S2 EP06 Rebecca Harries - Market Research, Run Clubs, and a new PB

Paul sits down with Rebecca Harries, a market researcher of 20-plus years who's spent her career on the other side of the microphone — and for once finds herself being interviewed instead. Rebecca's running story starts with a first 10K she hated so much she swore off running entirely, until a friend talked her back into it years later. A reluctant Parkrun phase and a "why would we join a running club?" moment followed — and thirteen years on, she's a running club leader, seven marathons deep, and still chasing the next PB. The conversation centres on the run-walk method that turned Rebecca's running upside down: a precisely tuned nine-minutes-and-seven-seconds run, one-minute walk structure that let her smash a half marathon PB she'd set over a decade earlier — without changing her training at all. She and Paul dig into the mental trick of only ever having to run nine minutes at a time, the men who show up mid-race with unsolicited "encouragement" for women pacing themselves, and why the sweetest revenge is simply overtaking them eight miles later. They also cover her seven marathons (London: euphoric; Brighton: relentless out-and-backs; Worcester: "hell on earth"), the twice-weekly 7am runs with the same three friends she hasn't missed in over four years, and the accidental ultra — Race to the Stones, 50K, signed up ten days before the start line. The conversation also turns to bigger change: Rebecca was recently made redundant after two decades in market research, and is now launching Conkers and Thread, a business upcycling old denim and shirts into bags and clothing — built, fittingly, around the same make-it-yourself instinct that's carried her through running for over a decade. Warm, funny, and full of hard-won running wisdom — this episode is about pacing yourself, showing up for the same four people every week, and reinventing what's already there.