Eat. Sweat. Play

by Anna Kessel

  Don’t just take my word for it. A recent study published by the British Psychological Society focused on how exercise can change the way we view our bodies – even before any discernible physical change. Dr Katherine Appleton explored participants’ feedback over a two-week period, crucially a short enough period that physical benefits would not yet begin to factor. Her conclusion that ‘a focus on body image [and our responses to it] . . . may be more rewarding for those embarking on an exercise programme’ is enlightening because it is a rare example of the emphasis being placed on how we feel after doing exercise, as opposed to how we look.

  It was a no-brainer then that on the morning of one of the most important days of my life – my wedding – it was Elaine who came to meet me for a run, before any hairdressers or make-up artists or friends with bouquets or cameras. Off we set, as we had done so many mornings before, stretching in the September sunshine. A final gasp of unadulterated female friendship: no talking, just breathing and legs turning. ‘One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten,’ I counted in my head, urging my thighs to keep lifting my knees. ‘Breathe in, breathe in, breathe OUT,’ I puffed, nostrils noisily inhaling, mouth exhaling.

  A week later, on my honeymoon, I ran with my husband through gorse bushes in the South of France. It caused the only argument of an otherwise wonderful trip. ‘Come on!’ he teased, ‘you can run faster than that, surely?’ He laughed. This was meant to be encouragement, banter. I seethed. And snapped. This male approach wasn’t what I was used to. Contrary to every bitchy portrayal of women, running with my girlfriends was supportive, encouraging, caring, fun. Every time we ran Elaine would say, ‘Shall we run a bit further tonight?’ To which I would groan, ‘Noooo! I can’t! I swear I can’t do it . . .’ She’d nod and say, ‘OK then, don’t worry.’ And because of her kindness, and because I didn’t want to let her down, I’d buckle and change my mind. ‘OK, let’s do it,’ I’d say, shaking my head. And then we’d run our hearts out.

  Through running I found that friendship was central to exercise. It was Tamzin who convinced me to start running, against all the odds, and Elaine who helped me to keep at it even when I least felt like it. It became about teamwork, about supporting each other, about the very fundamental act of making it possible to get out – because we couldn’t have run down the canal alone in the dark and still felt safe. Even better, running together meant sharing the exhilaration. And the laughter.

  No matter how tired we were, at the end of the run Elaine and I always sprinted the final 100m, just for fun. It was my favourite bit. ‘Ready? Steady? GO!’ Somehow the energy came flooding into our legs, a whoosh of adrenaline, the excitement of sprinting, feeling like your body was being propelled by your quads, so fast you might just stumble and fall over. Sometimes we’d shout. Sometimes we’d cheer. We ran so fast it felt like flying. I have amazing female friendships, but that feeling of flying together down a ropey canal, or round the bend of a litter-strewn park, cannot be replicated. It is right up there with my best-ever moments. Thinking about it gives me goosebumps, like it did to hear my best friend talk about giving birth – a gentle soul transformed as she literally lifted the hospital bed from the pain of her contractions – or that buzz of an amazing night out dancing.

  In my day job, when I interview female sports stars this is one of the recurring themes they themselves talk about: that strengthening sense of female friendship. And it’s not just about having a nice bunch of friends, it’s about that group dynamic and the positive lessons it gives young women. I see it especially in team sports, where women lose their inhibitions and sing and dance and loudly joke about in front of huge crowds, buoyed by their camaraderie. As a non-sports person it can be hard to understand; surely all women have great friendships? That’s one of the things we pride ourselves on. But if our friendships are so great, then why aren’t we helping each other to make more of them? To be physically active, healthy and happy? When I met Olympic and world champion rower Helen Glover in 2014 she talked about her close friendship with rowing partner Heather Stanning. ‘When we’re in the boat I want to win for her as much as for me,’ she said, echoing my exact feelings about running with Elaine. After dropping out of sport, and then being identified in the talent recruitment programme, Sporting Giants, ahead of London 2012, Helen is evangelical about providing sporting opportunities to school-age kids. ‘When I go to school talks now, I want to convince them they can do it too,’ she says. ‘The thing is you just don’t think it can be you. I remember being in school assembly and they asked us, “What do you want to be when you’re older?” In my head I thought, “Win Olympic gold”, but I put up my hand and said, “Vet”.’ There’s that perceptions thing again, worrying what others will think, unsupported by our environment to truly pursue our goals, afraid to voice our ambitions.12

  But at the end of the day, how much time do we want to waste on this appearance stuff? How much more time do we really want to spend arguing over whether Kim Kardashian’s naked arse is female empowerment or exploitation? All this discussion accompanying endless music videos with buttock-shaking slo-moes, selfies, belfies, conversations about implants, eating disorders, Botox and dieting, is enough to make you go mad. Or contract body dysmorphia, if you haven’t already got it.

  This 24/7 stream of poison that affects every female being subjected to these images, whether they are an elite athlete with the ‘perfect’ butt, or not. This tyrannical grip over what is feminine, and what – most importantly – is not. Because what’s the alternative? The TedX make-up artist Eva DeVirgilis spells it out when she says that it takes three seconds for a woman to sit in her make-up chair and tell her what they hate about their face. That only women in their autumn years, or dying from cancer, seem to celebrate being there, enjoy the process of applying make-up as something fun, rather than something they depend upon simply to leave their house. It’s a theme that women the world over are finally waking up to. Australia’s Sky News anchor, Tracey Spicer, in her inspirational TedX talk that went viral, argues that we’re wasting precious minutes – hours – each day on beauty routines, time that could be spent doing something more productive. Having calculated that she was spending an hour a day – or fifteen days a year – on hair and make-up, Spicer asked women to tot up how much time they spent on their beauty habits, and then work out what they could be doing instead. By the end of 2014 Spicer had dropped the fake tan, hair curlers and body-control tights.

  Sport is one of our greatest opportunities to escape this constant undermining life-ruining drip feed about what women and girls should look like – in some cases even down to our genitals. Because if we embrace sport and exercise for women properly – championing female athlete role models in education and the media – then we won’t have this body dysmorphia crisis. Because there won’t be a ‘normal’ women’s body, just a life-affirming brilliant array of every type of female body under the sun – boobs of all shapes and sizes, curvy hips, slim hips, broad shoulders, tiny bums, huge great powerful gluteal asses, wispy legs that travel for miles, hulking great thighs that accelerate over 100m, bellies that dance, or are neatly stacked in six-pack abdominal squares.

  And once we accept that we needn’t look a certain way, then we can start to share our euphoria about exercising or playing sport rather than a perfectly poised appearance, contrived post-workout pouting, critically staring into our phones. Just take the picture, and bugger the extreme red face and sweaty hair! Or maybe we don’t even need to instagram every moment of our lives for others to judge. Maybe exercise and sport can be something we do for ourselves. For fun! For happiness! For clear thinking! Because physical activity should be something integral to our being alive. And it is the essential part that really concerns us here, not the bit about how many millimetres it might shave off your inside thigh measurements.

  Let’s be real for a moment. The outside of our bodies is only a tiny part of who we really are. When women begin to realize that physically connecting
with our own bodies isn’t about being bullied by a media assault of unattainable female images, then we will begin to come into our own. Maybe we will stop curling our eyelashes every day and use the extra thirty-five minutes a week to read up on nuclear physics, or maybe we will give up the frappuccinos with friends and instead meet them outside in the fresh air for t’ai chi or a kick around with a ball. Maybe we will take our sons, daughters, nieces, nephews and grandchildren to the park and RUN like the wind until we’re out of breath, and laughing. And maybe then we will discover that feeling generated when women become part of a physically active community: the confidence, the friendships, the energy to take on every other challenge in our lives – from dysfunctional relationships, motherhood and the gender pay gap, to just having a really great time.

  Just as women fought for the vote, and that very achievement compels us to the polling stations, so women have fought for the right to exercise and participate in sport, and we cannot throw that away. From the women of ancient Greece putting their lives on the line just by watching sport, and the women in Iran who continue to risk imprisonment today by doing the same, to the likes of Kathrine Switzer who campaigned for women to be allowed to run any distance they liked, or Caster Semenya and Dutee Chand who demand the right to participate in sport as women, without being told what their labia should look like.

  We need to reclaim sport and exercise for women. It needs to become part of our world, not a borrowed space where we are allowed to intrude. We can decide ourselves what we want it to look like: whether we want all-female events, or jewellery, or beauty treatments, or crèches or free access to make sure that all economic groups can attend. Because when sport and exercise become normalized in a way that reflects society – real women doing real physical exertion free from worries about what anyone else thinks – we will be able to truly embrace our bodies. And enjoy them. After all, from pooing to prancing, periods to pregnancy, these are the real miracles our bodies perform. Not squeezing into that size 10 dress, or nailing the latest up-do. But finding our muscle, and wielding it. Just a little.

  Why sport will make you successful

  How many times have I asked for a pay rise? Once. And I nearly cried. How many times have I asked for a promotion? Never. That’s the problem with so many women in the workplace, we think careers are like a 1940s tea dance. Nice girls wait to be asked. But after fifteen years of work, I’m finally realizing that men do things differently. Or so I hear. There’s X who demanded to be promoted to chief whatsit, or Y who refused to take the job unless he was paid £10K more than it was advertised for. Why aren’t I more like them?

  According to one study that has received worldwide attention, sport has everything to do with it. In 2013 multinational firm EY found that women with sports backgrounds were more likely to reach the top of the career ladder. As journalists hurried to distribute the news, it wasn’t hard for them to find real-life examples. From Hillary Clinton (college basketball), head of the International Monetary Fund Christine Lagarde (France national synchronized swimming team), Condoleezza Rice (figure skating and tennis), to Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff (volleyball) and CEO of Pepsi Indra Nooyi (cricket). My favourite example of all time, however, has to be Twitter board member Marjorie Scardino, an ex-rodeo rider.

  So what does sport give women that they wouldn’t otherwise have? Of course it teaches you how to win, how to lose and how to work in a team. But according to the EY report, the most important thing sport teaches you is how to bounce back from rejection, failure and all other manner of major or minor setbacks. That’s both liberating and empowering. Finally, here’s a way to take on that gender pay gap in a world where women are forfeiting an average of £100,000 over the course of a lifetime.

  Michelle Moore is one of those people who have benefited from sport. A former athlete who competed at county level in her youth, now in her forties she still displays all the traits of a sportswoman’s drive. ‘Someone said to me recently that I often refer to myself in the third person,’ says Michelle. ‘Apparently that’s typical of ex-athletes. I’d always look for my name in Athletics Weekly, page 89, and keep a scrapbook of all the cuttings in which my name was mentioned.’ Illeism, or referring to yourself in the third person, is a recognized trait among sportspeople – from Pelé to Andre Agassi. It’s often mocked as egotistical, but research suggests that it’s actually a helpful habit to have as it calms the brain and improves performance in the workplace.

  ‘Undoubtedly sport has had a huge effect on my career,’ says Michelle. ‘Sport brought out my natural leadership abilities – as netball captain, as a fast runner, and as the eldest of five children, sport helped to hone who I am. In my career I’ve fast forwarded through every level, at every stage. I want to win. I want to be the best. I’ve got a really intense work ethic.’ That drive translated into her career, and Michelle has been a high-flyer ever since. At thirty-two she was assistant head teacher in a secondary school, rising to become one of a very few black women in a senior position with local authority management, and is now an expert on diversity in sport. Michelle is adamant that a youth spent on the athletics track prepared her for a successful path in the workplace. ‘You come to see yourself almost from the outside. I think it’s a result of constantly measuring yourself against external barometers. You see yourself as a machine, an entity.’

  Echoing the EY research, Michelle agrees that it’s the disappointments from her sporting experiences that still motivate her today. ‘I think as female leaders we have to have resilience. I’ll never forget being fifteen years old, at the English Schools’ Championships, my biggest-ever competition. I had to do a race-off with another girl to secure a place in the 400m final, and a chance of earning an international vest to represent England. I wanted that so badly, and yet I lost the race because I was overcome with nerves. I still feel that loss today, and I’m so annoyed with myself. It still hurts, and I still wonder what my life might have been like had I won.’

  Nowadays the ‘winning’ is played out in her life post-athletics. During the London Olympics the local organizing committee asked council departments to get schools to sign up and secure their allocation of tickets for schoolchildren in their borough. Michelle was determined to be the first local authority in the country to get all her schools signed up. ‘My motivation was about doing something great for the kids, yes, but if I’m honest what drove it all was my obsession with always wanting to be the first. I just love coming first. And it’s a hidden first, because nobody actually ever knew that it was me who had achieved it. But that didn’t matter, I just wanted us to be first.’

  It’s so rare to hear women speak openly and unashamedly about wanting to be the best at work. Despite all our societal demands for a more productive workforce and economy, being competitive is still a taboo for women – as though, somehow, it’s all a bit bitchy and unseemly if you want to get ahead. Michelle nods. ‘When you’re ambitious people are intimidated. They want to put you down. In a management position, such as I am in, you are seen as being difficult. You know, “She’s got really high standards, she needs to relax a bit.” They don’t get it – I get things done. That’s what I’m known for.’ But shouldn’t ambition, or getting things done, be lauded? Maybe if more women were able to embody these qualities, and actively pursue them at work, we wouldn’t have such a debilitating attitude to all this stuff.

  Olympic bronze-medallist heptathlete Kelly Sotherton laughs knowingly. ‘I’ve been called a loudmouth or an interferer, or a moaner or a troublemaker – you don’t really hear people say that about a man though, do you?’ says Kelly, who retired from athletics ahead of the London Olympic Games, but is living proof of the EY report’s conclusions. Even as a young athlete Kelly was always upfront about her ambitions beyond her athletics career. She wanted to be a chief executive and have a say in how her sport is governed. That aim has not changed. ‘I want to run my sport, one day. The ultimate goal for me is to be president of the IOC. That’s a
far-fetched comment but if I can get anywhere near that I’ll be happy.’ Now she’s on the UK Sport International Leadership Programme maybe she’ll make it. In the meantime she’s being headhunted in the business world, and when I ask her which skillsets they see in someone who has spent her life on a training track, rather than an office, and has no experience in business, her answer is illuminating.

  ‘When I went to see the managing director of one company, he said: you have every attribute I’d like in someone coming to work with me. Someone who can succeed and plan and perform; they’re the same skills you need in business, it’s just learning a bit more business acumen. But you’ve learned and coached and can take direction, be critiqued and learn to use that to your advantage – as a sportsperson you’re not offended by criticism, you just use it to improve, and that’s a skill that I think a lot of people who haven’t been in sport don’t have. They don’t like to be criticized because they think it’s offensive. But if it’s constructive, it’s something you can learn from and it helps you to improve your performance. I spoke to various people along the way, and so many people have said sport is a great background for business. It also makes you a good team member.’ (If anyone can take criticism it’s Kelly. One of her coaches famously called her a ‘wimp’ – immediately after winning bronze at the 2004 Olympics – and used to make her do ‘wobble tests’ on her bottom.)

  But you don’t have to have played sport at a high level for the EY effect to have an impact. Mumsnet CEO Justine Roberts was sports-mad as a kid, playing in the back garden with her brothers, and still follows her beloved Liverpool FC today. She enjoyed a spell as a sports journalist writing for national newspapers before deciding to carve out a more family-friendly career and set up Mumsnet. The forum is now the biggest discussion site for parents in the UK, and is said to have so much influence that gaining the support of Mumsnetters can win you the general election. The Mumsnet working pattern is exemplary in its design and means that parents can easily be employed across flexible hours. So far, so unsporty. Four children later, and Justine says her interest in sport has massively influenced her career. ‘It’s helped me hugely,’ she says now, ‘it’s helped in male-dominated environments – it’s a great icebreaker talking about sport because you’re never stuck for anything to say – but it’s also exposed me to how to deal with competition, and how to work in a team. Being in a leadership role, it’s no good having one or two high-flyers going off and being brilliant, you need to pull the team along together and that’s a very sporting scenario.’ Scattered across sport are many more examples – from the female footballer Claire Rafferty, who combines a career as a city analyst at Deutsche Bank with playing left back for Chelsea and England, to qualified lawyer and England striker Eniola Aluko, or Britain’s greatest female rower, Katherine Grainger, who also has a PhD in criminal law and homicide.