Runner

Born: March 6, 1931;

Died: March 13, 2017

ED Whitlock, who has died of prostate cancer aged 86, ran as a teenager, took up running again in his forties and could run a marathon in under three hours. It is the sort of time that most good runners can only dream about. But what was so special about Whitlock doing it was that he was in his mid-seventies at the time.

It was reckoned that, after making adjustments for his age, a race he ran at the age of 73 was the fastest marathon of all time. But were the adjustments right? Whitlock was not only an exceptionally good veteran runner, who inspired many other older runners around the world, he was also something of a phenomenon, who attracted the interest of sports scientists and forced them to reconsider their thinking on age, endurance and training methods.

Detailed biological tests found he had very high oxygen-carrying capacity and had lost much less muscle mass than most people his age. “He’s about as close as you can get to minimal ageing in a human individual,” said Dr Michael Joyner of the Mayo Clinic medical research group.

There was not a lot of science in Whitlock’s personal approach to sport. His training consisted mainly of jogging five-minute loops round the perimeter of his local cemetery in Toronto, for three or four hours at a time. "I don't particularly enjoy this daily drudge,” he said. “It's something that has to be done if you want to run well."

But if it was raining or he had something better to do, he would skip it occasionally. He did no stretching or core strength work and had no coach or special diet. There were no regular massage or physio sessions. When it came to races he would simply up the pace and he set a string of age-division world records, sometimes wearing shoes that were 20 years old.

He was never quite sure how records many he had. It rather depended on which distances you might include. It was upwards of 20, from the 17.23 time he set for a 5k road race when he was in the second half of his sixties to the 3.56.38 he ran at the Toronto Waterfront Marathon last October.

He talked about his achievements and his whole approach, in an interview with the National Post in Canada after the Toronto race, admitting that his shoes that day were probably about 20 years old. “I have other pairs of the same model,” he said. “So they’re not the only shoes I’ve used for racing, but they are the ones that are the most worn down. I like them in comparison to modern racing shoes. Modern racing shoes seem stiffer.”

But there may have been another, more practical reason for the choice of footwear. Alan Brookes, the Toronto race director, said: “Running brands used to love to sponsor races with product for the winners of the age categories and Ed cleaned up. Ed ran to race — he loved racing — but he didn’t really go in for buying shoes. I suspect he broke many of his records in our old Nineties shoes.”

Born in Kingston-upon-Thames, in London, in 1931, Edward Whitlock was a county-standard cross-country runner during his schooldays. He moved to Canada, worked as a mining engineer in Ontario and gave up running. He was in his forties before he started running again, winning masters races at 800 metres and 1500 metres.

He moved up to longer distances because his teenage son was determined to run a marathon and Whitlock decided to do it with him, and things developed from there.

“I realised in my late 60s that this silly objective of being the first person over 70 to get under 3:00 in the marathon was just sitting there waiting for someone,” he said. In 2003 at the age of 72 he ran 2:59:10 at the Toronto Waterfront Marathon. A year later, he knocked more than four minutes off his own record.

In 2010 the New York Times ran a lengthy piece on older athletes, noting: “Big physiological benefits from exercise are there for the taking. You just have to keep exercising. But you can’t exercise if the body breaks down. To avoid injuries, ageing track athletes are often advised to keep to their old routines but to lower the intensity.

“The best advertisement for that strategy was a race turned in five years ago by a 73-year-old from Ontario. Age-graded, Ed Whitlock’s 2:54 marathon (the equivalent of a 20-year-old running 2:03.57) was the fastest ever run.”

He set records in the 70+, 75+ and 80+ divisions for pretty much everything from 1500 meters up to marathon. A long-limbed, wiry figure, he was the classic long-distance runner build. Flowing silver hair added a slightly piratical look, as he strode past runners half a century younger than him. Last year he became the first man over 85 to run a marathon in under four hours. Not only did he break the record, he did so by 28 minutes.

Despite all the records and global attention, Whitlock remained a very modest individual. “I don’t believe I should be a hero,” he said. He was undoubtedly a role model and inspiration for many, but when asked what advice he would give other runners, he said: “I’m not sure what I’m doing is good for me, let alone anyone else.”

He is survived by his wife and two sons.

BRIAN PENDREIGH