William Sichel - A Head for Running - Season 6 Ep 20 - Young Hearts Run Free - 9 December 2022

Welcome back to the Young Hearts Run Free Podcast. Welcome to the Good Life. It’s time for the curtain to come down on Season 6! And as promised it’s a belter! Our season finale is headlined by someone well qualified to do so, we’re thrilled to be joined from Orkney by Scottish running royalty William Sichel. Whilst most of us were either young (and wayward?) or indeed still an apple in our parent’s eyes William’s running story was already well underway. An early foray into marathon running, a life changing move to Orkney and the fire catching on what turned into a passion for long (long, long, long) distance endurance races. William takes us along for a ride through his many running chapters. Already a very accomplished marathon runner William talks us through his method, approach and transition into ultra distances. Ever ran a marathon completely fasted? No. Hear how chance meetings with others in the running community, nae spoilers but lots of familiar well kent faces, opened the door to ultra-running for William. The arrival of the internet in the 90s plays a key role in this Orkney treasure discovering more and finding his tribe. We home in on William’s greatest ever running achievement.  The Sri Chinmoy Marathon Team Self-Transcendence 3100 mile in New York City, to hear about its format it itself is hard to absorb. To hear about the highs, lows, and triumphs of competing in it is simply absorbing. William has a new book out charting his running journey (see link below) and we are treated to some stories from the book that simply whet the appetite. William treats us to a dialect dictionary spectacular along with a song choice that’s simply transcends the generations. We loved meeting William and his running CV contents are altogether next level for most of us, the fact he makes what sounds like the impossible possible for us all is what makes this episode quite so entrancing. Finally, we’d like to thank you so much for all your support and for listening to the podcast. We’ll be back for Season 7 before you know it, and we’ve big plans in place, oh yes, YHRF is not going anywhere! Grab a copy of Williams Book A Head for Running here https://williamsichel.co.uk/shop/ Read more about the 3100 mile race here https://3100.srichinmoyraces.org/