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 o...
May 04, 2022•1 hr 30 min•Season 1Ep. 90
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 t...
Apr 27, 2022•1 hr 1 min•Season 1Ep. 89
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 Ch...
Apr 20, 2022•1 hr 14 min
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 AMAZ...
Apr 13, 2022•58 min•Season 1Ep. 87
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 postpon...
Apr 06, 2022•1 hr 12 min•Season 1Ep. 86
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 an...
Mar 30, 2022•1 hr 19 min•Season 1Ep. 85
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 ...
Mar 23, 2022•1 hr 7 min•Season 1Ep. 84
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,...
Mar 16, 2022•1 hr 8 min•Season 1Ep. 83
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 th...
Mar 09, 2022•1 hr 2 min•Season 1Ep. 82
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 s...
Mar 02, 2022•59 min•Season 1Ep. 81
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 B...
Feb 23, 2022•1 hr 1 min•Season 1Ep. 80
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...
Feb 17, 2022•48 min•Season 1Ep. 79
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 ...
Feb 09, 2022•59 min•Season 1Ep. 78
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: c...
Feb 02, 2022•50 min•Season 1Ep. 77
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 trainin...
Jan 26, 2022•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 76
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...
Jan 20, 2022•56 min•Season 1Ep. 75
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...
Jan 12, 2022•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 74
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,...
Jan 05, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Season 1Ep. 73
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...
Dec 29, 2021•49 min•Season 1Ep. 72
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 th...
Dec 23, 2021•59 min•Season 1Ep. 71
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...
Dec 16, 2021•46 min•Season 1Ep. 70
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 – gu...
Dec 09, 2021•52 min•Season 1Ep. 69
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 P...
Dec 02, 2021•59 min•Season 1Ep. 68
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 fu...
Nov 25, 2021•54 min•Season 1Ep. 67
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 ...
Nov 18, 2021•1 hr•Season 1Ep. 66
In this episode I speak to Carla Molinaro . Carla is a runner and adventurer of epic proportions – and even more importantly, if you read the magazine, you might remember her adorning the cover of our April issue this year. She first came to my attention in 2020 when she smashed the Land’s End to John O’Groats record by about 10 hours during lockdown. Turns out this wasn’t her first adventure by a very long chalk. She tells me about her start in running, which actually came from triathlon, and h...
Nov 11, 2021•45 min•Season 1Ep. 65
In this episode we’re talking gear. And there’s a reason for this – We’ve just stumbled past Halloween, and you interrupt us having a giggle about that, and then next up it’s firework night, and before you know it, it’ll be Christmas. Don’t hate me for saying that. So if you’ve got some favours to pull in, it’s worth thinking about those big ticket items first, so you get exactly what you want on Christmas Day. And by that, I mean shoes and jackets. So this is us having a chat about the shoes we...
Nov 04, 2021•54 min•Season 1Ep. 64
Welcome to Episode 63 of the Women’s Running Podcast. This is one of our hybrid episodes – it’s part workshop chat with me and Holly, and part chat with one of our favourite people to give us some advice. Our expert this week is the very lovely Anna Harding from the Running Channel. She’s been on here before – way back in the mists of time in episode 8. Check that out to hear all about how she started running in the first place, and her journey from non-runner to running expert. In this episode ...
Oct 28, 2021•47 min•Season 1Ep. 63
In this episode Holly and I are talking about parkrun. Yes, we actually went after talking about it for months. After a bit of an early start, and some not inconsiderable nerves, we got Holly through her very first parkrun – and only my second since lockdown lifted, so it felt very new to both of us. We talk about our experiences, but most specifically Holly’s – how she found the course, the experience itself, and how she feels now. It turns out she was quite overwhelmed by it, in a good way, an...
Oct 21, 2021•42 min•Season 1Ep. 62
In this episode, I speak to Nikki Love , runner, adventurer and menopause goddess. I love talking to women who speak frankly about their bodies and their experiences of the weirdnesses being female can throw at us, and Nikki does all of that and then some. We pile straight into the menopause, as Nikki’s experience is pretty grim listening, but also incredibly inspiring for those of us staring menopause in the face. She talks about the stuff that she had to push for with her GP, as traditional HR...
Oct 14, 2021•53 min•Season 1Ep. 61
