Meet The 72-Year-Old World Record-Breakers
You’re never too old to be serious about running. Ask masters record-breakers Jeannie Rice and Gene Dykes
Veteran stars Jeannie Rice and Gene Dykes
OVER THE PAST TWO YEARS, Jeannie Rice and Gene Dykes, who were born within a few days of each other in the US, in April 1948, have attacked the running record books in their age group. Rice kicked off the spree in October 2018 at the Chicago Marathon, where she ran 3:27:50, shattering the existing 70-plus world record by more than seven minutes. A few weeks later, Dykes ran the Toronto Waterfront Marathon and finished in 2:55:17, coming within
30 seconds of the amazing world record (2:54:48), set by Ed Whitlock of Canada in 2004, when he was 73. Many considered the record to be untouchable until Dykes came so close.
It seemed Dykes bested Whitlock in December 2018, when he ran the Jacksonville Marathon, in Florida, in 2:54:23, bettering Whitlock’s mark by 25 seconds. But Dykes later discovered that while the Jacksonville race was certified, it was not sanctioned, a classification blunder that rendered the course ineligible for records.
What’s next? For Dykes, 72, it’s another attempt at the record, possibly in Chicago this autumn. Meanwhile, Rice, also 72, improved upon her own time last September in Berlin, when she ran 3:24:48, or 7:49 pace. How do they do it? Some of it is the luck of genetics, sure. But the rest is hard work, focus on a goal and committed training. (Rice runs about 65 miles per week and Dykes builds up his mileage through numerous ultras.) In other words, they’re just the same as athletes decades younger than they are. Here’s how they roll back the years.
• Reach for a goal
Dykes plans each upcoming year in December and he makes his intentions public on his Facebook page. Before the coronavirus struck, he had planned to enter 35 races in 2020, on a mix of distances and surfaces. Along with trying to officially set the 70-plus marathon world record, he hoped to improve on his own 5K PB (19:01). There were six ultra events on his calendar, including the Bigfoot 200 in Washington state.
‘Runners, if you haven’t planned a really nice adventure, you are missing out on one of the great pleasures of running – anticipation!’ he wrote on a Facebook post.
Rice also encourages runners to set a goal and write it down. She keeps a list of records she wants to go after – her own or someone else’s – on her refrigerator and on a slip of paper in her purse, crossing out the times once she betters them.
‘Set the goal,’ she says. ‘It doesn’t have to be winning, it doesn’t have to be three and a half hours, four hours. If you don’t have a goal, what do you do it for?’
‘A LOT OF PEOPLE RUN MANY, MANY MARATHONS, BUT THEY ARE NOT REALLY RACING. I RACE.’
• Continue pushing
Rice races herself into marathon shape with 5Ks, 10Ks and half marathons. Dykes has a coach who gives him gruelling workouts. A recent example: 8 x 1 mile at 6:33 pace, with one minute of jogging between each. He didn’t nail the workout, and he gave himself two minutes of jogging, but he kept at it. Year in and year out, he finds that he improves. ‘If you try something just a little bit more ambitious each year, the impossible becomes possible and the possible becomes routine,’ he says. ‘I always think, “I did that last year; what can I do next year to beat that?”’
• Never let your focus waver Rice doesn’t mess around when she gets to the start of a race, and she’s deliberate about her pacing and self-talk. She says to herself, ‘I know I can do it,’ rather than allowing negativity to creep in. For the first three to five miles of a marathon, she tries to settle in to her pace – no faster than 7:45 per mile. (In Boston last year, she went out too hard on the downhills and suffered from cramp later on.)
Until mile 20, she looks at her watch and focuses on the splits. At mile 20, she thinks of the finish and the people waiting for her. In December, she ran her 120th marathon, in Thailand, in 3:27. ‘A lot of people run many, many marathons,’ she says. ‘But they’re not really racing. I race. Once I’m on the starting line, my competitiveness is right there.’
• Find what works for you
Dykes has not had luck with many of the prerun and postrun rituals other runners swear by. ‘I notice correlations between stretching and weight-lifting,’ he says. ‘And the correlation is the more I do them, the more I get injured.’ It’s not that the extras don’t help some people; they do. His point: ‘You should not accept it as gospel. Only do it if you perceive the benefits. I don’t see any benefit at all, so I don’t do them. I encourage everybody to not think of them as must-dos, but maybes. Give it a try; see if it works.’
• Have a blast
Dykes is a contrarian in many ways, including this advice: he advocates waiting to train seriously until you have the time for it, not when you’re raising children or working full-time hours. People who think they’re not going to have any fun running when they’re older? They’re wrong. ‘That’s the message I’m trying to get out there: You can have a blast as an older runner,’ he says. ‘To a certain extent, you only have so many good years. Why would you want to waste them when running is hard and your competition is fierce? Wait until you hit my age. Most of your competition has one foot in the grave.’