This month, 40-year-old Des Linden set a new American Masters record at the Chicago Marathon, running a time of 2:27:35. The previous record had been set in 2015 by Deena Kastor. I’m expecting Masters records to keep tumbling with increasing regularity from here on. To me, it feels like women in particular are questioning more than ever what we’ve been told about ageing.
The truth is, there’s not that much we know about middle-aged women’s bodies. They’re less interesting to scientists and have long been an overlooked area. The menopause and perimenopause - something experienced by half the adult population eventually - is only now getting some light shed on it.
So it’s no surprise that every time we reach a birthday that pushes us into another age group, our expectations of our running performances lower a little. Of course performances will, to an extent, slow with age but possibly not as dramatically or as soon as we imagine.
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