advice on gluteal tendinopathy. And sign up to her healthy hips programme here.This podcast is sponsored by Vega. Vega is a premium range of vegan protein and nutritional powders made from real fruit and veg. Discover the full range here.Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running. Go here and enter WRPOD at the checkout to get a whopping 35% off. Come and join Women’s Running - we’d love to have you with us. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode I speak to Mel Bound. This is the second time we’ve had Mel on the podcast, and there’s a very good reason for that. In recent weeks, we’ve launched the We Will campaign. We have been appalled at what feels like a recent rise in the harassment and heckling of women runners, and we got together to talk about that. And once we started talking about it, we realised that this wasn't recent at all: this is every woman's lived experience - always. At Women’s Running we had sent out a survey in January, and one of the questions asked how safe women felt when they ran, and 69% of them didn’t feel safe. 69%. We asked them more questions about the experiences that made them not feel safe, and there was a catalogue of horrible things: heckling, shouting, body shaming, following, stalking, waiting, threatening, spitting, hitting, groping. No matter what the experience was, these women felt real danger and real fear. Crucially, for some of them, it stopped them from running altogether. So we want to do something about that, and part of what we’re doing is launching We Will, in which we’re asking for everyone – men and women – to pledge small changes that will have a combined bigger impact. We want women to tell their stories, we want to educate our young men, and we want to challenge the status quo, and we want to run without fear. I speak to Mel here about all of this, our own experiences, and how we’d like you to help.Find out more about We Will, follow us on Instagram and please pledge what you’ll do to help women run without fear.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

So Holly and I have made it past the half marathon date – and this is our debrief. Did we succeed? And, actually and more importantly, what did success mean to both of us? It turns out we both wanted very different things from our half marathon experiences, and we had very different runs. We talk about what we had hoped for, and what actually transpired, and how the differences between those two things have coloured our opinions of ourselves and of our running.. For me, it has challenged everything I thought about me and running, and it has set me on a new path. For Holly, I think that this experience has given her the confidence to not only run and race again, but to appreciate her body’s strength and what it has enabled her to do. So what are our plans now? Well, we’ve got a 10K booked in in May and, as I keep on forgetting, a real-life half marathon in September, so there’s definitely enough to keep us going. Meanwhile I’ve got the London Marathon still in my sights in October, and I’ve nudged another little race in there in the meantime.Next episode we have a treat, we’re going to be talking to a physio about hip injuries in runners, as Holly has been suffering from hers. Victoria Smith is a hip and knee specialist physio in the NHS, and she’ll be talking to us about how we prevent hip injuries, how we manage it if we damage ourselves, and how to recover fully afterwards. Holly can’t wait. This podcast is sponsored by Vega. Founded by a vegan former professional triathlete, Vega is a premium range of vegan protein & nutritional powders made from real fruit and veg ingredients. They’re full of the things your body needs, so you can thrive each and every day, leading an active lifestyle without skipping a vitamin, mineral or a beat. Protein helps build and maintain muscles. Add to smoothies, shakes and bakes and enjoy as part of a healthy lifestyle and balanced diet. Go to www.myvega.co.uk to discover the full range.Podcast listeners can claim the best discount we have for membership to Women’s Running: honest, it’s better than anything anywhere else. Go here and enter WRPOD at the checkout to get a whopping 35% off as well as access to loads of discounts and freebies. Come and join Women’s Running - we’d love to have you with us. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode we chat to the very joyful Jada Sezer. I first met Jada at the beginning of March 2020 – a month most of us remember pretty well for some reason. Before all of that kicked off, and long before we knew our worlds were going to change so radically, we met up at the New Balance pub in London, with an impressive bunch of women including Bryony Gordon, Deborah James, Anna Harding, Emma Campbell and Andrea McLean, all of us booked in to run either the London Marathon or the London Vitality 10,000 or both. Things were beginning to feel different in that first week in March, but not so different: we talked about running, we ate a delicious lunch, we shared food off each other’s plates, we hugged. Jada talks to me about her history with running, and how that started when she met Bryony for the first time over a table of sports bras. She talks about (famously) running in her underwear for body positivity, and the emotions of running a marathon, no matter what you’re wearing. She also talks about her life on Instagram, and how she deals with the sadly inevitable trolling that exists on social media. We talk too about what lockdown has taught her, about her coping mechanisms, and what she thinks lockdown has taught us all. One of her favourite phrases, she says, is “this too shall pass” and it’s definitely one that we should keep in mind right now.Both Jada and I are taking on the virtual Vitality London 10,000 this May. If you’d like to join us and take on a goal, you can sign up and run your 10K any day between the 29th May and 6th June. This time round, the emphasis is on our mental health; so the idea is to run for your head as well as your heart. You can walk, jog or run your 10K. It costs just £19 to enter and all finishers receive the official medal and technical tee. Enter now and join us!And here’s a thing: all podcast listeners can claim an exclusive 35% off Women’s Running membership by entering WRPOD at the checkout. That’s better than any other deal! You’ll get the mag, FREE access to digital back issues, and lots of discounts, freebies and exclusive deals with brilliant running brands that will help you run better. Come and join Women’s Running - we’d love to have you with us. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 30 of the Women’s Running Podcast. This is our 7th Running Workshop, in which I chat to Holly Taylor about our training ahead of our half marathon this weekend. We open this episode with the mother of all confessions in terms of that virtual half, so hang on to your hats. Mainly, though we talk about tapering, race day prep and a bit about recovery too. So we talk about Holly’s walk/run strategy, which has been brilliant and has worked fantastically for her, and we also talk about how we should be training and what we should be eating in this last week before the race. There’s a bit of a shocker there where we both confess that neither of us like porridge, and I expect us both to be banished from the running community for saying so. So we talk about other things we could eat for breakfast, and whether we really need to carb load before a half. And we chat about how best to recover after our 13 miles. Small warning: Holly is a leetle bit sweary when the possibility of not necking a bottle of prosecco the minute she finishes is mooted, but I think that’s fair enough. Anyway, we’ve decided that okay, we shan’t get smashed the second we cross over our respective finish lines, but we certainly will enjoy a glass or seven that evening. So there. We also talk about keeping our motivation going post-half, and as I’ve signed Hol up to another race, she can’t get out of that one. If you’re running a race for you this weekend, let me know as it would be lovely to run with you virtually. And in our next workshop we'll chat about how to prepare for our best 10K in May!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode we speak to Lucy Hurn. Lucy is a personal trainer, a running coach and a triathlete, and she works with the fitness and wellness app Auro. I wanted to speak to her because she basically knows everything about running – she’s an absolute goldmine of running information. Now that Holly and I are coming to the end of our training for our virtual half marathon, I wanted to speak to a trusted running coach to ask her all our questions, and so that you could ask her your questions too. We put a shout out on social media to find out what you wanted to know from our expert, and I ask the ones you sent in during the podcast. So this is a lovely practical session, covering tapering, nutrition and training. She offers us all sage advice for people aiming to run a virtual race in the next few months, no matter what the distance, and we talk about the walk/run method, and she explains how to use our rest days more smartly. We talk about the best distance for your last long run before a race, and the best strategies for marathon training when you start upping your mileage. She also talks about the importance of a healthy menstrual cycle, and she explains what the heck glycogen is, which is news to me. This episode is sponsored by Auro. Auro is a leading fitness and wellness app, with over 700 on-demand workouts for home, gym or outdoors lead by world-class trainers. All Women’s Running podcast listeners get unlimited access FREE to all of this for 30 days, worth £11.99. To get this, go here and enter the code WR30 at the checkout. And don’t forget to sign up to a Women’s Running membership for our brilliant mag, along with tons of discounts and freebies for just £8.75 for three months. Go to our shop and enter WRPOD at the checkout and join us! We’d love to have you with us. Happy running.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 28 of the Women’s Running podcast: this is our 6th Women’s Running Workshop. In this episode, we’re getting closer to our half marathon start line, and we hear how Holly’s running has been going over the last four weeks – spoiler: pretty good actually. Endurance is coming on apace, but I obviously need to slap her wrists about the strength training, but I let her off the hook because runners always avoid strength and conditioning, so I just see it as Holly becoming a Proper Runner ™. So we talk about that, we talk about my training too, which I somehow managed to forget to do. And we talk about the taper – how to do it, when to do it, and how it’ll help us on race day.We also talk about some other strength exercises we can do, using resistance. You can pick these up for under a tenner online: do please have a search around and try to spend money with local, small businesses if you can – I’ve been using John Moore Sports in Bath, but other local sports shops are available!Try and add in some resistance band moves to your S&C sessions, with crab walks and clam shells to really give your glutes some oomph. I’ve also given Holly a couple more exercises so she can switch these up a bit, while I’ll list below.We also talk about nutrition – the sort of breakfast that will help rather than hinder your training, and nutrition strategies during the race, which might include actual jelly babies – whatever gets you through.And what do I have to warn you about? I think I say the word ‘segue’ too much, and we absolutely do NOT hate cyclists or dogs, I promise, despite all indications to the contrary. These are the exercises I’ve asked Holly to do for the next couple of weeks, just so she wasn’t getting bored. You can do these too if you like. Meanwhile, we’re running 3 or 4 times a week (mostly 3), made up of our increasing long run, a technical run and an easy run. So the exercises are: A side plank. This is forearm to feet, make sure your body is in one straight line, and that you keep your head and neck in a straight line. This is harder than a normal plank, so start by holding for 20 secs, and build up to a 45 secs on each side. Tricep dips - sit on the edge of a chair, place your hands on the edge to take your weight, shift your body off the edge. To start with keep knees above ankles, as you progress, move your feet further away. Then don’t move ANYTHING apart from your arms and bend your elbows, while taking your weight, and then pushing back up to straight. Look online if you’re unsure of technique, or you don’t feel anything working. Do 10 very slow ones. Then instead of squats, we’ve introduced Single leg lunges: Stand tall, take a huge step forward with one leg, lower your body so that your back knee almost touches the floor, push back off the front leg to stand tall again, and then switch legs. Keep your body upright at all times. Progress by holding a weight to your chest or wearing a backpack full of books. Do 10 of these each side. Good luck with these, and with your training – let us know how you’re getting on, and Holly and I will update you just before we do our half in a couple of weeks’ time. Excited!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In episode 27 of the Women’s Running podcast, we speak to Jo Pavey. Yes, Jo blooming Pavey. It’s difficult not to feel starry eyed about five-time Olympian Jo Pavey, but she instantly puts you at your at ease. She’s warm, lovely and super enthusiastic about running at all levels. She’s more than happy to offer advice to us amateurs and is keen to get us all out running. “Running is amazing!” she says, And she’s right. We talked to Jo on a chilly January day over Zoom. We start off by talking about the challenges of homeschooling, as we had both had to nudge our children out of our respective rooms before we began talking, and also about being a Women’s Running cover star – Jo graces our February cover in style. We also talk about her memories of the Olympics, discussions around her age, competitiveness in sport, friendship with her colleagues, how to encourage your kids to be active, and spreading the Saucony love to her entire village. She’s ridiculously lovely, is Jo: we hope you enjoy this as much as we enjoyed talking to her.This episode is sponsored by Decathlon. Decathlon knows the vital role staying active plays on our physical and mental wellbeing. Decathlon has just launched its brilliant Power of 10 Podcast: in this Olympic skier turned Dancing on Ice star Graham Bell chats to stars of sport and media to discover their top tips for a healthy body and mind, and how they achieve balance in their lives. The Power of 10 is available on all the usual platforms and provides the sporting boost your day needs.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 26 of the Women’s Running podcast. This is our 5th Workshop, and this time we’ve got something a little different for you. In the last four workshops, you may have tuned in to hear Holly and me banging on about our running as we gear up for our virtual half marathon in March. We are still training for that and very much banging on about it – do please listen in to our next workshop at the end of Feb for our next exciting instalment. But in this episode we have a special treat for you – for those of you who have been training with us, and also for those of you who haven’t, we have a guided interval run brought to you by Auro. Auro is a leading fitness and wellness app, with over 700 on-demand workouts for home, gym or outdoors lead by world-class trainers. With the app, you get access to over 700 on demand audio and video classes - and that’s things like running, yoga, HIIT training and meditation. You also get training plans, running stats, and hundreds of guides to help your running form and technique.And here’s a very lovely thing: all Women’s Running podcast listeners get unlimited access FREE to all of this for 30 days, worth £11.99. To get this, go here and enter the code WR30 at the checkout. You’ll be auto-enrolled for a monthly or annual plan after the trial ends.If you’re training alongside Holly and me for a half marathon, please use this interval training session once a week alongside your easy and long runs. Remember to also do some strength work two or three times a week, and this is especially important for your core – so I’m afraid you’re going to have to do those planks. On your hands, your elbows, side planks or even mountain climbers – do whichever you hate the least, but do them regularly. You also need to be adding a good ten minutes to your long runs every weekend, too. The theory is that you should be at around the 2 hour mark in about four weeks’ time. Remember you can always use the walk/run method, but be careful how you use it – don’t go full pelt for half of it, then walk the rest of the way round. Run for a set period of time, then walk for a couple of minutes. It’s how all the best ultra runners do it!Meanwhile, don’t forget to sign up to a Women’s Running membership for our brilliant mag, along with tons of discounts and freebies for just £8.75 for three months – that’s 35% off just for you, brilliant Women’s Running listener! Go to Women’s Running and enter WRPOD at the checkout and join us!Now enjoy this beginner interval session – it lasts just under 30 minutes, just take it at your own pace. You can use this session as many times as you like as you continue your training, just increase your efforts week by week, and you’ll soon see an improvement in your fitness. Find out more about Auro.If you’d like to listen to the run without music, or alongside your own music choices, you can go straight to the interval training here.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode we speak to Denise Stephenson. We had a chat at the end of 2020, just before the third lockdown came in. We discovered Denise by chance as the founder of the Emancipated Run Crew in South London, and fell in love with her passion for inclusivity and her joyous approach to running. Denise is, as we discover, busy. She is a solicitor by day, a profession that she only realised might have a place for her after a black lawyer came to speak at her secondary school. That experience, along with her faith, has had a huge impact on her, not only in terms of her choice of job, but also influencing her decision to then set up a charity, Reach Out 2 Kids, that does just that: placing BAME professionals in schools to talk about their careers to inspire black and working class kids to enter professions they might not think were open to them. She’s had incredible and moving success with the charity, as she discusses here. Denise is also co-host of the brilliant Start Line Podcast, along with her sisters, Jules and Petrina, in which they chat effusively about running and eating, and the joy of their many, many half marathons. She talks to us here about her podcast, her charity, the racism she’s faced both at work and at racing events, as well as the lack of diversity in races and the lack of progress made by event directors in terms of their marketing and targeting. Get inspired right here, and make sure you interrogate your race director the next time we’re allowed to race and you realise how few black people are at the start line. And make sure you follow Denise!@deeliz08@we_run_we_eatSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 24 of the Women’s Running podcast, and our fourth Women’s Running Workshop. In this I speak to Holly Taylor, Women’s Running digital editor, about how her training for her half marathon is going. We’re both signed up to do a virtual half marathon in the middle of March, and we’re working together to make her feel confident and strong ahead of that. If you’d like to train alongside us, that would be great! Do please drop me any questions about your training, if you have any.In this episode we talk about Holly’s endurance and strength. We’ve got about six weekends ahead of the half, and Holly is at around the 6-8K stage. So I’ve asked her to add ten minutes to her long run at every weekend run. Which might seem like a lot, but we also talk through walk/running. At the moment, the most important thing is time on your feet. And it’s great to be consistent if you’re walk/running, rather than running as far as you can and then slow down to a walk. So I’ve suggested that Holly runs for her preferred length of time – say 10 or 20 minutes – and then introduce a short walking section, before running for the same length of time, and so on. If you’ve been following along with us, hopefully you’re at the comfortable hour stage. So this is something you might want to think about, if the idea of running for more than an hour feels a bit worrying. Just give it a go on your next long run and see how it goes. Equally, if running for more than an hour seems fine to you, then please just go for it. And this week run for ten minutes longer than your last long run, and next week, run ten minutes longer than that. Meanwhile, run a further two times during the week as per usual: one of them a steady, easy run, and keep that technical run for the third one – and that can either be speedwork or hills, your choice.The other thing I’ve asked is for Holly to begin some strength work, and to continue doing it three times a week, every week up until her half. Strength work sounds scary, but it’s not, I promise. Do my special TV Workout three times a week in front your favourite guilty pleasure. It’s just three exercises, all of which are very simple to do. Do them all three times over. The three exercises are press ups, planks and squats. And this is them:10x press ups: these can be completed on your feet or on your knees. Keep your hands shoulder-width apart, lower your body slowly and push up, keeping your elbows as close to the side of your body as possible. Whether you’re on your knees or on your feet, keep the rest of your body in a tight, straight line, from ankle or knee up to the top of your head.30 second plank: you can do this on your elbows or your wrists. Keep your body as straight as possible, push up through your arms, keeping them solid like iron bars, push through your toes, and slightly protract your shoulder blades while sucking in your stomach. Hold for 30 seconds – or a minute if you feel you can.10x squats: stand with your feet hip-width apart, hands in prayer position. Lower your body so that, if you can, your hips go lower than your knees while your feet remain flat on the ground. Keep your torso straight and upright. Use your glutes and hamstrings to fire yourself back upwards. If it’s all too easy, hold a weight or wear a backpack full of books.Now repeat two more times. The whole thing should take less than 10 minutes. Easy. So add that in just three times a week to help strengthen your core, which will, basically, make running feel easier and make you less prone to injury. Nothing good ever took a week, mind, so stick with it! In our next workshop, we have a very special treat for you: a guided interval session to listen into for 30 minutes while you’re out on a run. Keep your eyes peeled for that one.Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this very special extra episode we speak to Eddie Izzard. Eddie is a big runner and a trans woman. She made headlines recently when her decision to use she/her pronouns came to light. We wanted to talk to her about her running experiences, and to demonstrate the inclusivity and support of our community. Last year, Eddie decided it was time to do something big, and she wanted to use running to achieve it. Throughout January 2021, under the banner of Make Humanity Great Again, Eddie is running 31 marathons on a treadmill, and then performing 31 stand-up shows, in 31 days, in 31 virtual cities from across Europe and around the world. She’s doing this to raise money to give to charities that Make Humanity Great. These charities include Fareshare, Walking With The Wounded, Care International, United to Combat Neglected Tropical Diseases and Covenant House New York City. Please donate to these causes by hitting the links below or donating to the numbers.We talked to Eddie while she was running her 20th marathon in a virtual Helsinki. She talked to us about her running, and all the injuries that she’s currently suffering from. And we also talk about her pronouns, and the response that she’s had as a result. Eddie talks honestly about her experiences and her politics, expressing her own views – which do not necessarily reflect those of Women’s Running, but are certainly interesting listening. She talks frankly about Brexit, Donald Trump, and also John Major and a Curly Wurly – you have been warned. What Eddie is doing right now, the money she’s raising and her quest to spread positivity and hope makes her one of the most inspiring people we’ve ever spoken to. Make Humanity Great Again Donation information:Just go to eddieizzard.com and hit the ‘Donate’ button to give as much as you like via our Crowdfunder site. Or if you have a UK phone, you can send a text instead. To donate £10, just text the word TEN to 70810. To donate £20, just text the word TWENTY to the same number - 70810. How to join Eddie the 31-Day Challenge: - Follow Eddie on Zwift Companion App- When you enter Zwift there is the 'join another Zwifter', Eddie will appear near the top of that list, click the name, and a press run with Eddie. You can now join Eddie for the marathon attempt of the day. Find out more on Eddie’s page here.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 22 of The Women’s Running podcast. In this episode we speak to relentlessly positive ultrarunner Holly Rush. Holly is the co-host of the Marathon Talk podcast with lovely Martin Yelling, she’s the Asics Frontrunner manager, an ASICS studio coach, and an online coach and mentor. As an ex-GB runner, she has represented Britain at the European Championships and the Commonwealth Games. She talks to us here about how she discovered her talent for running, and her training for the GB distances. We also talk about her relationship with food, which has been tricky in the past, leading to her periods stopping and discovering she had osteoporosis, along with suffering from a ton of stress fractures. But in the realisation of this, alongside a move from marathon to ultra distances, came a much happier relationship with food and a far happier and healthier outlook. She talks about her love of the ultra distance, and the races she holds close to her heart, and her love generally of trail running. She lets us into the secret of what her absolute favourite ultra is, and she’s got loads of tips for aspiring trail runners here: all very relatable and totally achievable!This episode is sponsored by Asics. Make sure you visit their online shoe finder at asics.tv/shoes for expert guidance to figure out which shoe is right for you, and to find out all about Europe’s no 1 running brand.We’ve got a treat for all podcast listeners: an exclusive 35% off membership to Women’s Running. Just enter WRPOD at the checkout for your discount, and you’ll get the mag, free access to hundreds of digital back issues, discounts off lovely merch, a free month’s subscription to Move GB Move At Home, and more! All for less than £9 a month! What are you waiting for?Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It’s episode 10, series 2 of the Women’s Running podcast! This is our third Women’s Running Workshop. In this episode, Esther chats with Holly, the Women’s Running digital editor about her running, as she builds towards running a virtual half marathon in March 2021. If you’d like to do this with us, it would be great to hear from you – do please email Esther with any questions you have – address below. Over the next few workshops, we’re going to be chatting about how she’s going to increase her long run at the weekends, and the things she can do during the week to increase her strength and endurance. Workshop 3 is all about form. Before we launch that on her, we chat about Holly’s running and how it’s been over the last few weeks. If you remember, she’d been tasked with a few technical runs, which she gamely took on. She’s been doing some hill sprints, and – as we suspected – avoiding the fartlekking. This is very much a usual state of affairs: the thing with running homework is that while it’s good to see it as a structure, there’s no point making yourself do stuff that will eventually put you off running altogetherWith her training for the half, she will continue to run three times a week – these runs include a longer run at weekends, and that now needs to be in the region of 6-8K, an easy run a few days later, and a technical run – that’s hills or sprints. While she’s doing this, she’s going to think about form. It can be weird to change the way you run. And can feel quite alien, but tiny adjustments in the way that you hold yourself, and the way in which you move your arms and legs, can have a massively positive effect on your running – especially in terms of injury reduction but also in terms of performance. Here’s your good running form checklist:Head: Hold your head up high, think about someone pulling your ponytail skywards. Keep your chin tucked in.Shoulders: Keep your shoulders down and back.Arms: Hold your arms parallel to your body at 90 degrees and pump them forwards and backwards. Don’t let your hands cross your body.Core: Hold your tummy in just a little bit, to help keep your posture upright and your back in a neutral, rather than curved, position.Legs. Cycle your legs behind you. Push backwards, drawing a circle with your feet, picking your heels up at the end of a stride and landing with your feet directly beneath you rather than in front. This will make you lean forward, and it makes you run a little faster. It also makes your feet land mid-foot, rather than heel or toe. Feet: Keep your feet on train tracks – so your feet place parallel to each other, and don’t cross over an invisible middle line.That’s it. Head, Shoulders, Arms, Core, Legs, Feet. It’s a lot to think about, so worth starting off thinking about it on one of your easy runs, and just check the points off one by one from head to toe.Remember, email Esther here with any questions, and we’ll talk about them in the next podcast. And here’s some good news: you can now become a member of Women’s Running? For the teeny tiny price of just £8.75 every three months – that’s a whopping 35% off – you can join Women’s Running and you’ll get our beautiful magazine delivered direct to your door, plus tons of other benefits, such as FREE access to digital back issues, A free month’s subscription to Move GB Move At Home, discounts off This Mum Runs merchandise and to Girls Run The World training videos. And loads more besides. Just enter WRPOD at checkout to get your exclusive 35% discount and join us today! We’d love to have you with us.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, we speak to the very lovely Jenni Falconer, TV presenter, radio broadcaster and avid London marathoner. We had a chat last October, just before Halloween and the second lockdown kicked in. She was as charming as she sounds on the radio and on her podcast: enthusiastically talking about her great love of running while brushing away her recent stress fracture. We chatted about her very first on screen appearance – on Blind Date, no less, just after she’d completed her A Levels. And how that appearance lead to a fascination and love for broadcasting. At around the same time she discovered her love for running, too, and chats about how she started, and taking on her first – and subsequent – London Marathons, an experience she loves every single year. She also talks about being papped on the way to work, how getting up at 4.30am is “a bit of a lie in”, and how she has inspired her daughter to also love exercise. In between her busy radio schedule at Smooth, Jenni has also found time to launch a podcast (about running), an app (also about running) and a collagen supplement, aimed squarely at runners. You could say she was a bit of a running fan. What’s next? Well, if she’s launching the Jenni Falconer run kit, put us first in line, please.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 8, series 2 of the Women’s Running podcast. In this episode we speak to Leanne Davies, the founder of Run Mummy Run. Run Mummy Run have just reached their 8-birthday milestone, and we spoke to Leanne just beforehand, and her passion for women’s health and wellbeing is extraordinary. From an initial group of just three runners, Run Mummy Run has grown into a unique community that supports and nurtures thousands of members, all abiding by Leanne’s overriding ethos, which has kindness at its heart. While running is the theme that connects these women, Run Mummy Run, as Leanne explains, has become so much more than that: its ever-present support network has become nothing less than an emergency service for all women – not just mothers – who seek advice and friendship on everything from running to relationships, providing emotional support during times of hardship as well as celebrating each other's successes. Leanne is so passionate about her community which has, she told us, supported her just as much as she has sought to support it. For many, Run Mummy Run isn’t just about wearing the beautiful kit - it’s nothing short of a lifeline. We can’t wait to find out what they're going to get up to next! This episode is sponsored by Asics. It’s so important to make sure you’re running in the right type of shoe to avoid the risk of injury and to improve performance. But apparently 81% of runners are running in the wrong type of shoe. Don’t be part of that 81%. Just head over to an Asics store or visit their online shoe finder at asics.tv/shoes and speak to an expert who’ll be able to analyse your foot and stride, which is a service they offer completely free of charge, and they will help you find the right shoe for you. Just go to asics.tv/shoes to find out all about Europe’s no 1 running brand.ASICS Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the second podcast in our series for beginner runners, or for those getting back into it, or just if you’re interested in unbefuddling some of the weirder running lingo. In this episode, Esther and Holly have a chat about how Holly's running has been over the past couple of weeks. We also talk about her current warm -up routine, and the sort of moves she can do to warm her muscles and joints up a bit more than, as she says, “putting her leggings on and going downstairs”. We talk about warm up mobilisation exercises that we can all fit in to our running. These are just recommendations, as how you warm up is a very personal thing, but it’s worth building a few in, especially if you’re an early morning runner, to warm up your joints and muscles before setting out. Try this great warm up routine here for starters.We also talk about introducing a third run. The technical runs we talk about are hill runs and fartleks, which of course we have a little snigger about. And the idea here is for us to work on Holly’s cardiovascular fitness to build up her endurance. We chat through both types of technical running, and how Holly can easily fit them into her week - the good thing about 'technical' runs is that they can be quick! And the rewards are massive: running faster and running up hills work wonders for your strength and fitness, in ways that our usual plodding run will not. In the next episode we'll find our what effect these runs have had on Holly’s weekend running, and we'll be talking about running form, and how tiny adjustments can have a huge impact.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode we speak to Gabby Logan. Gabby is a mainstay on our TV, presenting Match of the Day and Question of Sport, as well as reporting on the Olympics, the Commonwealth Games, and the London Marathon. Coming from a very sporty family, it’s perhaps not surprising that Gabby excelled at sport as a child, becoming an accomplished gymnast in her teens. Injury put an end to her gymnastic career, but an appearance on Blue Peter tapped into her ambition to launch a career in broadcasting, which she swiftly did once out of university. She talks to us here about how she launched her career, how she's shrugged off discrimination, the snarly comments in newspapers, and the disparity in the financing of men’s and women’s sports which, she explains, begins at grassroots level. She also talks about her running, how her teenage son now overtakes her, and how she’s chuffed to bits with her recent MBE, but because of covid she still hasn’t had her audience with the queen. Yet.Gabby is an ambassador for TYG, a gut health sports drinks packed with functional ingredients and live bio cultures to help optimise your performance. This episode is sponsored by Runderwear. Women’s Running listeners can still get an exclusive 20% off all full-priced items online using the code WR20 at www.runderwear.co.ukRunderwear Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the Women’s Running Workshop. This is the first in a new series of podcasts for beginner runners. In our first episode I have a chat with Holly, our Women’s Running digital editor. She’s eyeing up the virtual Bath Half in spring 2021, and I want to help her get there. So we got together to talk about her training, to figure out where she thinks she is running-wise, and to chat about what she can do in the next few weeks to get her fitness levels up. This is the perfect opportunity to join in with us if you’re starting to run, or you’re getting back into it. Over the next few episodes I’ll be coaching Holly every fortnight to a comfortable 5K, then to her first 10K, and up to the half marathon in March. We will discuss an easy running schedule, some strength and conditioning moves she can do at home, and some simple drills. Listen in to the end, and I’ll give you a little bit of running homework too – don’t worry, I promise it’s easy, it’s for all abilities, and it doesn’t matter if you’re not quite where Holly is right now. Give it a go, and let me know how you get on. Next episode, we’re talking technical running, so tune in then for an update from Holly, and to get your next batch of running homework!Email me with your questions.And find out how to prepare for your first run.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.