Joe Henderson began his magazine career in 1967 with Track & Field News. He continued as editor of Runner's World (1970-77), then as a columnist for the magazine most of the years through 2004. That year he began writing for Marathon & Beyond magazine. He has written or co-authored 30 books. Most recent are his three e-book memoirs – Starting Lines, Going Far and Running Home.

Born in 1943, Joe grew up in Iowa, where he began running races at age 14 and won several state high school titles. He competed in track and cross-country at Drake University in Des Moines, and later graduated to distances as long as 70 miles.

For decades Joe spoke regularly to running groups throughout the U.S. and Canada. He has taught classes at the University of Oregon since 1986, first in journalism and now running. He also coaches a marathon training team.

Photo: Joe finishing a marathon after a long "retirement."

Joe is also married to a writer, Barbara Shaw. They live in Eugene, Oregon. Together they have five children from previous marriages, and four grandchildren.

One of the best decisions I ever made was hiring Joe to be the editor of Runner's World.   He is a very talented writer and can relate to runners better than almost anyone else I know.  Thanks for sharing your thoughts with us.  (Interview by Bob Anderson)

1. How did you get started in running?  There were two starts, really. One came when my dad told me about Roger Bannister’s sub-four-minute mile (in 1954). At age 10, of course with no training, I tried to run one in twice that time – and managed 7:23 but at a steep price in pain. The second beginning came more traditionally, in my high school freshman season. My first mile there was a DNF after starting way too fast.

Photo: As a high school senior in Iowa

2. Tell us about your early running days? When did you get hooked?  I peaked early, making the state meet (in Iowa, smallest schools) as a freshman, placing there as a sophomore, winning as a junior and setting a meet record (of 4:22) as a senior. Then at Drake University, improvement was only marginal – just four seconds in the mile. But this school gave me the best possible training for a career I couldn’t yet imagine: traveling to nearly half the states to race, and writing about running for the student newspaper.

3.  When did you start writing? Did you study it in college?  Both parents were journalists, and they guided me to newspaper writing at a tender age. I covered all sports for a local paper as a high school senior. My college minor was journalism (while planning to become a teacher/coach), but all my early job experience was in this field.

4. When did you start writing about running? What was your first article?  Running was my favorite topic from the start. The first article on this subject was a brief report on one of our school cross-country team’s meets. I couldn’t have a byline because I’d won the race and had written about myself in third-person. My first feature article appeared in an Omaha magazine in 1962. It carried the rather unwieldy title: “My Idea of Fun Is to Run, Run, Run.”

5. How did you hear about Distance Running News?  When and why did you start writing for the magazine?  I read everything about this sport that I could get my hands on back then, which wasn’t a lot. I can’t remember how news of DRN reached me; maybe an ad in Long Distance Log or Track & Field News. I subscribed immediately. This was 1966, when I worked for a newspaper in Des Moines. A year later, I was at T&FN. Bob Anderson asked me to write a summary of the year’s happenings in distance running. That became our start together.

6. What did you think of Distance Running News?  I was thrilled that someone would take this plunge, into a magazine that covered more than the statistics and schedules of long-distance running. Even as a practicing journalist, I never would have had the business skills and courage to do this myself. The magazine started small but got better with each issue as the subscriber and contributor lists grew.

7. When did you start working at Track & Field News? What did you do there?  DRN/Runner’s World changed my life, of course. But even earlier, T&FN did the same. Without that first push, there might not have been a second one. I went to California the summer before my junior year of college, 1963, planning only to bum around the race circuit there for a few months. While living in a T&FN’s employee’s house, I fell into a part-time job at the magazine, which grew to full-time that summer. I returned to college now intent on becoming a journalist, not a teacher.

8. How did you think of LSD?  I ran this way for years before the name long slow distance became attached. This was a necessary change for me personally, away from all-speed training to a gentler approach in the mid-1960s. Two reasons: (1) my feet and legs were rebelling badly against going fast all the time, and (2) I wanted to run a marathon and had to slow way down to go longer. Later I learned that other runners were having similar experiences, and they joined me in the booklet titled LSD. It began as a 1969 article in Distance Running News titled “The Humane Way to Train.”

9. Was leaving Track & Field News to work full-time for Bob Anderson a hard decision?  It was a surprisingly easy switch. It required no physical move except from one office to another a half-mile away. I took a small cut in pay (though was amply rewarded later), but at the time this didn’t matter because I had no wife or children to support. This seemed like a dream job, taking me from writing about distance running some of the time to doing it all the time.

10. Do you think encouraging Bob to move to California was an important moment and why?  It was vitally important to me. With Army Reserve obligations I couldn’t leave the Bay Area for anywhere else that Bob might have settled. He had to come here, and did. I think he’d agree that the move from Kansas changed his life’s course for the better too. Best evidence is that he still lives in that same area. (And I don’t.)

11. How was your own running coming along at this time?  You only see while looking back, but the late 1960s and early 1970s were my best ever as a long-distance racer. All PRs came then, injuries were few (until a big one at the very end of that streak). Even while never training for speed, I came within nine seconds of my mile PR. Only later did I realized that regular racing, at all distances, was my “training.” The slow runs in between were my recovery.

12. How important do you think Runner's World was to the running movement?  And why.  RW role in the first running boom can’t be overstated. It was the only real voice for the sport at a time when other magazines either didn’t exist or hadn’t caught on to what was happening. Two major forces were coming together in the early 1970s. The exercise-running movement sparked by Dr. Kenneth Cooper’s Aerobics program, and the mileage-based training of Arthur Lydiard. These combined to produce thousands of new road runners. RW was there to encourage and inform them.

13. What is your take on running in the early 1970s.  We were (mostly) young, we were (mainly) male, we were fast (by today’s standards anyway), we were innocent, we were ready to try almost anything. We knew most of the other runners in our area. We welcomed newcomers to the sport, whether they be old, slow or female. We had a closeness with each other that inevitably faded as the sport grew up. Even now, I expect a passing runner to return my greeting and am annoyed when ignored.

14. What was it like working at Runner's World in the early days?  It was a wild ride, in the best sense of the word. Every month brought new subscribers, every year brought new projects. The staff never quite matched the work load, but somehow we succeeded in bringing the magazine (and the booklets, then the books) out on time, with enough time left over for Fun-Runs, Running Weeks and the like. I never worked nearly as hard as Bob Anderson did, but also never harder than I ever would again. No regrets.

15. How many running books did you write in the 1970s.  Which ones did you like the most and why?  Here I discount the many Booklets of the Month, written by me but unacredited, and also books edited (often heavily) for someone else. Actual full-sized books with my name on them: Run Gently Run Long, Long Run Solution, Jog Run Race and Run Farther Run Faster. Runner’s World published all four. Of those, “Solution” was, and still is, my favorite because it said best what running meant to me. It available again as an e-book, by the way.

16. How important was the annual shoe issue to running? Tell us about this annual feature.  Vast improvements in shoes made possible the first running boom, by making it possible for people without perfect bodies and biomechanics to run on roads safely. Runner’s World shoe issues spurred the improvements in shoes by giving praise to the most improved models. This annual feature eventually caused controversy, to be sure, but worth it for the end result of better shoes.  

17. Tell us about George Hirsch and his magazine.  We’re really talking about two magazines, George’s Runner and Ed Ayres’ and Phil Stewart’s Running Times. Both came on the scene at about the same time in the late 1970s. Both played a role. Ironically both eventually came under the Runner’s World parent company. Rodale bought Runner, and made George Hirsch RW’s publisher, and later acquired Running Times which still operates as a separate magazine.

Thanks again Joe for doing this interview. Can you believe it...we have known each other for 43 years! It does seem like forever on one hand but then it doesn't on the other. You have done so much for running and you deserve a BIG THANK YOU!
Bob Anderson 1/11/12 2:33 pm

What a great interview about someone who has meant so much to the world of running. Thanks Joe.
Justin Wall 1/13/12 12:51 pm

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18. Tell us about Jim Fixx and his book.  His Complete Book of Running was a shocker to everyone, including Jim himself. I didn’t know him as a running writer until we talked while he worked on the book. He expected to live off the modest advance for a few months, then go back to magazine work. He wrote the right book at the perfect time, and it topped the all-topics best-seller list for 60 weeks. The book wasn’t the cause of the running boom but beneficiary of it, as were other books published at that time – including one by George Sheehan that also made the best-seller list.

19. How important we're events like Fun Runs, National Running Week, 24-hour relay, Runner's World Indoor Classic, Corporate Cup, book publishing, twice monthly Racing Report, regional editions, other magazines, booklet of the month, Olympic Tours and the Marathoner magazine to the success of Runner's World?  I look at that list and think even now: Wow! Did the RW staff do all this? No magazine publisher would attempt to do so much today. These projects and promotions would be fragmented among a dozen different companies.

20. Was Bob trying to do too many things?  Maybe I was tempted to think so at the time. But somehow he surrounded himself with people who could made it all work. Some, of course, couldn’t take the pace and diversity of their assignments, and left for calmer waters. I guess you could count me among those not tough enough to last, since my stay in the RW offices lasted just seven years. Bob was there for almost 20, and even then left reluctantly.

21. What was the scene like at Runner's World during these days?  Long, full days stretching into weekends. Staff and office space continually expanding. Circulation soaring. I must add, however, that the astronomical increase in subscribers, from less than 100,000 to more than five times that number, came after my departure as editor and after Bob Anderson guided certain changes in editorial emphasis.

22. How was your running during this time?  My running had taken a big hit in 1973, when a lingering injury (to the left heel bone and Achilles) led to surgery. Racing was never the same after that, but I did return fairly quickly to running long (many marathons) and fairly fast (sub-six-minute miles for 10Ks). However, I never again could run as hard, as often as before without the heel acting up. You don’t really know how much the running itself, not the racing, means to you until you’ve almost lost it. 

23. What was it like going to the Olympic Games with a Runner's World press badge?  Both times were a blur of busy-ness, as the first with Track & Field News to Mexico City had been. Munich was especially tough, with the tragedy overshadowing the events and with the RW tour group to help shepherd into and out of the Olympic city. Bob made it easier for me in Montreal, where all I had to do was write. But there was plenty of that, with a daily newsletter (which now would be called a blog) to compile, plus a full-length book to complete.

Photo: Joe handing the torch to new Runner's World editor Rich Benyo

24. You left Runner's World and Rich Benyo came on board.  Tell us about that.  My heart was always with writing, not editing. Writing time became harder and harder to find as the job of editor grew. Two things happened at once in 1977: Rich Benyo joined the team as managing editor as an ideal replacement for me, and book royalties rose so dramatically that I saw the chance to my living as a writer. I left RW as an employee that fall but remained with the magazine as an independent contractor for most of the years through 2004.

25. We're you surprised when RW was sold to Rodale Press?  Only the details surprised me. I knew that Bob Anderson had marital difficulties (as I did; I’d recently separated from my first wife) and that selling the magazine might be part of a settlement. The buyer did surprise me, since Rodale had no previous involvement in running. Fortunately certain key members of Bob’s editorial team made the jump to Emmaus, Pennsylvania, and smoothed the transition.

26. What was your role with RW after the sale?  My contract was extended there. And in fact it was renewed annually through early 2004. Just after the sale I was offered the position of editor, but this would have meant moving across the country (I lived in Oregon by then) and away from my three young children (their mom had official custody). I declined.

27. What was it like working for Rodale Press?  It hardly seemed like I ever worked for Rodale Press, except for the checks that came from there each month. Only twice did I ever visit Emmaus, and never in my last 20 years with RW. I always had the feeling of working for Amby Burfoot and a few of his junior editors. Teaming with Amby was never less than a delightful experience.

28. Why did you leave and what happened?  This happened abruptly, in late 2003. A new editor came in above Amby and was charged with making changes in the magazine. I’d never met him when he phoned me to say, “Your column has run its course.” More than 30 years with RW ended that day.

29. What have you been doing since RW?  My next move was to Marathon & Beyond. This is the magazine Rich Benyo edits, and is a descendent of Marathoner, which RW once published and Rich edited there. I wrote columns in M&B from 2004 through the end of 2011, then pulled the plug voluntarily to give another writer a chance to be heard in that space. Now is the first time in 45 years that I haven’t written regularly for any magazine, though I do post weekly pieces on my website, http://www.joehenderson.com

30. What is your take on running today?  To be honest, I don’t give much thought to the big picture anymore, to what’s happening nationally or worldwide. Gradually since 2001 I’ve turned to thinking locally, acting locally. My focus now is on the runners I get to look in the eyes three or four days a week as a teacher of running and a coach of marathoners. This is the theme of my latest book, titled Running Home.

31. Do you think a sub-two-hour marathon is possible?  I’ve long said it won’t happen in my lifetime. But I’m in no hurry to leave, and runners today seem to be in a great hurry to reach that barrier. I fear that if or when it does happen, the suspicions of artificial assistance will run rampant. Back when Runner’s World was beginning under that name, I wrote this line: “I’d rather see 50,000 people run a mile in eight minutes with no one watching than have 50,000 watch one person break four minutes.” I’d update that now to read, “I’d rather see 500,000 people run a marathon in four hours than have 500,000 watch one person break two hours.”

Photo: Current shot..."my first career goal as a college student was to become a teacher/coach. It took me 40 years to get there."

32. Why have times at the top improved so much? What are these top runners doing different than let’s say a Steve Prefontaine?  The answer above applies here equally. I don’t really know what the top runners are doing because I can barely remember who the top runners are anymore. The names of the leaders change so quickly the few runners have time to establish themselves as true heroes of the sport.

33. Why is the half-marathon becoming the race of choice, or is it?  It’s a great distance with a terrible name. No other race is known as a portion of another, which makes it sound like a cheap imitation, which it’s not. The marathon is a survival test for most of us, but the “half” is a true race. We can run it without making training a second job. We can recover from it and run another race with a week, not a month or more.

34. Why do you think the average runner times are slowing down? What needs to be done if anything?  It’s slowing because the average runner is, well, slower. Runners today are generally bigger and older than they were in the first-boom years. We have more run-walkers and pure walkers in “running” events, and they skew the results toward slower. But there still are plenty of runners who want to go faster and train to do so. I see them in all my groups. It might surprise readers, who know my writing history, to learn that my university running students train for speed one of the two class days each week. They improve rapidly.

Photo - the spirit of Steve Prefontaine is always around in Eugene.  Steve winning an Univ of Oregon Twlight Invitational at Hayward Field.  There were so many...

35. What is it like living in Eugene, Oregon?  I’ve been here 30 years now. It’s home. It’s also known as Track City USA for the events at Hayward Field, and has more runners per capita than anywhere I’ve ever visited. The great part of living here isn’t that top runners are celebrated but that average ones like me are just part of the scenery. People here know what we’re doing, and why, and leave us alone to do it.

36. How is the coaching working?  My wife Barbara says, “This is the happiest you’ve been in all the time I’ve known you.” We’ve been together 25 years, and for the last 11 of those I have taught running classes at the University of Oregon; the last six I’ve coached a marathon team through a local running store. More than 1000 runners have passed through these programs. Very few have any idea that I ever wrote articles and books, or even that I ran races. This is about their running, not mine. And helping them with theirs is one of the greatest satisfactions I have known.

37. Are you still running?  Yes, though it’s nothing to brag about. Thirty to 60 minutes a day, six days most weeks, with most days closer to 30 than 60 and very few much more than 60. My last marathon, which was the last race of any length, celebrated my 50^th running anniversary in 2008.  

38. Is there anything you would do differently in your past life?  I would have started the teaching/coaching earlier. This wouldn’t have been instead of the writing but in addition to it. Interestingly my first career goal as a college student was to become a teacher/coach. It took me 40 years to get there.

39. How is your family?  My family keeps me real. No one is a runner except my stepson Chris, whose trail runs are so different from mine that we have little in common that way. No one wants me to spend all my time running or talking about it. Each has their own interests, many of which I’ve adopted. Wife Barbara and I are both cancer survivors (or “veterans,” as I prefer to think of it), breast for her and prostate for me. We share five children from previous marriages and four grandchildren.

40. How important is the running world to you now?  It’s as important as ever, except that the boundaries of that “world” have shifted and narrowed. I took a long time and a lot of travel to learn that the world beneath our feet and before our eyes can be just as exciting as one a distant plane trip away.