Welcome to episode 104 of the Women’s Running Podcast. I’m your host, Esther Newman, and she’s your other host, Holly Taylor. We start off by catching up after Holly’s holiday. Has she run while in Italy? I am firmly bating my breath, obviously. We then catch up on everything we’ve been doing in the huge heat that we’ve just experienced. I’ve been running as usual, but I’ve made sure to adjust my running to allow for the heat – taking walking breaks up the hills, and drinking way more water, and so far it’s working for me. But of course we have to talk about sweat because that’s a huge issue right now! And never was a sweat wicking top more needed than around me during the summer.

We also talk about sports and schools, nudged into it by an email from a lovely listener. As neither of us had the best experience at school in terms of team sports, this is a hugely emotive subject for us, and I know we won’t be alone. While tons of you will have had enormously positive experiences at school in PE, there are many of us that haven’t – so many of us were picked last, and felt unequal and unable to compete with the best of them. Thankfully, quite a lot has changed in PE since I was at school, but we still need to consider young girls in whom there is a massive drop off in engagement with sport when they hit puberty. Body shaming, self confidence, and simple practicalities all have their part to play. But so do we! We need to be encouraging our girls to enjoy the feeling of participating – not for the end goal of winning something, but for enjoyment itself. Just like we do. At the end we have a bonus section on a new animal that we hate on our running!

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