Author Margaret Webb (of
Older, Faster, Stronger: What Women Runners Can Teach Us All
About Living Younger, Longer) returns to talk about race
etiquette, body image, and ways to live a healthier, longer running
lifestyle. Serena Marie, RD, and Kari fill the Gratitude Jar this
week and also talk about what stress and cortisol levels do to the
body. Serena recaps the
Eileen C. Dugan Memorial 5K that she recently ran, and Kari
updates listeners on her back injury.
Featured Guest: Author Margaret Webb
Kari and Margaret Webb, from self-titled Episode
48, converse about what’s going on in Margaret’s life right
now, race etiquette, body image, the top seven ways to live a
healthy life, and much more.

Margaret has been running in her late 20s, and because of her
flat feet, she was always afraid of running too long or far.
One day, her sister challenged her to run a half marathon, and
she felt she couldn’t say no since her sister is thirteen years
older than she.
After her first book came out, called
Apples To Oysters: A Food Lover’s Tour Of Canadian
Farm, she felt she needed to lose a few pounds gained
while researching and going on tour to promote the book.
She thought she’d try her hand at a marathon, and she was about
to turn fifty years old, so she wanted to try to get into the best
shape of her life.
She had an amazing fiftieth year, ran several marathons, and
achieved a personal best (PB).

Older, Faster, Stronger: What Women Runners Can Teach Us All
About Living Younger, Longer is her memoir as an
overweight smoker and couch potato to a fit distance runner. She
also talked to long-distance female runners while writing the
book.
Her largest goal was to turn herself into a runner who could
run for life.
She found that when you get into distance running, there’s
about a ten-year arc where you continue to build your speed and
strength but you inevitably run into a slower period.
Age doesn’t disappear, and it shouldn’t stop anyone from
starting running at any age.
Find the age grade running calculator that Margaret mentions

here.
Kari updates Margaret on her experience of running three
marathons (and how it all started in “ Bank Of America Chicago
Marathon Race Director Carey Pinkowski”
Episode 88) and how she enjoys 5Ks and half marathons much
more.
Margaret talks about the ridiculousness of thinking we are not
runners if we haven’t run the marathon distance. She thinks it’s
useful and interesting to have trained for a marathon, because it’s
a big goal to achieve.
Many women can and do successfully run marathons well into
their 70s, 80s, and 90s. But for most of us, in order to be healthy
running those distances, we need to cross train a lot.
Margaret wants to get into distance swimming, kayaking, and
cycling.
One major takeaway is to respect your body type and mechanics
in order to run injury free.
Last year she ran the BAA 5K
with some of her running club friends and had an amazing time. The
next day, she took a running tour through Boston. Although it’s
sexy to run a big-city marathon, there are other ways to run a city
too!
Margaret thinks that 5 and 10K distances should get more
respect. For the BAA 5K, you self select what corral you go in, so
those runners who are least experienced go to the first corral to
try and get to the finish line faster. In the first corral, there
were elites mixed in with slower runners.
For folks in the second or third corral, they had to pass the
slower runners from the first corral. People were even stopping to
walk in the first corral, which made it very difficult for the
faster runners who had to dodge and weave around slower folks. It
becomes frustrating and dangerous.
Her goal was to run a personal best there, and she wanted to
try and place in her age group, so she wanted the conditions for a
fast race.
For someone who’s new to a 5K race, Margaret suggests the
following etiquette:

All races should have an etiquette guideline with the race
kit/bag.
For those who are on a run/walk program,