The Women's Running Podcast

This episode is sponsored by Wine52, which is thoroughly appropriate. Today’s episode is about one thing, and one thing only – and that’s Holly’s half. Mine too, but mine is nowhere near as important. We start this conversation the day after the Bath Half talking about French school songs and novelty loungewear. But then we’re into the meat of it, with Holly talking through her nerves, her carb strategy and how she felt on the morning of the race. She was really nervous ahead of the day, but she used all the mental strategies that we’ve been talking about over the past few weeks. There’s a lot to talk about in terms of race days throwing curve balls at us – the weather was warm! And that had an impact on our running and our hydration, so there are a lot of learns there, but not least that you have to expect the unexpected. She is so proud of herself, and I am so proud of her. It’s my first race after the London Marathon, and it was actually okay – slightly painful but okay.It’s also time for our Big Announcement about what we’re going to be doing in March 2023, and we’d like to involve you. I was hoping to share a discount code here, as you’ll hear on the pod, but we’re not quite there yet – next week, we’ll have it for sure, and it’s better than I thought! More details to come. And of *course* we finish up with some intense Bake Off chat.LinksClaim your three whole, proper sized full bottles of wine from Wine 52, and you just have to pay 8.95 to cover the cost of postage.Please support us on Patreon and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks, including an exclusive newsletter from me and Holly, and invites to patron-only zoom chats with us too!Thank you for listening. Email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories, as we’d love to include them.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

 Today we have a very special guest in the shape of Charlie Watson, who you might know better as Runner Beans. Charlie was one of the first runners I followed on Instagram many, many years ago, and her enthusiasm and realism when it came to training, goals and nutrition have been fundamental to my own running journey, so we were thrilled to speak to her here. Charlie has had an adventurous journey so far, from aspiring marathon runner, to NHS employee in the face of the pandemic, and she has also very honestly documented her journey to parenthood, of which she touches on at the end of this podcast. To begin with I ask her, now that she’s just completed her 16th marathon, does she still have the fear when she steps on the start line? We also talk about how she got into running in the first place, and how she moved into her new career as an NHS dietition – a sidestep that is in fact entirely linked to her running. Both Holly and I are desperate for advice ahead of Holly’s half marathon, so we quiz her here on training and nutrition, and if there are any shortcuts we can take ahead of our next goals. I think you all know the answer to that one...Next episode: Holly's half marathon debrief!LinksThis episode is sponsored by Merrell! All podcast listeners can get an exclusive 20% discount off all Merrell Orders over £50 at SportsShoes.com. Just use the code OUTOUT20 at the checkout on any Merrell products.Sign up to Charlie’s free, monthly Rise & Run from the Westin. Both Charlie and I stayed at the Westin London City ahead of the marathon – you can’t get a better location! Check it out if you’re running in April, or just planning a visit to the Big Smoke.]Follow Charlie on Instagram.Check out her brilliant book, Cook Eat Run – the best cookbook for runners. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

First things first – I need to give you a big old trigger warning here, as we’re chatting about pregnancy and I also bring up the topic miscarriage. Please stop here, if this chat isn’t for you.This episode we welcome our third, very beautiful, wheel in the form of Kate, who works with us on Women’s Running and is – SPOILER – up the duff. We wanted to bring her on as she is a personal trainer and a runner and a pregnant person, and we thought it would be wonderful to combine all those things and talk about running and pregnancy.Kate talks us through her experiences with training and pregnancy through the first and second trimester. Her experiences will not be applicable for everyone – they’re certainly not the same as mine – so I’m not asking her about these as guidance for pregnant people, it’s just what she has experienced and how she has managed her training. As a sensible woman and through her experience working in fitness, it turns out that her saving grace was the trusty Couch to 5K app, which she used when she started running again after her morning sickness had subsided.I talk about the miscarriages I went through before having children – so if this is triggering for you, do please avoid this episode. I only wanted to bring this up because my experience was that I gave up running and exercise immediately when I got pregnant because of having those miscarriages and wrongly assuming one had something to do with the other, while Kate has continued to exercise and is reaping the rewards from that.Kate has also some sensible words on eating and pregnancy, and how that it has actually been a refreshing thing for her, to be able to see food as fuel.Speaking of fuel, we end with Bake Off. Obvs. Oh and we start with conkers. Standard.LinksThis episode is sponsored by Merrell! Use OUTOUT20 at the checkout at SportsShoes.com on any Merrell order over £50 to receive an exclusive 20% off. Please support us on Patreon and you can join us for our SECOND Live event on Thursday 20th October for a chat on Zoom!Get your hands on Women’s Running magazine for half price, and bag yourself a pair of exclusive Monkey Sox running socks! Just enter X22WRP at the checkout.Thank you for listening. Email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories, as we’d love to include them.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode is about one thing and one thing only (with a few tangents): the London Marathon! We’re speaking here at 10.30am on a Monday morning, the day after the London Marathon and this is the first chance I’ve had to talk to Holly about it all. There is so much to discuss! We talk about the sleepless night beforehand, the famous people I had pep talks from, and the surprises along the way. The actual running was almost just a secondary part to a day that I’ll remember for the rest of my life. I had specifically downloaded an audiobook purely for its distraction techniques, but as I divulge here, I didn’t listen to any of it (aside from the sexy bits). Instead I was entirely distracted by the experience itself – the sights, the crowds, and managing my running. Please bear with me here: I’m extremely sweary, but emotions are high, and mostly high because I’ve finished it, but also because I loved it. I can’t wait to do it again. And a very big shout out to you, our wonderful podcast crew: I had so many messages of support and so many donations to my sponsorship page, that I felt lifted by all of you. You made me cry, but in a very good way. We also, in this episode, discuss Holly’s latest running adventures. Two weeks out from her half marathon, she’s had a little wobble over the weekend, but I hope I’ve seen her right. Finally, it’s been the third episode of Bake Off and we have had a few thoughts about that, which we have to talk about now that we are the unofficial Bake Off podcast (with a bit of running on the side).LinksThis episode is sponsored by Maaree, makers of the most wonderful running bras in the whole wide world. Fact.Please support us on Patreon for exclusive weekly newsletters!Get your hands on Women’s Running magazine for half price, and bag yourself a pair of exclusive Monkey Sox running socks! Just enter X22WRP at the checkout.Thank you for listening. Email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories, as we’d love to include them.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 111 of the Women’s Running podcast. I’m your host, Esther Newman, and she’s your other host, Holly Taylor. We start this podcast just as you might imagine, with a full debrief of the first episode of Bake Off. Then we’re on to the boring running bits:  we talk about preparing for the long runs, and the psychological tricks our minds play on us.I am SO proud of Holly, her long runs have been going spectacularly and she’s surprised herself with how brilliant she’s felt during them, and after them, recovering quickly and well. We talk about pace – we still haven’t quite got to grips with this yet! And we remind ourselves to focus on our ‘why’ – which is very different from our goals. My goal is to run all the way round without stopping for any considerable amount of time. But the why is why I’m doing it in the first place – and mostly it’s to prove that I can do it. And in order to do it, that doesn’t have a focus on time, that has a focus on getting to the finish line, no matter what the time is. So I’m going to work really really hard in those first few miles to keep  an eye on my pace and bring it right down, so that I have an easy first half (hopefully an easy first three quarters) so that the last bit isn’t that awful.We talk about our first ever Podcast Live, taking place this Thursday 29th September, which I just have to get in there. It’s free for patrons, so head over to patreon.com/womensrunning to sign up.We chat too about the pros and cons of a running coach – and discuss whether they’re for the rest of us and not just for elites. And we talk through a reader email who has some nerves ahead of a race – and we truly empathise with all of that! Next podcast will be recorded the DAY AFTER the London Marathon. Oh em gee, wish me luck!LinksThis episode is sponsored by Maaree, makers of the most wonderful running bras in the whole wide world. Fact.Please support us on Patreon and you can join us on Thursday 29th September for a chat on Zoom!Get your hands on Women’s Running magazine for half price, and bag yourself a pair of exclusive Monkey Sox running socks! Just enter X22WRP at the checkout. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode we welcome back Friend of the Pod, Anna Harding, a woman who has knocked out a number of marathons and ultras. I wanted to get her back to pick her brains about tapering. However, turns out she’s an old hand at the Great North Run, which I’ve just run, so we kick off by talking about that... We talk about the brilliance of the great north run – the crowds, the route, the atmosphere – it was all such an incredible day, and it’s lovely to reminisce.Then I pick her brains about the taper that we’re in the middle of right now before the London Marathon. Holly is also ramping up her miles towards her half marathon, so we talk about the goals we need to be thinking about on the days of our races, and strategies to keep us sane and moving on those tricky miles. Anna has some fantastic advice on how to tick through the miles, and also some spot on practical advice for these last days before the marathon, with exactly what sort of running and mileage we should be doing in the last two weeks, and what we also need to be doing to give ourselves the best chance on the start line. Two big takeaways here – wash your hands lots to avoid catching any bugs in these last precious days, and get lots of sleep!At the end of the chat, Anna has some Big News about her next goal race – put it this way, the Loch Ness Marathon is in a week or so, and she’s running it as one of her training long runs. So it’s not that. It’s a teensy bit longer....LinksHolly and I are doing our first Women’s Running Podcast Live event on Zoom on Thursday 29th September! The small catch is that it’s exclusively for patrons, but the massive upside here is that it’s only 2 quid a month to become one of our patrons. Our Live event is at 7pm on Thursday 29th September, we’d love you to join us. Join us on Patreon, and we’ll send you a link to join us next Thursday. We can’t wait to meet you!Follow Anna on Instagram.Do please email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories, as we’d love to include them in a future podcast. Get your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running magazine for just £1. Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout.Thank you for listening. Email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories, as we’d love to include them.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 109 of the Women’s Running podcast. I’m Esther Newman, your host, and she’s Holly Taylor, your other host. We kick off this week’s episode by talking about corrective eyewear, as you would probably expect. This segment finishes (finally) with Holly explaining how we can all get a “Beers For Life” token from her family. We finally get on to running and then chat about distraction techniques on longer runs, which Holly has been using as she’s upping her mileage in her half marathon training. At this point I was still worried about upweighting the Great North Run into a longer run, but that will be all over and done with by the time this comes out, so fingers crossed it all went to plan!We talk strength training again, as a result of the workout that Holly did this week, which destroyed her slightly. So our main focus here is the dreaded DOMs and how to minimise them, and recover from them.We also talk about what it’s like to live with people who aren’t as enthusiastic about your running as you are – we’d love to know your thoughts on this. We hope your training and running is going well as we head into Autumn! I personally love Autumn because there’s no danger of me having to wear a vest, so there we have it.Links: Find your new favourite bra at Maaree. Please support us on Patreon and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks, including an exclusive newsletter from me and Holly! Get your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running magazine for just £1. Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout.Thank you for listening. Email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories, as we’d love to include them.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 108 of the Women’s Running Podcast. I’m your host Esther Newman, and she’s your other host, Holly Taylor. Holly’s half marathon training is going well, and she’s tentatively enthusiastic about tackling longer distances with her running buddy, and considering potentially a bit of walk running.We talk here about strength training, and the stuff we can do to support our running, and make everything easier. I talk to Holly about some simple bits of strength training she can do – and all of them are bodyweight (so no equipment required) and she can do them at home. Equally if she fancies a trip to the gym, she could easily do this using weights or machines at the gym to get a bigger session in. The trick here is to simplify strength training – it doesn’t need to be a billion different moves, and it doesn’t need to be complicated. Divvy yourself up into three sections: arms and shoulders, core (stomach, back and hips), and legs. Then think of three exercises – something like press ups, crunches and lunges. Do them 10 times, and repeat three times. And Bob is most firmly your uncle. Running will be, progressively more easy. And after a few weeks you can add in weights, up your reps, change up the exercises, whatever you like – you’ll find LOADS of strength training on our website.I talk about my worries about running a half (the Great North Run) when I’m supposed to be running  20+ miles in training for the London Marathon, not 13.1, so I’m having to add a few miles on to it before or after. I want to know if anyone is doing something similar in the lead up to the marathon.We finish up by talking about the dreaded chafe, and in this instance, specifically boob chafe. As Holly says, “you don’t want your tits to ruin your marathon”. Somehow she makes this an issue that she lays firmly at the door of the patriarchy, and who are we to disagree?LinksStart your running journey or find inspiration for beating your personal best with Forestry England. Please support us on Patreon and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks, including an exclusive newsletter from me and Holly! Get your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running magazine for just £1. Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout.Thank you for listening. Email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories, as we’d love to include them.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 107 of the Women’s Running podcast. I’m your host, Esther Newman, and she’s your other host, Holly Taylor. So in this episode it’s a bit of a game of two halves – despite our podcast dropping every week as normal, we’ve actually had a bit of a break, it being the summer holidays and all. But while I’ve been not-eating Cornish pasties, Holly has had a very different time of it. As candid as ever, she talks about the swerve in mental health she’s suffered over the past fortnight, and the tools she’s using to help bump her back up again. She also talks about how while she had once used running as one of those tools, this time around it’s been less helpful for her (all that said, we know that generally speaking running can be a brilliant support for our mental health). On my side of things, I’ve been training for the Great North Run in September and the London Marathon in October – I’ve just about kept up with my plan while on holiday, but I’ve found the change in terrain and the second heat wave very challenging. And while ostensibly I’m on track, my mind is spiralling with all the things that *could* go wrong, and also all the reasons why the bad runs were bad, and why the good runs were good, and how all these things are going to affect my races negatively one way or another. Please tell us how your training is going! We also talk about some emails we’ve had in on the back of our chats about heckling, and they’re really shocking. And again, do please let us know if you’ve had experiences like this – I think talking about it like we began to do during our We Will campaign is one of the best things we can do to raise awareness that this happens and how we feel as a result.LinksThis episode is sponsored by SportsShoes! Search London Marathon at sportsshoes.com and use the code WRPOD on all orders over £50 claim 10% off.Please support us on Patreon and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks, including an exclusive newsletter from me and Holly! Get your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running magazine for just £1. Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout.Thank you for listening. Email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories, as we’d love to include them.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 106 of the Women’s Running podcast. I’m your host Esther Newman, and she’s your other host, Holly Taylor. We’re started recording this at 2.30 in the afternoon, but we immediately start talking about cocktails. Turns out we’re nowhere near as sophisticated as we thought we were. After an enormous ramble on the perfect way to mix a Margarita we eventually get on to running. Holly’s in the thick of her half marathon training, and she’s having issues with DOMs (that’s Delayed Onset Muscle soreness to you and me). And so am I! So we talk about that a bit, and how to recover.We also talk about the kit we’ve been wearing during the heatwave – I’m still firmly in my leggings and want to know what you wear if you also prefer to run covered up. Meanwhile, Hol talks about her adventures in finding the perfect pair of running shorts.Then we launch into a controversial topic; weight loss and running. We chat about this because of a stupid thing I heard a fitness instructor suggesting about losing weight before beginning to run. We talk about damaging theories about weight and exercise, how we’ve both been affected by it, and how we need to combat crap advice like this and help encourage EVERYONE to run. Listen here – you do NOT need to lose weight to run!Then we have just enough time to talk about managing parenting, school holidays and running  and we end with a rant about how we divvy up housework, because it seemed relevant at the time.LinksThis episode is sponsored by SportsShoes! SportShoes’ Running Hub is filled with the best expert advice, from training and nutrition, as well as news on the latest kit. They hope to inspire you to run stronger, better and happier – because it’s no fun standing still. Please support us on Patreon and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks, including an exclusive weekly newsletter from me and Holly! Get your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running magazine for just £1. Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 105 of the Women’s Running podcast. I’m Esther Newman your host, and she’s Holly Taylor your other host. We’re both in the thick of our training this episode. Holly is a few weeks into her half marathon training, and it’s going well, albeit hampered slightly by the glorious weather we’ve been having. I’ve been holiday running, which has had its ups and downs. We’re both finding the temperature a struggle, and it’s made me question my fitness and whether I’m entirely ready for this marathon at all. We also talk about our brushes with anxiety recently, and how for the first time in my life it seems, running isn’t quite cutting it in terms of helping minimise my catastrophising, but I have a feeling that the dull book I’m listening to at the moment on Audible has something to do with it. We chat though general anxiety and running, and what we’ve been doing to combat the spiralling. We also take a swerve and chat about hydration and how best to keep on top of that in this weather, and when to start running with a hydration pack. Once we’ve got through that, we also have a chat about heckling, and how it can completely derail our running. In between all that it’s the usual nonsense so hold on to your running caps.LinksClaim your three whole, proper sized full bottles of wine from Wine 52, and you just have to pay 8.95 to cover the cost of postage.Please support us on Patreon and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks, including an exclusive newsletter from me and Holly! Get your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running magazine for just £1. Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 104 of the Women’s Running Podcast. I’m your host, Esther Newman, and she’s your other host, Holly Taylor. We start off by catching up after Holly’s holiday. Has she run while in Italy? I am firmly bating my breath, obviously. We then catch up on everything we’ve been doing in the huge heat that we’ve just experienced. I’ve been running as usual, but I’ve made sure to adjust my running to allow for the heat – taking walking breaks up the hills, and drinking way more water, and so far it’s working for me. But of course we have to talk about sweat because that’s a huge issue right now! And never was a sweat wicking top more needed than around me during the summer.We also talk about sports and schools, nudged into it by an email from a lovely listener. As neither of us had the best experience at school in terms of team sports, this is a hugely emotive subject for us, and I know we won’t be alone. While tons of you will have had enormously positive experiences at school in PE, there are many of us that haven’t – so many of us were picked last, and felt unequal and unable to compete with the best of them. Thankfully, quite a lot has changed in PE since I was at school, but we still need to consider young girls in whom there is a massive drop off in engagement with sport when they hit puberty. Body shaming, self confidence, and simple practicalities all have their part to play. But so do we! We need to be encouraging our girls to enjoy the feeling of participating – not for the end goal of winning something, but for enjoyment itself. Just like we do. At the end we have a bonus section on a new animal that we hate on our running!LinksGet your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running magazine for just £1. Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout.Please support us on Patreon and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks, including an exclusive newsletter from me and Holly! Email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories, as we’d love to include them.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 103 of the Women’s Running podcast. I’m your host Esther Newman, and she’s your other host, Holly Taylor. In this episode of the podcast, we’re talking to the very lovely Sabrina Pace-Humphreys. But before that, Holly and I chat about ultrarunning and the races we’d be keen to take on. Then we chat to Sabrina, who we’ve had on the pod before but wanted to get on again because of three huge things. Firstly, she’s just completed the very brutal Spine Race and we want to find out ALL about it. No spoilers here, although I wil let you into a little quote she says, which is: “The Spine race makes the Marathon des Sables look like a picnic on a summer’s day” and that’s probably all you need to know. Secondly, we want to talk to her about her book, Black Sheep, which has just been published, in which among other things details the racism she experienced as the only black kid in a tiny village in England. Thirdly, we want to talk to her about the event she’s holding on September 11th this year, Black To The Trails, a day that she has created to encourage more black and brown people to run on trails. She’s encouraging everyone to attend if you’re interested in running trails for the first time, and it’s going to be a brilliant celebration of trail running, with lots of music, food and facepainting, as well as guided runs. Then Holly and I come back at the end to do the quiz that we didn’t have enough time to hold for Sab – Holly is in the hotseat and the theme is ultrarunning...LinksGet your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running magazine for just £1. Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout.Please support us on Patreon and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks, including an exclusive newsletter from me and Holly! Thank you for listening. Email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories, as we’d love to include them. Join us at Black to the TrailsPick up Sab’s brilliant book Black Sheep here Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 102 of the Women’s Running podcast. I am your host, Esther Newman, and she’s your other host, Holly Taylor. We start today chatting nutrition and supplements. I’m a bit of a fan of things that promise the earth, but I also enjoy taking things that I *know* will help me recover quicker and potentially help me to prevent injuries – along with my strength work of course. So that leads us to discuss all things turmeric and collagen.We also talk about the shoes that we’re running in, which range from everyday road shoes to brand new, interesting stuff that I just learnt from a company I’d met the week before.We also talk about something a little bit controversial. This is surrounding the news about Eilish McColgan running the London Marathon. We are extremely excited about the news that she’s joining the elites, but what we found interesting were the comments about the news in more male-specific channelsThis leads into a bit of a man slag off, which we thoroughly enjoy, but it is not a general observance so sorry to men everywhere (and here). We also chat about swallowing flies and over-reacting. We end on a miniature quiz, and what’s brilliant here is that Holly reckons that more people run the GNR than the entire population of Newcastle.LinksIf you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. If you become a member of Women’s Running Plus right now, you can get your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running for just £1! Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout.Please support us on Patreon and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks, including an exclusive newsletter from me and Holly!  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 101 of the Women’s Running podcast. We have a special guest with us this episode, Sophie Coldwell, Team GB triathlete and all-round good egg. She’s also going to be a Women’s Running cover star in August. But before we talk to her we have some important things to discuss, such as the many holidays we’re going on this summer. We also talk about the trainers we’re currently running in, the start of my marathon training, and the nutrition that we’re using on our long runs. I’m a big fan of having electrolytes in my water, something I’m trying to persuade Holly to do. If you’re either a salty sweater or a high volume sweater, in weather like we’re seeing this week, it's really important to consider what you take with you on a run. For my long weekend runs at the moment, I have a litre of electrolytes, and I use Precision Hydration’s highest concentration, and I make sure I drink more of it before and after the run as well. I might even pop a salt tablet if it’s very hot. Then we shift gears to talk to Sophie about the appeal of triathlon, what it’s like to perform in front of a crowd, and her hopes for the Paris Olympics. You’ll be pleased to know we’ve devised a little quiz for her too, and it involves squirrels.We come back after that conversation to chat about the stuff we eat, and the weirdness of people who don’t like food very much, and a tiny bit about our actual running.LinksSophie is supported by the very brilliant SportsShoes who have the very best running gearMy favourite drinks are from Precision Fuel and HydrationHolly has been very much enjoying VeloforteIf you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Right now, it’s our summer sale, which means you can get your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running for just £1! Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout.Please support us on Patreon and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks, including an exclusive newsletter from me and Holly!  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the hundredth episode of the award-winning Women’s Running Podcast! It’s our hundredth episode! We are so thrilled, so we’re having a celebration – this is our second plonkcast, and this time it’s thoroughly In Person. In the actual same room! We pop the cork on a rather lovely bottle of English sparkling, and we start off by chatting through our very favourite episodes. We talk about Josie Perry our most favourite psychotherapistwho made us cry in episode 97, the wonderful Scummy Mummies in episode 90, the legendary Paula Radcliffein episode 77, the astonishing Eddie Izzard in episode 23, the brilliant Tasha Thompson in episode 13, and the hugely missed Deb James in Episode 9. Rather shortly after this, Holly gets too drunk and tells us all that she loves us, which is nice, but might have something to do with the fact that her champagne flutes are actually buckets, and by this point she’s on her second.Then we have two fun things for Holly to do: the podcast in numbers followed by a Podcast Quiz, which we would love you to join in with. If you’ve been counting and are able to tell us the exact number of swearwords that Holly has dropped since her first episode, then do please let us know.Thank you for being wonderful listeners and for joining us on our journey so far. Do please let us know what you’d like to hear more – you can also tell us what you’d like to hear less of, although if that’s less drinking, swearing and stuff that’s not about running, I can’t 100% promise that we’ll comply. Happy hundredth episode to us, and happy running!LINKSIf you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Get your hands on your first issue for £1 by entering WRSS22POD at the checkout.Do please email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories. For just £2 a month you can become one of our supporters on Patreon, and we’re working hard to add more rewards for you very soon.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 99 of the Women’s Running Podcast. I am your host Esther Newman, and Holly Taylor is the other one. In this episode, Holly and I are talking about the night before. We were out last Tuesday at the BSME Talent Awards, in which we had been shortlisted for two awards. We didn’t win the one for our podcast (boo) but we DID win the Diversity and Inclusion Award. We got very very drunk, and we are giddy with our win here. Especially as I got to meet my Cbeebies hero Dr Ranj who was presenting the awards. Not just meet – hug. We talk about bowl food, and we talk about booze, and we talk about drunken interviews that don’t really go to plan.After a little while, we start talking about running. I talk about doing accidental tempo runs, and we chat about the companionship of running with people side by side, and being able to talk like that rather than having to make eye contact, and how that can be so much easier in terms of sharing personal stuff. We talk about the first week or so of my marathon training which is going well, despite my massive hangover, and we discuss Holly having to start thinking about her base half marathon training plan. We also have an email from a listener about a fabulous embarrassing moment that involves actual manure.Please email us with your embarrassing moments and also famous people you might have seen at parkrun at [email protected]. Speaking of famous people, it’s so worth listening in right to the end when Holly tells us about the most famous person she’s ever met. Be prepared to be utterly whelmed. I think, on reflection, we were still drunk.LinksWe’ve won an award!Marathon training plansHalf marathon training plansIf you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Right now, you can get your hands on your first issue for just £1! Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout.Do please email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories. For just £2 a month you can become one of our supporters on Patreon, and we’re working hard to add more rewards for you very soon.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 98 of the Women’s Running Podcast. I’m your host Esther Newman and she’s your co-host, that’s Holly Taylor. We recorded this on that super hot Friday a week or so ago, so you’ll have to forgive us for kicking off proceedings by discussing underboob sweat and cold showers. This week we have a special guest on the show, Anna Harding from The Running Channel, who we’ve had on before, along with a very special appearance by Ralphie the interrupting dog. I wanted to get her on again because she has run many, many marathons. I’m kicking off my London Marathon training, Holly’s kicking off her half marathon training, and I suspect a number of you are in the same boat (or at least I hope so!). I’m having collywobbles about my training – I need tips about how to ramp up, and good things to do mid-week, and what I shouldn’t be doing. I wanted to pick Anna’s brains about what she’s learnt in the course of all her training – and what I can learn from her. I ask her about her mistakes, and what a training plan should look like for someone like me. We also talk about half marathon training, and get her practical advice on what we should be doing, how often, and how far. So we’re doing all that, and we have a special treat for her at the end as we invite her on as our very first proper guest on the Women’s Running Quiz! And we’re not going to stop doing this, by the way, until we’ve had actual complaints, and so far you’ve all been very silent on the matter, so we’re going to Quiz Away!If you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Right now, you can get your hands on your first issue for just £1! Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout.Do please email us at [email protected] with any questions or running stories. For just £2 a month you can become one of our supporters on Patreon, and we’re working hard to add more rewards for you very soon.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Holly and I are delving into the psychology of running and nutrition. We have a special guest with us for much of the episode, Josephine Perry, a sports psychologist who has genuinely blown our tiny minds. Josie got into sports psychology after doing an Ironman, while facing a scary ocean for the swim section. The tannoy shouted out to the assembled athletes: “You guys can’t change those waves, but you can change the way you feel about them” and it switched her brain into gear, gave her a triathlon PB, and motivated a change in career. And it’s lucky for us that she has. We have so many questions for Josie, and she talks to us here about how the brain is connected to our bodies, and she explains the part of the brain, the Amygdala, which is the bit that notifies us about threats. We talk about how this can affect us on the start line of races (a lot, it turns out). And we also talk about sports and exercise addiction, and the unhealthy attachment of sport and food. Holly and I both found this chat extremely revealing, and a little bit emotional if I’m honest. What Josie reveals about the dynamic between exercise, food, and historical unhelpful behaviours and thinking feels like a light switching on. What we need to be doing, it turns out, is discovering what our values are, and making sure we run for those things, rather than as a negative punishment. Sounds obvious – often isn’t. This feels like a really illuminating and important podcast – I hope you enjoy it as much as we did. Please take care here, there are some potentially triggering mentions of eating disorders and sporting addiction.LinksDo please email us at [email protected]!Josie’s book The Ten Pillars of SuccessYou can get your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running for just £1! Holly and I are VERY excited about this. Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout. For just £2 a month you can become one of our supporters on Patreon, and we’re working hard to add more rewards for you very soon. Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Holly and I have a bit of a confession to make, because my Mac crashed halfway through this and we had to re-record what was actually a ludicrously funny half an hour talking about wine drinking. So we hastily recorded another podcast and the first half of this is the result. We start off talking about various skin conditions – and let us know if you can sympathise here. Moving on we chat about afternoon drinking, adapting training plans, and running when we shouldn’t really run. We also talk about running for charity – how it offers us an additional goal but can also give us that additional pressure. And then it’s time for Part 2 of our Esther and Holly quiz. And we are utterly giddy with joy about this, so apologies for our excitement. Holly goes all Paxo on me and is the quizmaster, and is testing my very slack knowledge on everything from running records to running history, and I have to say now, I’m not sure I did very well. Please do the quiz along with me, and let us know who you want us to quiz next on [email protected], because this has been my most favourite episode of all time. We also talk a little bit about the next podcast, in which we’re going to be discussing overtraining and sports addiction. LinksIf you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Right now, it’s our summer sale – hurrah! That means if you become a member of Women’s Running Plus right now, you can get your hands on your first issue of Women’s Running for just £1! Holly and I are VERY excited about this. Just enter WRSS22POD at the checkout. For just £2 a month you can become one of our supporters on Patreon, and we’re working hard to add more rewards for you very soon. For the price of a coffee, you’ll join our gang and be first to know. Here’s that University Challenge answer that cracks Holly up.Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Holly and I are talking training plans. Well, first of all, we’re talking about Holly’s very big life decision, of which I will say no more – you’ll just have to listen in to find out more. And *then* we’re talking training plans and running diaries. We talk about how to manage your training and your own expectations when things go slightly off the rails, and we talk about some of the fundamental issues that can affect our running – in this instance, it's sleep. For those of us signed up to an autumn marathon we’re staring the beginning of our training plans in the face – mine starts next week. And Holly’s half marathon training starts just a few weeks further on. Both of us are equally nervous about this – and would love to hear from you if you’re also starting your next training block too. We’re all in this together, right? We talk about how to manage our training plans so that they work around us, rather than being slaves to them, and – just for Holly – I introduce the concept of a reward chart around her training plan, and I’m fully contemplating buying her some gold star stickers to get her started. We also have the pleasure of another embarrassing moment from lovely podder Louise who had an issue with her trousers which again I shall leave you to discover. Oh and there’s yet ANOTHER big revelation from Holly at the end of the podcast – What pleasures await!LinksJoin our lovely Patreon gang!Then have a look at how dirt cheap it is to become a member of Women’s Running PlusRun for an hour and we’ll plant 60 trees. 60!Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we have something truly special for you. Firstly, we have a bit of a pooey story to start us off, with which I know we’re truly spoiling you (and it’s not even anything to do with Runner’s Trots), but the main event here is our very first Big Running Quiz. Holly is in the hotseat, while I’m doing my very best quizmaster impression, possibly channelling Anne Robinson. But it’s all for a good reason – running is jam packed with weird lingo and we’re here to demystify with the help of some very silly sound effects and some very rapid googling on my part. Tempo run? We’ve got that covered. Jeffing? That too. We’ve even got a spot of fartlekking in there. Everything you could ever want to know about running, aside from all the stuff you actually really wanted to know, basically. We finish on a high with a fabulous embarrassing moment, which is actually a bit of a running annoyance. Do please keep sending these in, along with your embarrassing moments, and the stuff that you listen to on your runs.LinksJoin our lovely Patreon gang!Then have a look at how dirt cheap it is to become a member of Women’s Running PlusRun for an hour and we’ll plant 60 trees. 60!Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, Holly and I begin with a rather burning issue. We’re talking about the dreaded chafe here, and Hol is giving her all in this podcast so we must be supportive, even if her choice of running pants is questionable. We chat through our running, and we’re both on the up in that regard. Then, today, we want to talk about the stuff that entertains us while we’re running – in my running career, I’ve moved from music, to radio, to podcasts to audiobooks and I have a LOT of opinions about all of them. Holly seems to have moved in a slightly different direction, but we both utterly love the spoken word, and we chat through some of our favourite things to keep us going during a run. This is the start of something – we would love to hear what you listen to, so we can share that, and so we can selfishly have a few more things to line up on Audible and Spotify. Books, music, podcasts – what does it for you? Listen right through to the end because we have what we think is the very best running annoyance so far – a total corker involving parkrun and an MP. I’m saying no more... LinksJoin our lovely Patreon gang!Then have a look at how dirt cheap it is to become a member of Women’s Running PlusRun for an hour and we’ll plant 60 trees. 60!Everyone must read Georgia Pritchett’s My Mess Is A Bit Of A LifeOr, alternatively, listen to it on a runHolly’s favourite podcast, SerialAnd my favourite, Adam BuxtonSupport the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Holly and I start by chatting about her very brilliant mug. So it’s all very standard really. Honestly, we go on about it for AGES, so if you want informed running chat you have definitely come to the wrong place. Try that boring podcast over there. There is a bit of running, I promise, but I’m afraid we then quickly disappear into a little Eurovision love-fest.But then we have a very special guest – the brilliant Dr Juliet McGrattan, who is a runner AND a doctor, two good things in one. I wanted to talk to her specifically about the perimenopause, and HRT, and running because I’ve been bitten by the Davina bug. I wanted to involve Holly this time cos I wish I’d had this sort of information when I was in my 20s, it’s so important for us to educate our younger girls and women about the menopause in just the same way as we do periods and pregnancy. So we have a lovely in depth convo about symptoms, about running and managing those symptoms, and we talk about HRT – of which I feel very much in the dark and I really wanted to find out more about what it can offer my perimenopausal self. We also talk about what’s great about the menopause, because it’s important to acknowledge that while many of us will have struggles, there are a whole bunch of upsides which Juliet details and which I, for one, intend to embrace wholeheartedly.Holly and I come back after our meno chat to discuss really important things such as hugely embarrassing moments and whether or not I should do a track half marathon. But more importantly, we have a belter of an embarrassing running story – one that involves a children’s game and A&E. Send us yours please! Tree HourSunday 5th June is Global Environment Day, a day where if you simply sign up through Earth Runs for a 1-hour challenge, to run, walk, cycle or roll for 60 minutes, then for every minute you are moving forward, a tree will be planted for you. Join us to plant as many trees as we can!Women’s Running magazineIf you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Right now, you can read each issue every month right on your phone for just £2.99 a month. Just use the code WRSPR22POD at the checkout.PatreonWe’ve launched ourselves on to Patreon as we need your help to keep going. Please support us with whatever you can and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks. LinksGet more of a Dr Juliet fix Check out her brilliant book, Run Well: Essential health questions and answers for runnersSign up to a virtual marathon like Holly!Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Holly and I are talking about the National Running Show, which took place last weekend. This was a big event for the podcast, as we were doing a talk on stage, and we were a little bit nervous about it – thankfully it’s all over and done with now, and it went better than we could ever have expected! Did you see us there? We also talk about stress, and how that can affect our training negatively, something I’d be interested to hear from you about if this is something that has also happened to you. And then we talk about *that* Samsung advert and how I got caught up in a bit of a media storm! We talk about the danger of the advert in that it emphasises the belief that women feel safe and are empowered on every run, which isn’t representative, and at the same time undermines our campaigning to make women feel safer.We then have a few emails to discuss – one of them is a question about breathing, which we will address with the help of an expert in a forthcoming episode. And we have a couple of brilliant embarrassing stories – thank you so much! More please!Tree HourWomen's Running and Earth Runs have joined together to help make a massive impact on our environment. Sunday 5th June is Global Environment Day, a day where if you sign up through Earth Runs for a 1-hour challenge, to run, walk, cycle or roll for 60 minutes, then for every minute you are moving forward, a tree will be planted for you. Find out more and join us to make a huge difference.Women’s Running magazineIf you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Right now, you can read each issue every month right on your phone for just £2.99 a month. That gives you instant access no matter where you are, and you can access and search over a hundred back issues too. Use the code WRSPR22POD at the checkout. PatreonWe’ve launched ourselves on to Patreon as we need your help to keep going. Please support us with whatever you can and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks. You can support us from as little as £2 a month – and every patron helps us continue to produce a podcast that has at least 10% running content in it in every episode. Please join our very lovely gang to keep us going. Some of our recent patrons include these wonderful people: Jodie Price, Carly Evans, Georgina Taylor, Claire Farrer, Gillian Askew, Hannah Finch & Heidi Shuster.LinksIf you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Use the code WRSPR22POD at the checkout to read each issue every month right on your phone for just £2.99 a month.Sign up to Tree Hour and plant 60 days for an hour’s worth of movement.Please support us on Patreon!Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this bumper episode, Esther and Holly launch into it with the week’s headline event: Holly’s fight with one of Bath’s resident Herring Gulls. One stressful day later, and bolstered with a tetanus jab, she is FINE, and has used the experience to boost our stats on the podcast. Good girl. Then, less interestingly, Esther ran the London Vitality 10,000 on Monday, so lots of chat about the experience, the runners, the course, the time. Then Esther and Holly talk to comedians Scummy Mummies, one of which (the lovely Helen Thorn) was also running the V10K on Monday as well. They chat about running, their enduring friendship, and the big life changes that Helen has been through over the past couple of years. Be warned, it’s a bit sweary – but when isn’t the WR Podcast? Then there’s lots of chat about your embarrassing moments, which Esther and Holly have LOVED, so do please continue to send in, as it makes them feel so much better about their own.SponsoredThis Podcast is Sponsored by Lucy Locket Loves. Fall in love with their amazing activewear, snuggly hoodies, funky dungarees and so much more. Whether you're running marathons, going to the movies or playing in the park, Lucy Locket Loves has something for everyone. For a whopping 20% off, you can use the code RUN20 at the checkout. Women’s Running magazineIf you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Right now, you can read each issue every month right on your phone for just £2.99 a month. That gives you instant access no matter where you are, and you can read all our back issues too. Use the code WRSPR22POD at the checkout. PatreonWe’ve launched ourselves on to Patreon as we need your help to keep going. Please support us with whatever you can and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks. You can support us from as little as £2 a month – and every patron helps us continue to produce a podcast that has at least 10% running content in it in every episode. LinksGet yourself some period pants from BP3Or some leggings from WukaSign up to next year’s London Vitality 10,000Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode Holly and I are talking about how doing this podcast is our therapy (sorry for that). We also talk about how incredibly awful netball is, and the old “thank you marshall” email rears its head again. We are firmly in two minds here. Then I get the chance to debrief the trail run at the weekend that allows me to officially describe myself as an ultrarunner. In short, it was ace – find out more about my first ever just-about ultra, and the best way to start doing this too. We also talk about the Vitality 10K, which is coming up next week (more of that on the next podcast), which I’ll be running with the rest of the Celebrate You crowd. That neatly segues into our next podcast happily enough, because NEXT WEEK we have some very special guests – the wonderful Scummy Mummies, who are not only funny but they’re also runners. And if you like this podcast, you’ll love Women’s Running magazine. You can read every issue – and we make 12 a year – direct on your phone with our digital membership, which is just £2.99 a month. Use this code at the checkout to claim this fab offer: WR SPR 22 PODWe’ve launched ourselves on to Patreon as we need your help to keep going. Please support us at with whatever you can and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks. You can support us from as little as £2 a month – and every patron helps us continue to produce a podcast that has at least 10% running content in it in every episode. --This episode is Sponsored by Lucy Locket Loves. Fall in love with their amazing activewear, snuggly hoodies and jumpers, funky dungarees and so much more. Whether you're running marathons, going to the movies or playing in the park with the little ones, Lucy Locket Loves has something for everyone. Check out their full range at www.locketloves.com. And for a whopping 20% off, you can use the code RUN20 at the checkout. -- LINKSThis is the beautiful Bath Beat I ran over the weekend. And here is the Long Distance Walkers Association, in which they include Challenge Events, many of which (perhaps all) are open to runners. Here is the Vitality 10,0000 I’m running next week as part of the Celebrate You wave – although it’s too late to sign up to the in-person event, you can run virtually if you sign up before this Friday 29th. Join me virtually!Holly is very excitedly going to be taking on one of these Conqueror virtual events in the meantime for a brilliant medal.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, Holly and I are chatting utter nonsense as ever, as well as a bit of running chat you’ll be pleased to hear, from tales of woe around her poorly foot, to my nerves ahead of a fast approaching trail marathon.I interrupt our gassing to have a lovely chat with Anna-Marie Watson, an ultrarunner like no one I’ve ever met before. Over the last ten years she’s trained and raced across the globe, and has achieved podium positions at multiple ultras, and has competed in three Ironman World Championships. Since the arrival of Covid she’s switched her attention to the pursuit of Fastest Known Times (FKTs) from her doorstep in Wiltshire. And this is why I wanted to talk to her, as it’s on my doorstep too. I got in touch after watching Eight White Horses, the incredible film that she’d had made of her FKT attempt to run the white horses of Wiltshire. She is astonishing.Holly and I come back after my chat with Anna-Marie to talk through some more of your running annoyances – mostly, it turns out, it’s still other people. But because we like to think of ourselves as unbiased (ahem), we also include an email from a listener who has provided the other half of the story, and we find ourselves thoroughly chastised as a result. Maybe we shouldn’t hate people so much? Also we discuss our new topic: embarrassing moments, and a listener’s personal moment with a pesky front zip fastening. Do please email uswith your own stories!This episode of the podcast is sponsored by Forestry England. Forestry England cares for more land and trees than any other organisation in England - growing, shaping and caring for more than 1500 of our nations’ forests. It has built over 1,800 miles of running, walking and cycling trails. From 1km to 10km route lengths, their waymarked running trails have been designed with both beginners and seasoned runners in mind. They provide an opportunity to run on safe, off-road, traffic-free trails in beautiful forest locations. Start your running journey or find inspiration for beating your personal best with Forestry England. Find out more about the beautiful forest trails you can run right now. LINKSDiscover your own epic trails courtesy of Forestry England.Watch Anna-Marie’s epic FKT in Eight White Horses. Try out Women’s Running magazine for just £2.99 a month, using this code at checkout: WRSPR22POD.Please support us on Patreon for just £2 a month!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is our special we’ve-just-got-back-from-Berlin podcast. Holly and I have a LOT to talk about, so brace yourselves. We start off with Drag Race – standard – and then move on swiftly to a whistle-stop tour of our exciting trip to Berlin with Sports Tours International. We talk about hotel etiquette – and most importantly, the concern about which loo to poo in to be the most neighbourly. And we talk about our impressions of Berlin itself – and let me say right here, it’s absolutely bloody AMAZING, what a wonderful city. And then we chat about the half marathon itself, and what that was like to experience as a runner (me) and as part of the cheer squad (Holly). Oddly enough, we have had such an exciting adventure that the run was really just a minor part of it, and that really helped with race day nerves. If you can bear it, listen right to the end for a revolting European revelation.This Podcast is Sponsored by Lucy Locket Loves. Fall in love with their amazing activewear, snuggly hoodies and jumpers, funky dungarees and so much more. Whether you're running marathons, going to the movies or playing in the park with the little ones, Lucy Locket Loves has something for everyone. Check out their full range here. Listen in to the podcast for an exclusive discount code.If you like this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. And right now we have a bit of a treat for you. You can read each issue every month right on your phone for just £2.99 a month. That gives you instant access even if you’re running a race in Berlin, and you can read all our back issues too. All for just £2.99 a month! We’re practically giving it away! Use the following code at checkout for this brilliant offer – WRSPR22POD.In case you’ve not noticed, we’ve launched ourselves on to Patreon as we need your help to keep going. Please support us with whatever you can and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks. And some of you have already started supporting us, which is LOVELY. You can support us from as little as £2 a month – every little helps! Go on your own Berlin adventure with the super-flat marathon this autumn with Sports Tours International. Or pick from any number of brilliant city races to suit you.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 how our running is going in the lead up to the Berlin Half. It’s a game of two halves really, as you’ll soon find out. Changes are afoot, but never fear, we’re still lacing up our lederhosen in anticipation.We also want to talk about the Bath Half controversy – as you might know, this is a race that’s dear to our hearts, being our local half and the first half marathon that both of us have ever done – albeit about 15 years apart. It has been postponed again, which feels a little bit cruel. So we talk through that, and the local response to it. If any listeners want to run it on its new date on 16th October (through a charity place) or the one in 2023, which I believe will still be in March as usual, find out more here.We then, prompted by listeners who are totally on our side, get properly cross about poor use of pedestrian areas – aimless people walking out of shops, cyclists on pavements. We have loved having a rant about our pet running peeves, and hearing all of yours – it’s been very cathartic!But we’re changing the assignment – we want you to tell us your embarrassing running stories, and we promise to tell you ours in return! Email us at [email protected] with all those things that have embarrassed you on a run. Go on, dare you!---This Podcast is Sponsored by Lucy Locket Loves. Fall in love with their amazing activewear, snuggly hoodies and jumpers, funky dungarees and so much more. Whether you're running marathons, going to the movies or playing in the park with the little ones, Lucy Locket Loves has something for everyone. Check out their full range here. Listen in to the podcast for an exclusive money off code, too!--- We’ve launched ourselves on to Patreon as we need your help to keep going. Please support us with whatever you can and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks. And some of you have already started supporting us, which is LOVELY. You can support us from as little as £2 a month – every little helps! Over on our Instagram page we’ve launched #Run4Ukraine because we want to do whatever we can to support people who need it most right now. It’s really simple to get involved: just run or walk 4K, donate £4 to the Red Cross and encourage 4 friends to do the same thing. Tag us, use the hashtag #run4ukraine, and raise some cash. Please help. Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we’re talking hormones. Well, first of all we’re talking about creepy blokes in spinning classes, swiftly followed by Wordle tactics. It’s all going on. At one point, we even start talking about running. Then after a bit, I have a chat with Dr Nicky Keay from Forth who offer blood tests to track your hormones. This can be massively beneficial for women runners, as she explains. She talks to me about how mapping your hormones over the course of a month can benefit your general health and your training. I had a female hormone mapping test with them, and for me it indicated what I know – that I’m firmly perimenopausal. But Dr Nicky explains how the test can diagnose perimenopause and also RED-s, which can often show up with the same symptoms. So lots of chat about menopause, hormones, and owning your periods. Then it’s back to Holly and me to talk about even MORE running annoyances with some emails we’ve had in from listeners. We thought we were going to be ostracised by the running community, but it turns out we’ve hit a nerve!Over on our Instagram page we’ve launched #Run4Ukraine because we want to do whatever we can to support people who need it most right now. It’s really simple to get involved: just run or walk 4K, donate £4 to the Red Cross and encourage 4 friends to do the same thing. Tag us, use the hashtag @run4ukraine, and raise some cash. Please help. In case you’ve not noticed, we’ve launched ourselves on to Patreon as we need your help to keep going. Please support us with whatever you can and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks. And some of you have already started supporting us, which is LOVELY. A big shout out to the very brilliant Jodie Price and Carly Evans, who are two of our newest Silver Patrons!This episode is sponsored by Precision Fuel and Hydration. I love finding out more about how we can fuel ourselves better on our long runs, and it’s been brilliant getting to know Precision Fuel & Hydration's scientific approach to what we should eat and drink during training and races. Their tools and products are firmly built on scientific evidence and are designed to help you personalise your hydration and fuelling strategy for whatever you're training for. Head over to precisionfuelandhydration.com and take their free online Sweat Test and Quick Carb Calculator to understand your own needs. You can also book a free hydration and fuelling strategy video consultation. Missed the discount code during the show? Drop the Precision Fuel & Hydration team an email at [email protected] and they'll be happy to help. 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 all sorts of rubbish, and we start off discussing coffee, disappointments at yoga, and other random stuff until we eventually get into running. Mine is going well, the hip niggle appears to have subsided, and Holly has actually jeffed, and jeffed brilliantly, thank you very much. Both of us are running to feel – neither of us feel like doing hill sprints, so we’re jolly well not doing them. But, gloriously, we are enjoying running - and so much more than we have done recently. I’m hoping this is the beginning of me trying to stop thinking about times, and to instead enjoy the journey a bit more. That’s the ambition in any case. We also talk about getting annoyed at runners who carry on running after the race has finished, and also Holly’s disgust at anyone wearing a Cheltenham Harriers singlet. We have a bit of a chat about periods and hormones because I’ve had a hormone test to see what’s going on with my ovaries, and the quick answer is – not much. So we chat all things sluggish ovaries. More on that in the next episode when I’m talking to a doctor from Forth about how hormonal blood tests can give us useful insights for our running and our health.Then just a few more things: firstly, in case you’ve not noticed, we’ve launched ourselves on to Patreon as we need your help to keep going. Please support us with whatever you can and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks. And some of you have already started supporting us, which is just LOVELY. A big shout out to Ulrike Schlesiger, Kim Racon and Katie Fraser. Thank you!Over on our Instagram page we’ve launched #Run4Ukraine because we want to do whatever we can to support people who need it most right now. It’s really simple to get involved: just run or walk 4K, donate £4 to the Red Cross and encourage 4 friends to do the same thing. Tag us, use the hashtag @run4ukraine, and raise some cash. Please help. ---This episode is sponsored by Precision Fuel and Hydration. We recently welcomed Sports Scientist Abby Coleman onto the show as we discussed the importance of personalising your carb, fluid and sodium intake for training and racing. Precision Fuel & Hydration help runners refine their own individual hydration and fuelling strategies for whatever you're training for.Head to precisionfuelandhydration.com to use their free online Sweat Test and Quick Carb Calculator to understand your individual needs, and then book a free one-to-one video consultation with Abby or one of the team to refine your strategy for your next race. Listen in to the episode for an exclusive discount code!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 83 of the Women’s Running podcast. Today, Holly and I are (belatedly) celebrating International Women’s Day with a bit of random ramblings including the joy of Drag Race, and whether or not Harry Styles or Morten Harket would fancy us. We also talk about more running related stuff, including practising our jeffing, listening to our hips and being kind to ourselves and our training. In a lovely, sweaty interlude I speak to Abby, head scientist from Precision Fuel and Hydration, about how we can better hydrate ourselves before, during and after a run. I had a sweat test with Abby at the National Running Show, and she is keen to talk through my results, which are less disgusting than that sounds. She tells me how we can measure how much we sweat to ensure that we’re taking on the right amount of water and electrolytes when we run. Importantly, she also tells us whether we can or can’t drink coffee and booze. There is some good news here. Some. After that, we come back to Holly and me talking about the biggest thing that annoys me when I run – and I’ve tried not to ostracise all people here, but I have a worrying suspicion that I might have done! Spoiler: it’s about dogs. Which naturally leads into a discussion of what kind of animal we both are. Answers on a postcard – or to [email protected] please.Then just two more things: firstly, in case you’ve not noticed, we’ve launched ourselves in a slightly abashed way on to Patreon as we need your help to keep going. Please support us with whatever you can and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks. Last things last. Over on our Instagram page, we’ve launched #Run4Ukraine because we want to do whatever we can to support people who need it most right now. It’s really simple to get involved: just run or walk 4K, donate £4 to the Red Cross and encourage 4 friends to do the same thing. Tag us, use #run4ukraine, and raise some cash. Please help. This episode is sponsored by Precision Fuel & Hydration, who offer a range of tools and products to help you personalise your fuelling and hydration strategy so that you can perform at your best.Everyone sweats differently and the amount of fuel we require varies depending on factors like the duration and intensity of our activity, so a one-size-fits-all approach to fuelling and hydration just doesn’t cut it.Head to precisionfuelandhydration.com and use their free online Sweat Test and Quick Carb Calculator to understand your fluid, electrolyte and carbohydrate needs during training and racing. Then book a free one-to-one video consultation with the team to refine your hydration and fuelling strategy for your next race.As a listener of the show you can get 15% off your first order of fuelling and hydration. Missed the discount code during the show? No worries, drop the Precision Fuel & Hydration team an email at [email protected] and they'll be happy to help.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on the workshop we have a lot to get off our collective chests. The big news is that Holly has tested negative TODAY and is feeling super happy and looking forward to her first trip to Sainsbury’s, and also her first post-Covid run. We talk about how she should approach that, and how we can both train and run our half marathon in berlin sensibly, so that we enjoy it and don’t collapse. So yes, we start wanging on about the walk/run method, and I get all finger waggy with Holly about this. I also have a bit of a race report having completed the Brighton half marathon which, through no fault of its own was a bit of an uncomfortable run for me – so we talk about injuries here too. We also, because of my experience here, talk about the things we have inadvertently said out loud while running. We also finish this one up by talking about some of the things that annoy us while we run – I have quite a long list, so I’ve kept mine short. And in fact, this is something we’re going to revisit next time: please let us know your own running grievances, we would love to know we’re not the only ones! Tell us your big hates!Then just a few more things: firstly, in case you’ve not noticed, we’ve launched ourselves in a slightly abashed way on to Patreon as we need your help to keep going. Please support us with whatever you can and you’ll get some lovely patron-only perks. And some of you have already started supporting us, which is just LOVELY. So a big shout out to Rachel Stevens, Mary G, Naomi Corrieri-Hobbs and Fabiola Garay. Thank you!Over on our Instagram page we’ve launched #Run4Ukraine because we want to do whatever we can to support people who need it most right now. It’s really simple to get involved: just run or walk 4K, donate £4 to the Red Cross and encourage 4 friends to do the same thing. Tag us, use the hashtag @run4ukraine, and raise some cash. Please help. Today's show is brought to you by Precision Fuel & Hydration, who help athletes personalise their hydration and fuelling strategies so that they can perform at their best. Everyone loses a different amount of sodium in their sweat and that's why a one-size-fits all approach to hydration simply doesn't work. Check out their free online Sweat Test to get some personalised advice. As a listener of the show, you can get 15% off your first order of electrolytes and fuel. Missed the discount code during the show? No worries, drop the Precision Fuel & Hydration team an email at [email protected] and they'll be happy to help.The National Running Show is a home for runners, no matter how far or fast you go. Join us at Farnborough International on the 7-8 May for inspirational speakers such as Paula Radcliffe, Shakira Akabusi and Jo Pavey, the latest kit, cutting-edge technology, expert coaches, the best races and a host of tasty nutrition all under one roof. Just enter the code ANTHEM here for free tickets to attend.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 Chrissie Wellington. Chrissie is so enormously famous in the world of running (and cycling and swimming) that she really needs no introduction. Chrissie is actually part of the Women’s Running family – if you read the magazine you may have noticed her crop up in our annual Product Awards, in which she plays a big part. So we’ve spoken before, and it is to my utter shame she hasn’t appeared on the podcast to this date. We talk about her meteoric rise into professional sport – how she made the leap in the first place, how her coach saw her potential in the ironman distance, and how in fact she didn’t really come from nowhere, as everyone says – it was just an unconventional start with tons of experience of endurance, even if that was cycling around Nepal rather than around a track. She also talks passionately about the unifying and empowering force of sport, a belief that has moved with her from the world of professional sport to her current day job as Global Head of Health and Wellbeing at parkrun. She is super inspiring and happily overlooked the Zoom call from hell – we’ve done our best with this one, but do please bear with a slightly glitchy call in places. It gets better!We love making this podcast for you, and we hope you love it just as much. If you do, we’re asking for your support so that we can continue making it. We’ve joined up with Patreon to do that awkward thing of asking for money. But the thing is, we’re only asking you to donate as little as £2 a month. For that we’re offering you some lovely perks and, if you’re very generous, a free subscription to the digital magazine too. Come and be part of the Women’s Running podcast and we will love you forever!This episode of the podcast is sponsored by The North Face. Flight Vectiv from The North Face is an incredibly responsive trail shoe. Ultra light and breathable, it’s been designed for speed and agility. The Vectiv technology combines a 3D carbon fibre plate and rocker midsole to turn energy into momentum to propel you forward. A bio-based outsole rubber compound provides superior traction and durability, while the upper is durable, flexible, light and protective. All the things! The Vectic range of brilliant trail shoes enables you to power further. Available now at The North Face. Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 80 of the Women’s Running podcast. Holly is in the house – but not my actual house, because she has actual COVID. She’s been dancing around the Covid lurgy for the past couple of weeks, but now it has firmly struck. She’s feeling okay, though, so I cracked the whip and we did this podcast despite the virus. So we talk about that, and we talk about other things that have put the kibosh on our running, including my self diagnosed hip bursitis, which is worrying me ahead of the Brighton half marathon this weekend. I’ve decided not to run at all in the week beforehand, which I find very concerning, but I’m trying to find some confidence from within. We chat about how we as women, and as runners, can tap into that innate confidence men have, and use it to feel better at start lines – and in life. We also talk about something closely linked with that – Imposter Syndrome. And how we both suffer hugely from it, but how that isn’t a massive surprise because we are WOMEN. So not much about actual running here, and more about the mental tricks our minds play to prevent us from running, or entering races, or feeling good when we do run. We don’t have the answers, but we do have ALL the empathy.We love making this podcast for you, and we hope you love it just as much. If you do, we’re asking for your support so that we can continue making it. We’ve joined up with Patreon to do that awkward thing of asking for money. But the thing is, we’re only asking you to donate as little as £2 a month. For that we’re offering you some lovely perks and, if you’re very generous, a free subscription to the digital magazine too. Come and be part of the Women’s Running podcast and we will love you forever!Right now, you can become a member of Women’s Running Plus, which includes a subscription to the magazine and tons of great benefits for just £9.99 every 3 months, saving a third off the cover price. Just go to shop.womensrunning.co.uk and enter FEB22WRPOD at the checkout.This episode of the podcast is sponsored by The North Face. Flight Vectiv from The North Face is an incredibly responsive trail shoe. Ultra light and breathable, it’s been designed for speed and agility. The Vectiv technology combines a 3D carbon fibre plate and rocker midsole to turn energy into momentum to propel you forward. A bio-based outsole rubber compound provides superior traction and durability, while the upper is durable, flexible, light and protective. All the things! The Vectic range of brilliant trail shoes enables you to power further. Available now at The North Face. Find out more about the Brighton half marathon I’m running this weekend.Run the London Landmarks Half on 3rd April.Please support us on Patreon!For more information on how to help strengthen and support your hips, listen to this episode of the podcast all about hips!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this special edition, we speak to Hannah Beecham, the founder of RED Together to find out the answer to the biggest question of all: how we can all attempt to be active every day. I did RED January this year, something I’ve felt increasingly confident about doing because of the shift in recent years from Run Every Day to Active Every Day. We have a lovely, and enormously inspiring (and moving) chat, as Hannah tells me about how she started it all up to support her mum, who had been struggling with her mental health. So the roots of the thing has always been about managing mental health rather than achieving some kind of peak physical fitness, and I think this is HUGE. And marks what I hope is a shift in thinking in terms of sport and including it in our lives as a habit based on how it makes us feel as opposed to how it might make us look. It’s the only way we’re going to get more people moving, by understanding that sport and running isn’t punishment, and in fact can be something that people who hated exercise will end up loving and rearranging their lives to include. Because Hannah is at the heart of that movement, I thought it was so important to speak to her and find out what she’s done differently, and her thoughts on how we can all fit in being active every day, and enjoy it!This episode is sponsored by Yeo Valley Kefir - lovingly made with only the best organic British milk and 14 distinctive strains of lactic cultures for maximum gut flora diversity. Creamy and lightly tangy it literally packs billions of live bacteria in every spoonful. Available in Natural, Mango & Passion Fruit, Blueberry and Strawberry flavours, the daily boost you need to try is in the yoghurt aisle at all the major supermarkets. Find out more at Yeo Valley. We love making this podcast for you, and we hope you love it just as much. If you do, we’re asking for your support so that we can continue making it. We’ve joined up with Patreon to do that awkward thing of asking for money. But the thing is, we’re only asking you to donate less than a very average cup of coffee a month. You can become a patron of the Women’s Running Podcast for as little as £2 a month. £2! I mean, that’s nothing, right? And for that you get four whole new podcasts a month AND we’re offering you some lovely perks and, if you’re very generous, a free subscription to the digital magazine too. It’s just 50p a podcast! We’re worth that, right? Right? Come and be part of the Women’s Running podcast and we will love you forever. If you enjoy this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Right now, you can become a member of Women’s Running Plus, which includes a subscription to the magazine and tons of great benefits for just £9.99 every 3 months, saving a third off the cover price. Just enter FEB22WRPOD at the checkout.@REDJanuaryUK on Instagram, Facebook and TwitterFind out more information at redtogether.co.uk 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 a load of running bits and pieces that have got us incensed recently. First up: spin classes (which we love) with seats made for men (which we hate). Who out there is going to make a bike seat that doesn’t bruise our undercarriages? It seems ridiculous that in order to boost our cardiovascular health we also have to bruise our vulvas. Second on the list is motivation: we talk about how to keep trucking in the face of race postponement, and – thanks to a listener – ingenious ways we can get our mojo going again if we’ve fallen out of love with running a bit. Our big discussion point this issue, however, is stress incontinence. We talk about how we need to normalise the conversation about it, as so many women can experience it and it is particularly prevalent in women runners, but that doesn’t mean we need to accept it as a fact of life. Yes, it’s common – and that’s why we need to talk about it – but it’s not ‘normal’ and it can be fixed. If you suffer from stress incontinence, do please go and speak to your GP, who will be sympathetic and, in most cases be able to suggest a way forward that will lessen the symptoms or stop them altogether. Now: let’s talk about weeing!This episode is sponsored by Yeo Valley Kefir - lovingly made with only the best organic British milk and 14 distinctive strains of lactic cultures for maximum gut flora diversity. Creamy and lightly tangy it literally packs billions of live bacteria in every spoonful. Available in Natural, Mango & Passion Fruit, Blueberry and Strawberry flavours, the daily boost you need to try is in the yoghurt aisle at all the major supermarkets. Find out more at Yeo Valley. If you enjoy this podcast, you will love Women’s Running magazine. Right now, you can become a member of Women’s Running Plus, which includes a subscription to the magazine and tons of great benefits for just £9.99 every 3 months, saving a third off the cover price. Just enter FEB22WRPOD 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 I speak to Paula Radcliffe, my biggest running hero. Paula’s record breaking win in 2003 is something I think will always stay with me as not only a highlight in the world of athletics, but an inspiration for women everywhere. So I was a bit giddy to be speaking to her. We talk about her marathon achievements, and what it was like to nab that record on that day. We also talked about what it felt like to have that record taken 17 years later. I also ask her about her first love: cross country – what she loves about it, and why she keeps returning to it, and also her thoughts on equal distances for men and women in that sport. We also have a chat about RunFestRun – the running festival she’s been an integral part of since its inception: how meaningful it is as a concept to combine a festival about running, family and fun, how much her own children have loved it, and what she’s looking forward to this year. OMG, it’s Paula! And she is LOVELY.Join us at RunFestRun! You can camp! You can bring the kids! (Or you can leave them at home...) And you can run!Join Paula’s Families on Track waves at RunFestRun or at various events nationwide.Sign up to Women’s Running magazine this February for just £9.99 every 3 months. Just enter the code FEB22WRPOD at the checkout. Happy running!This episode is sponsored by Run 4 All. This year, set yourself the ultimate running challenge and join the thousands of runners who will be taking to the streets of York on Sunday 16th October for the Yorkshire Marathon. If you’re not quite ready to tackle a marathon, you can also try the Yorkshire 10 Mile. Taking place on the same day, this popular event will allow you to experience the atmosphere and sights of the Yorkshire Marathon while tackling a shorter distance. Enter today!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 workshop, Holly and I are hugely excitable about several things all at once. Holly’s running has been going brilliantly, so she’s feeling hugely positive about that. Mine isn’t too bad either – I’ve even done some hills, so am feeling a little bit smug. But all that positivity is against a backdrop of the disappointment of our half marathon being postponed, which we’re both gutted about – although we are still looking forward to running it in May. But as far as our training is going, all is not lost – as Holly confesses in her Big Announcement. No spoilers here. We also talk about alternatives to weekend parkruns, the universal truth of the last mile of any run being awful, no matter how long or short it is, and the lack of good public loos basically being a feminist subject. We also talk about an email we’ve had in from a listener who has a running issue that deserves masses of air time, and a solution. We have one idea, but if you have any other ideas on good places to go, or brands to visit, who can help women run who have had mastectomies, then do please let us know at [email protected] loved the National Running Show – find out about the next show in May!Check out Sports Tours International to book a half marathon in a beautiful cityGo to Boobydoo for expert bra fitting advice and guidanceBuy some flapjacks from Flapjackery – I’ve just finished the vegan one and it was IMMENSE (they do not have a pecan version btw, but they do have a dangerously addictive hazelnut one)This episode is sponsored by Run 4 All. This year, set yourself the ultimate running challenge and join the thousands of runners who will be taking to the streets of York on Sunday 16th October for the Yorkshire Marathon. If you’re not quite ready to tackle a marathon, you can also try the Yorkshire 10 Mile. Taking place on the same day, this popular event will allow you to experience the atmosphere and sights of the Yorkshire Marathon while tackling a shorter distance. Enter today!Don’t forget to sign up to Women’s Running magazine this January for just £2.99 a month. . Just enter the code JAN22WRPOD at the checkout. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode, Holly and I are chatting to Kate, who is not only our digital assistant on Women’s Running, but she’s also - very usefully – an F45 instructor AND a yoga instructor. And she runs! So she is perfectly place to answer all our questions about cross training, basically. Holly and I are a bit rubbish about doing anything other than running, and we know that cross training is the sensible way forward, but we have lots of questions: WHAT should we be doing, how OFTEN should we be doing it, how much EFFORT do we need to put in, do we need to join a gym, and how do we keep our motivation up? It’s so hard to get that motivation going in the first place, especially if you’re trying to persuade yourself to do something that you don’t think you’re going to enjoy. My personal tips, if this sounds like you, is to first of all find something that you DO enjoy. If you’re happy to do squats while you’re brushing your teeth, and you’re dedicated enough to do lunges during work breaks, then that is GREAT. If you start the week with good intentions, but have given up by Wednesday, consider a class or meeting up with a friend to do these moves instead. If you have to part with money, or put a proper cast iron date in the diary, you are way more likely to do it. Thank you for listening. Do please email us at [email protected] with any questions or any running stories, as we’d love to include them in a future podcast. If you run you’re your dog, look at the brilliant range of super nutritious food at ORIJEN. Don’t forget to sign up to Women’s Running magazine this January for just £2.99 a month. Just enter the code JAN22WRPOD at the checkout. 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 Holly and I are chatting about running recovery and our experiences with diets. You find us in the middle of chatting about my new haircut, so sorry about that, but I included a bit because it segues brilliantly to a comment we’ve had on the podcast, as you’ll discover. We also talk about running through illness when you should actually be recovering. We talk about how we need to be mindful of the recovery period as much as the running period, both when we’re in training and when we’re unwell. Something I have not abided by over Christmas unfortunately. We talk about our relationships with food and diet, a conversation we started in the previous workshop as it’s something we wanted to continue, and how we are trying to amend the way we think about what we eat and how we perceive ourselves. Essentially we want to appreciate our bodies for what they’ve done rather than how they look. We’d be interested to hear what you think about this, and your relationships with food and your body and if running has had a positive impact on that. In the meantime, happy running and I hope you enjoy the episode!This episode is sponsored by ORIJEN. As many of us will be getting into new running routines to start off the year, did you know that two-thirds of us want to get our dogs in on the workout fun too? ORIJEN pet food provides nourishment as nature intended – it’s biologically appropriate, and provides an authentic wholeprey diet, with the first five ingredients always being fresh or raw quality animal ingredients, to give them all the nutrition they need. Find out more at ORIJEN.If you love our podcast, you will adore Women’s Running magazine. This January you can bag a membership to our brilliant mag for just £2.99 a month. Just enter the code JAN22WRPOD at the checkout. Happy running!Support the show Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode we’re having a chat with Nell McAndrew, who just happens to be gracing the cover of our January issue right at this very minute. Have you got your copy yet? We are so chuffed to have bagged Nell on our cover - now you might remember Nell from back in the 90s when she transformed into Lara Croft and ended up on many a bedroom wall. But these days, she’s better known as a marathon and fitness superstar. She bagged an impressive marathon sub-3 PB back in 2012 at the London Marathon, and has continued to run and strength train and inspire the rest of us since then. I talk to her about what it’s like to run when you’re a well-known person, and also how she started in the first place. And now that she’s in her 40s, we also talk about why it’s lovely to run for running’s sake rather than chasing a PB all the time. She talks to me about running for charities that are close to her heart, wanting to run parkrun when she’s 80, and how her training for a marathon would be a whole lot different these days now that she knows more about nutrition. She’s an absolute legend on Instagram, and I have loved being inspired by her fitness sets during lockdown, and her unwavering enthusiasm for the joy of the run – you’ll be inspired too, just you wait!Please rate and review us wherever you listen to your podcasts – these reviews mean the WORLD to us, and really help us to keep this podcast going. If you love our podcast, you will adore Women’s Running magazine. And this January you can bag a membership to our brilliant mag for just £2.99 a month! £2.99! I mean, that’s cheaper than a large Americano! Just enter the code JAN22WRPOD at the checkout. Happy running!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on the Workshop Holly and I are talking about this in-between week, the perineum of Christmas. We have a chat about sitting around in your pants watching The Two Ronnies, and getting up off your bum for a new year’s day run. We chat about the anxiety of thinking people are looking at us while we’re running, and general imposter syndrome. We get a bit philosophical in this episode, because we’re looking towards the new year and we know that a lot of people will be adopting a new fitness regime to change their selves in some way. So we talk about aiming for body neutrality, about diets, and we talk about a world in which women are complimented for their strength rather than their looks. We also talk about our new year’s resolutions: for both of us, they’re not big and they’re achievable, and we’re making them public, so you can hold us accountable. Fingers crossed by the next episode we’ll at least have kept our resolutions for two weeks, but we’ve never been good at keeping our promises, so your guess is as good as mine. I hope you enjoy the episode, and a very happy new year!Please rate and review us wherever you listen to your podcasts – these reviews mean the WORLD to us, and really help us to keep this podcast going. And guess what, if you like this podcast, you’ll love Women’s Running magazine! If you join Women’s Running Plus right now, you’ll get our fab magazine delivered to your door every month AND you’ll get a FREE long sleeve technical top 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.

Welcome to episode 71 of the Women’s Running Workshop, and we’re treating you to a bonus Workshop Pro episode just before Christmas. I’m your host Esther Newman, and in this episode Holly and I are on the receiving end of much wisdom from running coach Laura Fountain. Laura has worked with Women’s Running for YEARS. She writes a column every month for us, and she’s the brains behind all of our training plans. If you’ve torn one of these out of the mag in the last few years, you have Laura to thank for making it to the start line. We have a chat with Laura this time because we want her expertise to make us better runners. First of all, we find out how she started her running journey – which is comparatively recently – and how she got into coaching. I want all her advice on setting up my own running group, and Holly wants to know how to join a group without feeling nervous about being at the back. We then ask her about our goals and how to achieve them: Holly wants to make the time to run more regularly, and I want to know if I can run double A races in March (spoiler: I can’t). We’re going to be running one Workshop Pro a month with a revolving door of coaches, nutritionists and health experts – so do please drop us a line with any questions you might have.Please rate and review us wherever you listen to your podcasts – these reviews mean the WORLD to us, and really help us to keep this podcast going. And guess what, if you like this podcast, you’ll love Women’s Running magazine! If you join Women’s Running Plus right now, you’ll get our fab magazine delivered to your door every month AND 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.

Welcome to episode 70 of the Women’s Running Podcast, and in this workshop Holly and I are on the countdown to Christmas. I start this one super hungover, so I use my delicate state to introduce the idea of running and booze. We talk about how covid has changed our drinking, with some big confessions on both sides – Hol and I are coming from very different angles on this. And we also talk about how we are going to manage booze and running over Christmas, which can be a tough thing to do. The key phrase here is that we’re going to be kind to ourselves, and that we will be adjusting our expectations – because the run is the thing. Sometimes, we don’t need to be “in training” – sometimes it’s fine to just go for a run. Here’s a bit more guidance on booze, sleep and food.There are some other things we’ve done to help our running, and one surprising thing is a bit of self care that Holly suggests (a good idea for a Christmas present for a runner). But this is on the proviso that you don’t mind wearing paper pants. So it’s definitely not one for me! I also have a big announcement to make at the end of the podcast, with a very exciting race to look forward to in the new year. Thanks to Sports Tours International for that one... By the way, Hol drops the F-bomb in this one: you have been warned.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. Also if you join Women’s Running Plus in time for Chrimbo, you’ll get our fab magazine delivered to your door every month AND you’ll get a FREE base layer from Zerofit, worth £40. Just enter X21WRPOD at the checkout. Or ask someone who loves you to do it for you!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode I have a chat with Suzanne Shaw. Yes, that Suzanne Shaw from Hear’Say. Suzanne is currently gracing the cover of Women’s Running – available now in actual shops – and she’s there for a reason. It’s not just because she was a member of a band that provided the soundtrack to some regrettable moments in my 20s. It’s because she made some very big decisions a couple of years ago that ended up being pretty life-changing. She gave up the booze, she embraced plant-based eating, and – guess what – she started running! But more than that, she rapidly went from couch to ultra, running for 19 hours, all by herself during lockdown, while raising money and awareness for the Samaritans. In her journey to that date, and ever since, she has thrown herself into the running community – and has discovered new passions that have enhanced her life immeasurably. Listen up to hear her story right now. Please rate and review us wherever you listen to your podcasts – these reviews mean the WORLD to us, and really help us to keep this podcast going. Also here’s a thing: it’s almost Christmas! Yes it is, there’s no point hiding from it. And if you’re searching for the perfect present, then we’ve got just the thing. If you join Women’s Running Plus in time for Chrimbo, you’ll get our fab magazine delivered to your door every month AND you’ll get a FREE base layer from Zerofit, worth £40. Just enter X21WRPOD at the checkout. Or ask someone who loves you to do it for you!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to episode 68 of the Women’s Running podcast. I’m your host Esther Newman, and this is another workshop with me and Holly. I’m not sure why we can even pretend to call this one a workshop, because basically we cackle pretty much all the way through it. So what we’re here to talk about is the massive secret joy that is that we’ve won an actual award – for this actual podcast! One we couldn’t even begin to imagine we would win, so we are utterly thrilled. The award is the PPA Independent Publishing Awards 2021 Podcast of the Year. I know! We won it! Just with us rambling on about not much at all! So we are overjoyed about that: listen in to hear about how we celebrated last Friday... We segue from that seamlessly to how our running is going and how bad we both are at the eight-times table. We then introduce an email from a listener, so we spend a bit of time talking about what she’s told us, and that includes topics such as Covid, our immune systems, recovery and being kind to ourselves. Something specific to that email, but some key points that we can all learn from. Let’s be kind to ourselves.Please rate and review us wherever you listen to your podcasts – these reviews mean the WORLD to us, and really help us to keep this podcast going. Also here’s a thing: it’s almost Christmas! And if you’re searching for the perfect present, then we’ve got just the thing. If you join Women’s Running Plus in time for Chrimbo, you’ll get our fab magazine delivered to your door every month AND you’ll get a FREE base layer from Zerofit, worth £40. Just enter X21WRPOD at the checkout. Or ask someone who loves you to do it for you!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week Holly and I have brought out the big guns to help us with our training for our half marathon next year, as we both have big goals. The big guns are Tina Chantrey. Tina is our Women’s Running Fitness Editor and she’s a running coach. She basically knows everything there is to know about running. So we wanted her to come on to the podcast to throw loads of questions at her about our training, among which are – should we be aiming for a time for our next race, or should we just run for fun? How do we run a race without having that past time in our heads? And if we do run to get a PB, how on earth do we do that? The answer, it turns out, is by putting the work in – but none of it is that scary, but it does include everything you’d expect: intervals, tempos and hills. But Tina is a kind taskmaster, telling us that three runs a week is FINE, but just to make sure each one of them is right. And what’s more with our long run, to consider it as a mental health run, and take the pace right down – like right down. Pure running wisdom. 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. Find out more about Tina’s coaching.Follow her on Instagram.Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/bePatron?u=67575412) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode’s chat with Holly is very much a mixed bag. A game of three parts (is that a thing?) we talk about our running, then we talk about a bit of gear that we’ve been running in, and THEN we introduce a brand new feature in which we have a chat about an email we’ve had from a listener. But first, we start with some general Covid chat, because I’m bracing myself for the onslaught and it’s all I can talk about. Then we move swiftly on to running, in which Holly tries to distinguish between podiatry and orthodontics – it makes more sense when you listen in (I think). We also talk about me setting up my very own run group – and I need a name for it, that’s a bit better than Esther’s Harriers. Answers on a postcard please! Kit-wise, we talk through the very best bras and leggings we’ve been running in – great ideas for Christmas presents here.And starting from this episode we wanted to include you a bit more – so we’re discussing an email we got in from a lovely listener based in New Zealand, who tells us about what running means to her. She also tells us how lovely the podcast is, and that seriously influenced our choice of email. Just saying.You can get in touch with us and let us know what you think, or if you have any running questions – if we can’t answer them, I’ll get an expert to help us out.More information about Crohn’s and Colitis right here.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.