The Truth About Running a 2:29 Marathon | Becky Briggs | Ep 57

0:00Becky Briggs, welcome to the podcast. Hello, thank you for having me on. For the people who may not know who you are, would you just be able to sum yourself up? For sure. So my name is Becky Briggs. I am a 229 marathon runner. I've ran for GB four times now and I'm also an online running coach and content creator. You did your 229, was it Manchester? Yes, it was Manchester, yeah, in 2022. How was that? it was amazing um yeah it was a really really crazy day and I had absolutely no idea that I would run that time it was only when I was coming into the finish that I saw the clock and I was like oh my goodness this is actually really really quick so yeah it was a special day and definitely a day that um I'll take with me for a very very long time for sure before that race like what was you expecting what pace was you going out at for sure so that year the Manchester Marathon in 2022 was serving as the trial for the Commonwealth Games and the European Championships and also the trial for the European 50k Championships and I'm pretty sure the standards were 2.32.30 for Europeans, 2.34 for Commonwealths and then the next quickest person over the line automatically qualified for the European 50k Champs.

1:21So I had those times in my head and I was kind of thinking I would love to get the commonwealth standard so that I can you know run the commonwealth games type of thing um which would have been around a 30 to 40 second pb so that felt like something that would be realistic if I could run 233 or something like that so in my head that was sort of what I was going for so yeah to run 229 was um pretty crazy and I still regret not sprinting a little bit harder down the final straight because I ran 229 04 and I definitely could have ran a 228 50 something and how good would that sound you know 228 marathon runner rather than 229 but I'll take it yeah that's that's some going where did running start for you it started in I think about 2009 so when I was nine years old when I was in primary school I grew up you know in a very very active family both my mum and dad ran on and off when me and my sister were younger they would go to their local athletics club like do the local 10k things like that not super super seriously but equally you know they were both pretty good running sort of 37 38 minutes for 10k like both my mum and dad so you know they were pretty good and I sort of watched them doing that when I was younger and I never ever wanted to do it I just thought why you know I just it didn't appeal to me at all I could see how nervous they were getting for races and things like that and I just thought no it's not a bit of me um and then my sister would go down to athletics and just you know situational isn't it you know the track in Hull was ages away from where we lived my dad worked night shifts I had to sort of go along and watch and eventually I sort of gave in and was like right okay I'll give it a go as well and it's pretty much as soon as I started I got completely hooked.

3:11Did you start off like in the middle distance group? Yeah so I've I was always destined to be like a longer distance runner I haven't got you know much sort of power at all but yeah definitely started on the track um you know when you're sort of you know nine you're in like the under 11's age group so like the longest distance you do on the track is 600 meters which is crazy sort of thinking back but yeah sort of started on the track like 600 then moved to like 800 1500 um so yeah did you do a lot of kind of like track events when you younger did you represent the athletic sport yeah yeah like represented i was kingston upon hull at the time and then um yeah quite you know a few years later it would have been when i was you know last year of a levels i did english schools track for humberside and did like the 3000 but it was never massively my my thing you know the track doesn't really appeal to me um the fact that everybody's watching you and it's kind of like you know laps after laps type of thing but yeah that is where I started a lot of pressure isn't I remember like back competing I used to do a couple of like 800 meter distance uh for my local athletics club and I couldn't think of anything worse like starting on that start line going off and then like everyone just watching at all times yes 100 % and I definitely feel that now especially you know you know at this age sort of being like okay I could do a 5k on the track or a 10k on the track but it just simply doesn't appeal to me at all I love watching it and love you know watching other people do it you know it was the diamond league at the weekend you know amazing to go and watch um like athletics of that amazing standard in real life but it's just doesn't appeal to me type of thing I prefer to kind of be out there on my own and you know just sort of you know not running laps yeah it makes sense when did you uh realize that you was better at the longer distance stuff I think I all along it was very much the endurance base I never really struggled to do you know even when I was still in primary school you know a few times a week I'd go for a run like with either my mum or my dad and you know looking back it's only sort of you know maybe three to four k but at the age of sort of 10 or 11 that's quite a long way isn't it and I would just never struggle like that just wasn't wasn't something that was a struggle so I think I was always destined to be a longer distance runner but then I did my first well I did my first 10k race when I was 15 I just turned 15 and in my head I was like I would love to run sub 40 but I had I didn't train with a watch or gb gps or anything like that and that was just a number I'd plucked out of the blue and I ran 39 58 and I think that at the age of 15 with no specific training that was kind of a sign to be like actually I think the longer distances are probably my thing yeah so you go from that and then do you just get hooked on the longer distance stuff yeah for sure so as soon as I was 15 just sort of you know the situation of my athletics club back at home um at that point in time I was part of a junior athletics club where they mainly did sort of fun runs and things like that wasn't any track running so when you hit 15 you moved automatically to just doing the 10ks so I did a lot of 10k races when I was sort of 15 16 17 and then when I was 18 I did my first half marathon and that was the real sort of turning point of okay I actually think that I could go somewhere with with my running because I ran it in 74 57 which for my first half marathon at the age of 18 it's only looking back that I realized quite how impressive you know that was especially before the days of carbon shoes and things like that and i remember finishing that in my and thinking oh my goodness some of the qualifying times for the marathon you know for like world championships and things like that um now seem like they would be within reach in the years to come because if i've ran sub 75 for a half now then you know actually maybe that is a possibility so yeah that was like a big turning point what was your training looking like then so this was when i was still living back at home so back in East Yorkshire it was nothing sort of super super crazy I would do a track session once a week I would do a really tough hill session some tempo work a lot of easy running but saying that the easy running was never easy and this isn't something that I would advocate as advice by any means but a lot of the running I was doing was quick it's not sustainable I definitely wouldn't be able to do it now I think my body would give up but at the age of 18 like I sort of had that um you know the the sort of sweet spot where I ran everything super super quick and I just got really really fit from it so I was running quite high mileage I reckon it was probably about 120k a week but it wasn't sort of um as structured in the way that it you know a normal training program would be structured that you would think that you know know a female athlete would run sub 75 now but it did work so what uh what paces were you kind of hitting like you said you kind of went hard like most days yeah for sure so most days if i was going for a run i'd be running definitely like sub four minute k's you know if i was going to go and do like a 12k run it'd be like 354 a k type of thing and it would feel like straight out the door straight out the door straight out the door and it would be like somewhat hard like i'm not saying that it was i'm not saying it was easy um but yeah that's that's sort of what i would be doing and then yeah some really tough hill sessions like especially in the winter we'd be running kind of like in the pitch black darkness that head torch is on and we do things like 30 minutes continuous and you'd have no idea how long that's just up and down a hill yeah you'd have no idea how long you've been running for and yeah there's a couple of you know really tough sort of hill locations back at home and you know hill work isn't something that i even do now but i think mentally you know know it gets you really really strong especially when you're running in the dark and you've got no idea how long you've got left and things like that and it was the same for being on the track at that time when I would train I would only record my recoveries I wouldn't record the paces of the reps because I was like I don't need to know the pace of the reps I'm just going to run hard which is really interesting because now you know sort of eight years on of course I wouldn't do that but at the time it worked and it was definitely that sort of naivety to um you know running and kind of like running those longer distances that yeah it um yeah it's funny when did that all change like when did you get more structured to retrain obviously it was structured because like you say you were still part of a group you're still part of a team but when did you take about take it upon yourself to have a little bit more structure yeah for sure so then in 2019 I moved to St Mary's University and was coached by one of the uni coaches for a year but then COVID hit and uni training was sort of like all over the place there was no group anymore because everyone was you know back at home for COVID and then I ran a really quick half marathon and then I decided to move coaches after that because I decided that I wanted to run my first marathon um so I moved coaches and then it was very much a lot more structured it was like no your easy runs must be this pace and the sessions became so hard that you know I had to run my easy runs easy because otherwise I definitely wouldn't have been able to do the sessions so yeah that was sort of in 2020 and has your training changed much since I mean I've had a couple of different coaches since that time um but overall very very similar you know it depends if you're in like a marathon block you know you've got those classic sort of marathon style sessions and you know a lot of easy volume and I think because I ran such a lot from such a young age I am definitely someone who needs a high mileage to be able to maintain a base level of fitness because I've always run such a lot um which is great because I love running um sometimes I'm like oh do I need to go out for another run but um yeah I would say overall in the past few years it's stayed fairly similar I know what works I know what like my body needs and reacts well to and doesn't react well to so yeah so what's a typical week looking like okay so at the moment um a typical week is looking like easy running on a monday maybe 10k and 10k so double run tuesday started doing some double threshold sessions so not every week but sometimes it might be something like um around it could be like 12 by 800s at threshold in the morning and then 16 by 400 at threshold in the evening type of thing so yeah sort of splitting the volume over the two sessions Wednesday easy once again distance sort of varies you know whether I do kind of like 10k and 10k or 10k 6k you do another double day yeah usually and then Thursday something a little bit shorter trying to kind of keep a little bit of top end speed because it's not my natural sort of strong point at all it's important to try and kind of keep a little bit of it so we'll do something a little bit shorter maybe like 5k volume whether it's on the track or you know if it's in the park you know some shorter faster reps um maybe do another double that's maybe like half an hour easy in the evening friday will be an easy day maybe like 10k 12k easy and then saturday will be a long run session so depending on whether it's in the thick of a marathon block or whether it's more sort of you know like 10k half marathon training will depend on how long that long run session is um but it's always got you know varying paces in there touching on that sort of like marathon pace and i think that even when i'm not in a marathon block it's something that i've kept in because i think it's a really good way to keep fit and also mentally strong as well rather than just sort of like jogging a long run um and then sunday i'll do a little bit of a longer easy run so it's kind of rounding up to 130 ish k a week at the moment which is a good place for me i've i've done the 150 160k weeks in the past and it's a lot um it's a lot I feel like um when you do increase distance like it's great for a couple of weeks yeah and then something starts yes yeah yeah for sure and that's definitely what I found and I think it's one of those things where you know there's I've done it before and I know that I can run you know those distances and the first time I remember running that first 100 mile week and being like oh my god like I've ran 100 miles this week which is so silly because it's just like a it's like almost like an arbitrary unit isn't it but you know you do it and you think wow okay this is amazing um but then a couple of weeks later you know you pick up a cold or a niggle or something like that and i think that you know especially as like a female athlete it's a really really fine balance between you know what is enough and what is maybe tipping slightly over the edge and you know it depends exactly where you are in the training or the marathon block or that jazz or and for me mainly what i'm doing outside of the actual running itself you know like i'm not a full-time athlete and I don't live the life of a full-time athlete you know I'm not on a team or on sort of like training camps or anything like that if I was in that position then I'm sure I'd be you know I know I can run those distances but right now it's sort of like okay what's the um maximum I can do while sort of like staying you know in one piece and you know being able to you know do really well with work and things like that and what's like a typical day looking like okay so I try and keep it's one of those crazy things where um I've always been self-employed you know since I finished uni graduated always been self-employed and that freedom of time is amazing but actually the structure of a nine till five is you know something that you kind of think oh actually working between those hours is a really good thing to do so I always try and structure my training sort of around that so I'll get up at maybe like 6 6 30 and then you know go for my first run in the morning and then I'll come back you know work from home work in a coffee shop do my coaching work which is what I do you know pretty much you know that's sort of like my nine to five type of thing um and you know I do that during the day and then once I close my laptop I'll go for another run um you know some days of the week vary a little bit whether it's you know like more kind of like creative things like you know coming on a podcast or you know whether it's like a physio appointment I do have the luxury of being able to do that during the day or like a gym session or something like that but more often than not actually my life looks very much like a you know I try and keep it as you know doing the laptop work keeping it to the nine to five and then having my running outside of it how important is it to how important do you think it is to kind of like have a big break in between your runs if you're doing double days yeah for sure i think it is i think it is really really important i think um you know i see some people doing sort of like their first run at maybe like midday and then going in the evening but i prefer to have them you know as far apart as possible type of thing and i think that um yeah it's a funny one with double days because in previous marathon blocks i have just done all my runs as like single runs um but i do think you can get a little bit more volume out of yourself with you know kind of balancing the recovery if you do split it and sort of split it well but then from an endurance side of things I do think for the marathon there is some benefit to being familiar with just that extended time on feet you know running for over an hour lots of times a week but um yeah equally in terms of like the working week I love being able to run before I start working afterwards which I think is really really important as well you know when you look at your training you want to structure it in a way that is yes beneficial but also enjoyable like running will always be my hobby and my break from work even though my work is centered around running so that's why I'm like yeah I love going for a run in the evening do you do a lot of your training on your own I try and do as many easy runs with other people as possible but the majority of my interval sessions I do on my own which I actually really enjoy and I've always really enjoyed doing those hard sessions on my own um I think that there is you know there is loads of benefit it goes without saying with training in a group and you know you might be able to get more out of yourself physically but mentally I really enjoy pushing myself and it being completely reliant on just myself and like me alone and I really think that that's something that's important to take to the marathon as well yeah because you can't like rely on always having a group within a marathon because yeah you might i i had this problem within uh the houston marathon like i was running with a group of people that were saying that they were running sub 220 yeah but i kept looking down at my watch and it was too slow yeah yeah to then leave them but like and it was so much harder like going off them and running on my own than it would be running in the group yeah and i suppose it's same within training really yes you can get an extra couple of percent but um i don't know sometimes you got to train being alone yeah for sure for sure in the race you're alone yeah exactly and i think you know when it comes to race day knowing that you're not going to be reliant on anybody else this is super super important especially you know some of the marathons that i've done you know for instance being like on the elite start of london marathon where you are actually running on your own for the majority of it and it's like if you've done every training session in a lovely big group you know sat behind a few guys and you know that's that's lovely but then when you're out there completely on your own you need to know that you can do it on your own so yeah it's something that I actually really enjoy and I think that that's really the time when I kind of you know running is so much more for me than like the performances but like an opportunity to just like really like almost be myself and I feel like I am most at home when I'm doing a really hard session on my own and that's like the most satisfying thing in the world when you finish you finish that last rep you know you're in battersea park you're clinging onto the railings and no one else is around and you're just like i just did that yeah that's that's uh that's class how was being in the elite start wave of london marathon yeah so i've done it twice i did it for my second marathon in October 2020 and then I did it again in April 2024 um which crazy looking back you know for my second marathon and being only like 20 years old I just was so fearless and I was like of course I'm on the elite start line of London marathon which now I'm like I feel like I was such a baby you know like it was six years ago um but yeah it was really really scary you sort of stand on the start line with there's not many other girls on the start line you know that you know the international athletes are going to be significantly quicker than you and you're pretty much looking at that road in front of you and thinking this is going to be somewhat of a solo run from you know here to like buckingham palace type of thing which is a really really scary thought but equally you know very special and once again it's like you know you have got the whole of london cheering you on but really it's like down to you to really sort of like make that happen and i'm really glad that i've had the opportunity to see london marathon from you know doing it twice as an elite and then twice in championship definitely a lot more fun in championship 100 but really special to sort of be like yeah i have done like the elite start line of london marathon why is that just because you get to run with more people yeah and it is more fun you know and there's more crowds out because the the women kind of go off half an hour before the masses you know it is a little bit quieter and if it's just you sort of running along you know sometimes people actually aren't cheering you know they're just kind of like awkwardly staring yeah because you know and i'm fully well know that like i probably don't look like i'm running like crazy quick you know i mean you're literally just running completely on your own um whereas if you're in the championships wave then it's it's you know it's mega it's amazing you know you've got people around you like it's yeah it's a completely different atmosphere yeah no that's that's cool so you've done on a marathon four times yes four times yeah how many marathons have you done in total i've done 10 now 10 10 yes which is where else have you done so manchester my first one was the olympic trial event in kew gardens oh yes yes which is like which was the most unique experience for my first marathon that you could have possibly ever had um but also one that i'm very grateful for um because it definitely taught me like that the marathon even though now the marathon can be very much all sort of like glitz and glamour and you know these shakeout runs and you know the people cheering and signs and which is all amazing but actually like the marathon is like your 26 miles and the experience at Kew Gardens it being in covid with no spectators 13 laps and being like yeah that's the marathon for my first experience I'm really pleased that that's what it was yeah it's pretty brutal in it it was really brutal hardcore yeah 100 especially for the fact that you know like i finished and yeah it was the middle of covid no spectators and i went back to my uni room and just sort of like sat there and ate a bowl of cereal and thought oh that's that then i've ran it now what time did you get there i ran 2 38 and i was so disappointed oh that was your first marathon yeah 2 38 and you was disappointed Yeah, I was in really, really fantastic shape.

22:46And it's one of those things where you, you know, as you know, you know, the training that you've done and you know sort of what fitness you're in. And I was in really, really good fitness. And it was sort of like a go for it or don't do it type of thing because it was the Olympic trial and the Olympic qualifying time was 2.29.30. So that is what my training had been geared towards. I think I could have ran about a 2.31 or 2.32 on the day I think 2.29 would have been probably a little bit on the you know kind of quick side for my first marathon but I was on track for like 2.31 until like 21 miles and I just got the fueling side of things completely wrong the pace was that little bit too quick for me actually to take the the Morton that I was using and drink it so I was taking the bottle having a couple of sips and throwing it away and I just completely hit the wall from like a nutrition standpoint um the classic you know like dizzy I couldn't think straight like I was you know running and then stopping dead and then running and stopping dead um but luckily because it was laps I sort of got myself around to where my coach was at the next lap because he was the um person handing like handing me the morton and I said to him I was like I don't know what to do like I can't see and he was like you will regret this if you don't finish it so I took 500 mils of Morton and walked and drank it and then it was like a switch and I was like Becky you're finishing this and I'm so glad that I did because 238 is still absolutely incredible and I would have been so sad if I hadn't have seen it through and finished it and it definitely taught me that the marathon is so much more about resilience and that anything can happen within those 26 miles but it's about like how you sort of be smart and like cope with it type of thing so yeah a very unique experience but I was I was devastated because I knew that I had so much more in me and then it was only a year later that I ran 229.

24:44Yeah that's a that's a huge improvement but I think it's worth noting that like anyone's first marathon you're you're not going to do your best time no like it's going to be very very rare that you get everything right 100 yeah and like it was such a good learning experience about like myself and about you know like the the nutrition side of things and just being like this is really important it needs to be a non-negotiable that if you're like right I'm going to take eight gels that like you have those eight gels you know that side of things because it wasn't that I wasn't trying I was picking up the bottles but like the pace was just that bit too quick for me to actually you know like drink kit and actually take in the nutrition so it was a great learning experience um and yeah it definitely is the marathon is about so much more than just the running and i think that everyone's first marathon is yeah such a learning curve for yeah the physical sort of like maybe time that you get and things that you learn but what you learn about yourself as well what's other marathons have you done so so it was Kew Gardens and then London Manchester and then Manchester qualified me for the European Championships later that summer so um that was in Munich um which was yeah a really special experience to like represent GB over the marathon was sort of in my eyes I was like yeah that's that's pretty special you made it yeah made it and yeah it was really really special and then unfortunately after that I got pretty badly injured so then I had to have a bit of a break from the marathon and then my first marathon back post-injury was being back on the elite start line of London Marathon in 2024 which was exactly what I wanted to do I wanted to show that despite having this injury that could have definitely been completely career-ending and you know I could have never got back to being that standard again as I want to stand back on that elite start line at london marathon and i did which was really really special so i did that and then how did you get injured i it was double sacrum stress fracture so both sides um one side went first and then the second side couldn't tolerate the load of you know me sort of offloading onto that side and then the other side went so yeah it was as running injuries go to fracture both sides of your sacrum at the age that I was as well at 22 was not good did you uh did you kind of like analyze why potentially that happened or do you feel like it was like freak accident or for sure it definitely wasn't a freak accident I mean unfortunately um you know in my younger years through the sport it's definitely been a rocky rocky journey um with my relationship between running and not eating enough and you know that has sort of like longer term consequences and even though at the time in 2022 I was doing everything I possibly could to be like my healthiest self ultimately I was 22 years old I was at uni unsponsored didn't have physio support you know I was just simply doing my best I was like working a nannying job doing my degree and it was one marathon block too many you know four marathon blocks in the space of like pretty much like not that much more than a year is a lot and the training that you have to do to run a 229 and then to be going to the European Championships is is such a big demand on the body and ultimately like it was it was too much but um yeah with uh with the nutrition side like in 2022 was was you kind of on it with everything as as much as you you want to be yeah for sure i was i was like doing my absolute best but equally it was one of those things where it's only sort of looking back that you then kind of really respect what i was asking my body to do for instance my classic friday at that time sort of preparing for like the european champs i would wake up I would do my marathon session in the morning which would be like you know 22 23 24 miles they were hard they were really really hard sessions I would come back and then I would go to my physiology lecture which at the time was in a heat chamber so I'd be sat in a heat chamber for two hours and then I would walk straight out of the heat chamber to go and pick my nanny and kids up from school at like 3 30 until eight and then I'd get back and I'd be like absolutely exhausted and I know that people train for marathons around full-time jobs and things but like I was 22 and the training was really really really hard and I would get to the end of the day and you know I would do my best to eat enough but like the amount that you realistically need to be eating and resting if you're doing those types of sessions you know 30k progression run with a 5k warm pump 5k warm down I just I was doing my best but it just wasn't wasn't enough yeah yeah I feel like it as well like it catches up with you it catches up with you and it's one of those things where it's like I felt like I was running on borrowed time for a really really long time um and it wasn't that I don't know whether anyone ever deserves a stress fracture but I I was like yeah there were points where I thought maybe I am invincible to this but I definitely wasn't and it was just that wake-up call to be like you know you get one body and you aren't invincible and if you want to run because that's what makes you happy then you need to be like really really really sensible and since then I have done absolutely everything in my power to be as sensible as possible because I'd much rather be running than not running at all what's changed then so just being a little bit more kind to myself and I think in terms of the training and things like that that like actually if you if it's a day where for whatever reason the session just isn't happening you can be like right okay that's all right and I I would just be so so harsh on myself and then especially even from the things like you know from a nutrition standpoint and it just happens with age doesn't it and even just literal kind of like the environment that you're in rather than being in you know a uni house with six boys in the kitchen that you know is you don't want to be in to living in my own flat where I can go to the shops and cook and do you know what I mean it's like things like that that actually can be very easily overlooked but like the environment that you're in and just making sure you get enough sleep and things like that can make a huge difference so just sort of like actually being able to look after myself in the way that you should be able to look after yourself makes a massive difference and it sounds silly but it's really not when you're asking so much of your body yeah and uh with kind of like the recovery like you touch on their sleep is there anything else that you do not really so i go to the sauna a couple of times a week i think that's really really beneficial not just for the sort of you know physical recovery but mentally to actually fully switch off i think that you know we're all sort of exposed to it now but it's really hard to actually fully switch off especially when like my job is online and as much as i try and keep you know my laptop hours between nine and five I don't think there's ever a time where I don't wake up without a message related to coaching or go to bed without and there's always there's always something that's like stimulating your brain so being in the sauna actually forces me to switch off because I can't take my phone in there so I do that but apart from that you know eating well making sure that I eat within like 30 minutes after getting back from sessions and then yeah just just sleeping well but I don't do anything sort of super super crazy I'm not someone for tracking too many stats yeah do you do much like stretching or foam rolling no not as much as alphie yes yeah not as much no um a little bit of stretching here and there but not a huge amount like if i'm in the gym i will do i should probably do more but equally like you know it's always the case isn't it you get back from a run and there's a million things to do a million things to apply to yeah sometimes as well with uh with stretching especially like for running sometimes it's not the most optimal because you need the spring in your legs yeah exactly yeah you need kind of like that tightness yeah 100 100 so obviously you you uh did the london one and then after that after that i then did new york marathon oh so you've done which was amazing um what's it like honestly the most incredible marathon um i absolutely loved it it was just like chills from like start to finish you know they're playing like frank sinatra as you like cross the start line and it was just simply like super amazing and i and at that point in time as well you know i did it with sports tours it was my first time ever going to america and it just felt really special that like it was my running that had taken me like to new york marathon and you know like you know taking me like to america for the first time and yeah it was really really special so did new york but that was four weeks before valencia marathon so i ran new york just sort of for fun as like you know my longest run of the block for Valencia so that was actually my slowest marathon I think I ran 250 or 251 at New York but my legs were still battered afterwards because it is actually quite hilly like yeah it was it was still tough going um and then yeah ran Valencia in December 2024 around a 2.32 there which I was pleased with yeah that felt like a really really good day and then that was 2024 2025 I did London again and just did that did that for fun I was really ill in the lead up to it just kind of kept getting the flu um and sort of had to you know lose sight on a quick time but I had the best time you know running London Marathon when it was super hot and you know it's my first time doing it as championship and really sort of gave me that like this is what London Marathon is about so I'm really glad that actually things did work out that way and then I did Chicago Marathon last October so another major and I absolutely love Chicago um such a great city in it such a great city like and it was just such a the whole city just felt like it was alive and sort of like backing the marathon which was really nice and I really enjoyed the route I thought it was fantastic and you know that that marathon was like yeah this is really really special because I was running it once again I was running it for fun I was meant to do Valencia marathon last December but I decided against it after running Chicago but I was just having the absolute best time you know like being amongst like all like the massive buildings it was just it was great so yeah really enjoyed Chicago and ran 238 there off just you know being like right I'm just gonna go and have fun with it oh imagine when running a marathon and running it for fun and getting a 238 yeah it was yeah it's one of those things where it's like I'm not saying that it was easy by any means it's still such a long way I think no matter how many marathons you run you'll still get to like 26k and think how on earth have I still got 16k left that's always like the point for me where I feel like I've been running for ages and I've still got so long to go um but yeah it was so amazing and I really really enjoyed it um and then yeah London Marathon again this year which once again I did that with you know no time goal in mind it was six weeks after five weeks yeah maybe five weeks after my first ultra marathon so once again it was just kind of there for enjoyment but I ran 237 I feel like I've perfected the art of running like just under 240 for a marathon um and being able to have fun with it which I don't take for granted at all well that's that's pretty cool and then you're uh you're now preparing for Berlin right yes I am yeah how's that going yeah it's going good it's going good like it's one of those things where I feel like the end of September feels like it's just around the corner but I just feel like I'm also very much only getting started with the marathon block but equally it's not my first time running a marathon now I feel like I've you know I've ran a lot of marathons you know it's not sort of a case of it being like that first week where you know the marathon session is like 20k you did like I don't need to come in at that point so yeah it kind of like will look a little bit different but I'm excited and you know it's another major I'd love to do all of the majors you know I've never been to Berlin before and um yeah I'm excited to see what to see what I can do yeah so it's a cool little city it's quite quite a serious one as well yeah yeah like I say being one of the fastest in the world um have you got a time in mind um TBC okay yeah so obviously probably just need a little bit more training to yeah find out work out your time for sure have you got any like test sessions i always find this like interesting like what what do people like say for example if you're aiming for a time is there a session where you need to hit them paces beforehand that you do i would love to say yes and have a simple answer but i actually don't think i do i think it's more of a feeling of you know every so often you just get that session where you think like actually i think i can do this and there might even be a session that doesn't 100 % where you don't feel great but you still manage to do it anyway or if you know it's really bad weather or you know there's something else going on in your life but you manage to do it anyway that's when you're like okay I think I'm I'm ready um yeah yeah so there's no like I don't know four by five k at marathon pace or anything like that yeah I'm not I'm not one for being sort of too tuned in on exact numbers because I think you know like some people are and it works really really well for some people but i think especially over the marathon is that ultimately you know a really successful run out is like your fastest run on the day and sometimes i think if you know you put a time goal on it actually could that limit you as to what you could have potentially done on the day you know for instance if you're like I'm going for sub 240 actually then would are you then pulling back on your paces during the marathon because you're like no I need to be running 240 pace but actually you could have ran 238 on that day if you weren't sort of you know sort of like defining yourself to that set pace which I know is a really interesting way of looking at it and will not work for everybody but I feel like I've been running for so long that I've got a bit of a different perspective on it and I really like know my body so yeah how'd you pace the marathon I feel I feel so so you go feel you don't look at your watch at all like I will have my watch showing the individual um kilometers type of thing um but I think a massive part of the marathon is being able to know what feels right when you're actually running because it's one of those things as well where like we're talking such fine margins and gps and the course and all that jazz you know if you're relying completely on exactly what your watch is saying and it's a bit out then you know what are you going to do type of thing so i think really being able to tune in with yourself is very important but that being said within that i know that i would only be a couple of seconds you know if if I'm running at marathon pace and I wasn't able to look at my watch I would be very close to it in my head as to what the actual pace was type of thing um so yeah you know you know about what you want to go through halfway in but I think yeah a massive part of it is you know running by feel and especially in those later stages like oh my goodness you're just doing everything you can to go as quick as you can and there's no point if you're looking at your watch it's telling you that you're running slower but you're going putting in as much effort as possible so that you know you can get to the finish then that's going to be like a negative influence so actually just like being like no just dial in and just keep going can sometimes be the best possible thing you coach a lot of people um where do you feel like people go wrong within their training or just like their their lives when they're trying to improve their running for sure I think that especially now there's this, everyone wants everything to be perfect all of the time in terms of their running, in terms of, you know, they want their sleep score to be perfect, their heart rate variability to be perfect, all of their splits to be perfect, the perfect pair of shoes.

41:25And it's like, that's not really what running's all about. And then I think sometimes you get to marathon day or race day, no matter what the distance is. And if something goes wrong, I think people panic. and then it's like oh whereas it's like actually no you're absolutely fine it's just sometimes you know it's being able to be like now I can do hard things and you know it doesn't matter I can block it all out is like the best possible thing something that I sometimes write on my hand when you know I know that it's going to be a tough session I'm going to be in Battersea Park on a Saturday morning and there's going to be a million one people there and it's just going to be like oh my god I just write block out the noise because I'm like you don't need any of that stuff it's just like you and like your mental willpower and just what you can do physically and I think that that's really important I think that some people miss it is there a lot of people running around but I see on a Saturday it's crazy especially in the lead up to like marathon season sort of like March April time and then again sort of September October time it's just absolutely crazy but equally you know like I do like a lot of my long run sessions on my own but it's it's nice to have other people doing their long run sessions and you know you know that everyone's sort of like training for a common goal even whatever standard they're at type of thing and i think that there's something really sort of special in that and you do see friends and cheer people on and yeah yeah it's nice that everyone's getting after it yeah yeah and it's one of those things where it's like no matter what the weather's like no matter what time of day it is there'll always be people there and you just think okay yeah like it's not just me that is cool i think that's something that we're uh being from like manchester way i think that's what we're missing yeah we don't really have like a place where everyone goes running yeah for sure for sure and i do think that you know i know some people you know dislike battersea park but i think that even in the middle of winter you know it's like february it's freezing cold you'll be there on a tuesday night and you've got all the different groups doing their interval sessions and you just kind of think actually all these other people are doing hard things as well so you just don't feel sort of like there's no sort of like woe is me like i'm doing this interval session it's cold and it's dark because everyone else is doing it as well which i think is really like beneficial yeah but that is one really good thing about london yeah like you say you've got a good standard down here as well right yeah it's crazy you know just the standard of even like sock and e10k last week you know so many amazing runners and you know especially on like the female side of things you know runners running in like the you know 34 35 36 37 minutes there was loads which is just so incredible to see and you know really nice to be part of you mentioned before I think it was off air you said that you're interested in doing more ultras yes so I did my first ultra marathon this year which was a really really amazing and unique experience so I got a message it was it just like clicked on to 2026 it was new year and I got a message saying hi Becky I think you should apply for this I think you know you would do really really well like clicked on to it and it's the world 50k chance which was meant to be in December of 2025 but the pollution was too bad in Delhi which is where it was being held so it had to be postponed and rescheduled for March I hadn't originally applied because I was meant to be doing Valencia Marathon and it was the same time and it would have clashed but I had thought about it like earlier last year and thought that is maybe something that I would like to do but dates didn't align type of thing so when I got this message I was like hmm okay maybe I'll just apply for it and you know trust in the fate that if I am meant to be doing this race I'll get selected and I'll be going so I applied for it and I got selected and then I was like ah I actually only have six weeks to prepare for this and I'm running 50k and I'm not just running 50k I'm running 50k in Delhi which is you know worlds away from Battersea Park so I was kind of like right but I'm so so so glad that I did it and I do think that ultimately you know I've always been sort of good at the longer distances and I think that my strength comes from you know being able to tick over around that sort of 160 beats per minute at quite a fast pace for a long time I think that's almost like my niche which is why I can run like you know 238 marathon with my phone in my hand and waving because my heart rate's like sitting at like about 160 so I was kind of like right okay I do really really want to do this um but yeah it was a very unique experience it was 10 laps of essentially around a track up and down a dual carriageway in the pitch black it was hot humid polluted there was wild dogs it was a crazy experience but gave me so much more than just you know what running 50k was it was just so much perspective and taught me so much about myself um I'd never ran further than a marathon before I stepped on the start line so it was a really like scary experience but one where I just proved to myself that like if I wanted to do it then i absolutely would would you stick to road road ultras i think for now yeah i think it's one of those things where being based in london like i you know as much as like trail running and trail ultras you know would be so so so beautiful um i think it's definitely an art you know you look at the amazing trail runners and they're like doing the descents and it's so beautiful to watch yeah it's it's such a skill and i think you've got to be really fearless and i think that comes with practice it's definitely something that I would love to do in the future like maybe when I'm a bit older but I think for now like if I were to do more ultras then they're still going to be like the shorter distance ultras like I can't see myself going over 60k for quite a while because I still want to feel like I'm running quick but yeah I think road ultras could be yeah could be in the future of the next couple of years what do you think you can achieve in the marathon this is a really really difficult one because when I ran 229 I crossed the finish line knowing that I can I have it in me to run quicker but the way that life works out and running has become something that's like slightly different now and you know something that like I said after I got injured I would much rather be running than not running at all and the risk that comes with you know doing the training to get to that standard is so high especially if you're not on a team and not being you know almost like watched 24 hours of the day um it's you know such an incredible thing to do but like it's so so so hard that I'm like is that is that my quickest time over the marathon who knows I don't know I might run quicker who knows but I would like to you know I'd like to do all of the majors I'd like to sort of you know just be that hopefully be like a face of you know being a female marathon runner and being able to do it in a healthy and sustainable way but still be able to run quickly i really respect that answer because thanks i feel like a lot of people would just say oh yeah i'm gonna run faster or i'm gonna not but like you've i don't know you've acknowledged that life there's other things to running yeah for sure and I think that you know when I think back to the build-up to the time that I ran 229 I was so sad I was so so so sad and running wasn't giving me was it giving me anything positive in my life like yes I ran the 229 and I'm so proud of that but it was a really really really hard few months and um I wasn't happy at all running wasn't making me happy either whereas actually you know running in the 230s and being happy is also fantastic yeah no I love that obviously uh circling back around to you being a coach how important is it to gym as a runner it is important you know it's one of those things where especially you know I learned the hard way kind of coming back from being injured that you know your body needs to be strong enough to essentially just handle the load um so yeah it is really really important i think it's one of those things where if you're serious about running and serious about it doesn't you know matter what level of running you are you know whether it's your first 10k first marathon you know whether it's your 10th marathon um but having a gym program that's specific to you is really really useful and like i work with a team at the running room and i would say that for anyone rather than if you're unsure rather than walking into a gym and blindly sort of you know doing whatever exercises that you've seen on instagram is that you know having a couple of sessions with someone who's more of a running specific strength coach is really really useful so then you can take it away and be like okay this is what i need to do you know they've maybe watched you run or you know kind of like looked at your gate to be like okay where do you personally need to be stronger I think is something that's you know super beneficial do you plan gym work into like when you're coaching do you plan that in yeah I try to it's one of those things where it's like I'm you know a running coach rather than being sort of a strength coach so I will always sort of say to people you know this is what I can advise but I would love for you to go and see someone who's you know more specific type of thing if there was like a couple of exercises that are like most bang for the buck for like in the gym i think that people really neglect core work and like like deep core work i think that it's one of those things where you know like your core is like your main trunk and if the if if that's sort of like imbalanced then it's going to make everything feel so much more difficult and you might pick up more injury sort of you know like if you're overreaching or like understriding or all that jazz so i'd say like doing some really good core work whether it's you know having a very good plank routine things like dead bugs you know that real sort of like lower abdomen um is really really important and then i would say you know loading your calves is also really really important um i think yeah you know a lot of runners getting sort of shin issues or achilles issues and things like that and it's you know down to sort of like you know weak weak calves i'd like to think that really bizarrely like when i was you know growing up my running forms changed a lot over the years and back in the day i was such a four foot runner that i would literally run on my tiptoes like all the time i think it just built me like these rock solid calves but um yeah i do think that definitely like doing calf work is is really really important then i think that you know doing things like you know your back squats or even like goblet squats but you know getting some load through you know like through your quads and through your lower body is also really important yeah does that allow you to do more mileage yeah i think it's one of those things where it's like it's it allows your body to be able to tolerate the load better type of thing you know like the majority of injuries come from you know almost like doing too much running for what your body can cope with type of thing um so if you know you're doing the right work in the gym and building a body that's strong enough to be able to cope with the load then hopefully you're going to get less niggles and injuries type of thing do you think going to the gym just like once a week is enough or twice a week or i think it really sort of depends in terms of you know there's so many things to factor into everybody's training weeks in terms of time you know kind of like accessibility like ideally two strength sessions a week you know is you know probably going to be spot on but you know i think when it comes to strength work anything is better than nothing i think that's something that you know like every runner can take away and think that you know like even if you're like oh i've only got like 10 minutes to do this and even if it's just something that you can do at home that's better than doing nothing at all and just completely neglecting it yeah no it is uh it is crazy like to to think about every runner out there and see how how different people take things because like you'd speak to someone else and they'd be saying oh no you need to hit the gym like three or four times a week or there's someone there's some people out there that don't go to the gym at all for sure the gym slows you down some of the you know like maybe not the best of the best but some very very very good marathon runners will not go to the gym at all did i do any gym work in the lead up to my 229 did a bit of core and resistance band work at home but i did no heavy loading i didn't and i did run 229 but then i got injured afterwards so it's one of those difficult things where it's like you know it's it is a really fine balance but and i also think that every single person is built so differently um in terms of like your form like your genetic makeup you know even just like your body composition that there really is sort of like no one size fits all approach and there's so many ways that you can achieve the same thing you know so many ways that you can achieve a sub three marathon it could be running four times a week it could be running eight times a week you know you could not go to the gym at all go to the gym loads you need cross train not cross train um so yeah i really do think every person an athlete is so unique and you know that's why i love coaching is because the more time you spend working with an athlete the more you can understand what they actually need which i think is really exciting and is what makes it sort of specialist that yeah the more time you spend with them the more you're like ah okay that's what's working for them and that's maybe actually quite different to what's working for somebody else even if they're going after a very similar goal with um with like your running career so far obviously hopefully there's a lot longer to go but uh what's that the biggest like challenges you've come across was it was it the injury or was it something else yeah I would say as much as I think that really really hard balance of yes the injury but almost more sort of having that perspective of knowing what you know like I'm a really stubborn person like if you ask me to do something really hard like oh my goodness of course I will do it but I think after the injury came the fear of not being able to run at all and you know I know that I've ran for a very long time since I was you know really really young and didn't look after myself through many of those years and then the injury was that massive wake-up call that you're not invincible and if you want to be running then you really need to look after yourself and I think that that's what has been a really hard balance over these past few years of not knowing whether I fully go after my absolute potential at risk of not being able to run at all when it's something that I love for so far beyond times and achievements the real reason I run has nothing to do with that that's like a byproduct of it and I think that that's what's been the really big challenge is yeah of course I'd love to be like yeah i'm going to go after 226 but it's just quite it's just not as simple as that you know being a female athlete as well you know i'm not saying that it's not for male athletes but it is really hard especially over the marathon and there's a reason why you see yeah the top british female marathon runners you see them and then you don't see them for a few years and it's because they've got a really really bad injury and i've had to start from scratch again and it's so so so common and i don't think there isn't like a solution to it and even at the top level you know the support is not quite there from like the governing bodies and things and i've i've seen it firsthand and i think that that's the position that i'm in now of being like i love running so much and i love running quick but i love just being able to run what would you what would you change from like the support system at the moment for running or even just that education out there because yeah you could even argue like if you don't do it right marathon running is probably one of the most unhealthy things you can do 100 and i think it's it's really really really hard isn't it and you know it goes without saying in other sports as well whether it's you know gymnastics or whatever that at that top top level is that athlete like the most healthy person in the world well no probably not because actually like someone who is you know really really healthy maybe runs a few times a week they lift a few times a week you know they might do some different forms of cross training but that's not going to make you like the best marathon runner in the world you're probably going to be the healthiest just running a couple of 5ks exactly is there any need to run over five kilometers if like you're not doing it for health benefits you know for sure for sure so i think that you know that it's really really difficult and i think you know from governing bodies and things i think health screening only allowing people to run in teams if they are like almost having like a health check and being like they are healthy enough to run in the team too often especially through the junior years you know through cross country and things like that you know you see athletes and you think probably shouldn't be allowed to be doing you shouldn't be allowed to be representing your country you're not healthy enough to do so and then they'll go missing for the next couple of years because they'll be really badly injured you know there's been so many young athletes in the sport who were absolute stars as juniors and then they don't even run now because they can't and that's really really really sad and I didn't want to become another one of those statistics you know when I got injured and when I got the two stress fractures I was so very aware that if I didn't do all of the right things and didn't have a slightly different approach that I would be another one of those statistics and it would have been becky brooks the 229 marathon runner at 22 years old and that was just the end of the story and i was so determined for it not to be the end of the story but now the story looks slightly different and maybe it's not the olympic dream anymore but if i can inspire other girls to be like i can run really really quick and do it in a sustainable way then i think that that is slightly more important yeah i love how like so you want to educate people what do you see yourself doing in like 10 years time i know it's ages off difficult question um still very much involved within the sport um you know i really really enjoy things like podcasts public speaking i feel like that's when i feel my most alive like talking about running um so i would love to do more of that i would love to do commentary for marathons in the future i think you'd be really good at that i'd really enjoy it i just think i I would, you know, I just find it so exciting.

1:00:26That's, yeah, that's something that I would love to do. But yeah, just carry on being sort of, you know, an influential and, you know, hopefully inspirational person in the sport who has been through some really, really, really, really tough times within it, but is like, I'm still here and I'm still having fun and, you know, doing, you know, it could be like the most randomest races, you know, maybe some sort of rogue distance race or some relay event but I'm having fun doing it um yeah hopefully that's what I'm doing and then I've got a final question what would you tell your younger self is there any advice you give yourself that's such a difficult one there's probably there's so much advice I'd give my younger self but um that it's going to be okay it will just be okay just trust in the fact that you know it's going to be okay but the only person that can save you is yourself i like that thank you thank you