Episode 394: Benita Willis – World Cross Country Champion & Four Time Olympian
I'll Have Another with Lindsey Hein Podcast
SandyBoy Productions
4.9 • 2.1K Ratings
🗓️ 8 July 2022
⏱️ 60 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Benita Willis is the coach of Lindsay Flanagan who just ran a huge PR at the Gold Coast Marathon in 2:24:43. When I talked to Benita, Lindsay had just run the Paris Marathon where she also had a great race! Benita is an Australian distance running legend herself. She is a 4 time Olympian at the 2000, 2004, 2008, and 2012 Olympics. She is a 3 time national champion in the 5000m. She was also the 2004 World Cross Country Champion. She has a marathon PR of 2:22:36 which is the Australian record. She also holds so many other Australian records on the roads and on the track.
Benita is pregnant with her first child and is the coach for Lace Up Running. She coaches professional runners and every day runners.
What we talked about:
4:30- Introduction to Benita Willis
6:20- Benita’s pregnancy
8:35- How she met her husband
11:15- The miscarriages that Benita had
15:25- Retiring from her pro running career and seeing women in their 40s competing at a high level
23:00- All of the Australian records that she holds
25:40- Living in America
27:25- 2008 Olympics and what Benita dealt with in her personal life that year
33:30- Benita’s World Cross Country Championship win in 2004
42:50- Running the Australian Record in the marathon
44:15- Thoughts on the change in technology and the fast times being run
45:55- How growing up as a competitive hockey player helped her in her running career
50:40- Specialization in sports
52:15- Benita’s coaching business
56:10- End of podcast questions
Show notes:
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is a Sandy Boy Productions podcast. |
| 0:19.2 | Hey everybody, welcome to all have another podcast with Lindsay Heim. |
| 0:24.8 | I'm your host Lindsay and I'm so grateful you're here today. |
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| 1:16.5 | All right, today's episode is a fun one. It is with Bonita Willis. |
| 1:21.0 | Bonita happens to be the coach of Lindsay Flanagan who just ran a huge PR at the Gold Coast |
| 1:28.3 | Marathon in 224-43. So when I talked to Bonita, Lindsay had just ran the Paris marathon and had a |
| 1:36.3 | great race and now she's just had another great race. Bonita is a legend distance runner in Australia. |
| 1:44.3 | She is a four-time Olympian 2000-2004-2008 and 2012. She's a three-time national champion in the |
| 1:52.9 | 5,000 meters and one thing we talked about in this episode was super fun because she breaks down |
| 1:59.4 | this race even though it was 18 years ago still so fresh. She holds a gold medal in world cross-country |
| 2:08.0 | championships from 2004. She has a marathon PR of 22, which is the Australian record |
| 2:16.0 | and she also holds so many other Australian records on the roads and on the track. Bonita is |
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