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 wrpodcast@anthem.co.uk 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 wrpodcast@anthem.co.uk 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 wrpodcast@anthem.co.uk 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 wrpodcast@anthem.co.uk 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 wrpodcast@anthem.co.uk 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 wrpodcast@anthem.co.uk 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 wrpodcast@anthem.co.uk 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 wrpodcast@anthem.co.uk 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.