Interview with John Henwood

By Stuart Calderwood

John Henwood, a 2004 New Zealand Olympian at 10,000 meters who runs for the New York Athletic Club, had knee surgery in October 2007 to repair a torn meniscus. On May 3, in only his second race back after the surgery, he won the NYRR Half-Marathon Grand Prix Presented by Continental Airlines: Brooklyn in 1:08:37—very fast for most people, but only a step on the way back for Henwood, 35, who ran a personal-best 2:15:05 at the ING New York City Marathon 2005 and has a 10,000-meter best of 27:45. His third step will be the Healthy Kidney 10K on May 17, where he’ll be part of a world-class men’s field. New York Road Runners spoke with Henwood, who works as a personal running coach, between two of his coaching appointments in Central Park.

New York Road Runners: Nice race in Brooklyn—that must have been encouraging.

John Henwood: Yeah, I’m stepping up the training each week, feeling fitter as I build up the mileage. I was mostly at 56 to 60 miles per week before Brooklyn, but I’ve had a couple of weeks at 80 now.

NYRR: Do you run with your clients, or just watch them?

JH: I usually bike with them. Some of them, like Kelly Chin and Jamie Lefrak, are fast enough that I run with them once a week on my easyish runs. And on Sundays, I run with one client, Adam Nulia, who’s about a 2:30 marathoner.

NYRR: There are some big names coming for the Healthy Kidney 10K this weekend— Abderrahim Goumri [of Morocco, second at last year’s ING New York City Marathon] is running.

JH: Oh, is he? That’s all right; I’ll hang on as long as I can. I’ll be pleased to break 30 minutes—this is just a stepping stone.

NYRR: What would be at the end of the stepping stones, if things go the way you’d like?

JH: Possibly the Gold Coast Marathon in Australia. That’s on July 6—I’m thinking about that if I’m free from injury.

NYRR: That knee injury kept you from trying for a spot on another New Zealand Olympic team. That’s a pretty big lost opportunity, but you’re obviously serious about making a comeback. Do you think you can get back to where you were, and run 2:15 in the marathon again?

JH: I do; I think my best marathons may be ahead of me. I’m 35 years old, though, and for the first time, running isn’t the most important thing in my life. My priorities are different; work has to come first right now. You need money in New York. But yeah, I’d like to get down to 2:12, 2:13 in the marathon.

NYRR: New Zealand’s a very small country, but it’s had a huge number of world-class distance runners. First the ’60s period with Peter Snell, Murray Halberg, all those guys, and then the Walker-Dixon-Quax years, and women like Lorraine Moller, Anne Audain, and now Kim Smith and Nina Rillstone…and the men’s masters marathon record was held for a long time by one New Zealander, Jack Foster—until it was broken by another one, John Campbell. What do you think it is about New Zealand that makes it so full of good runners?

JH: Well, first of all, we love sport in New Zealand. Parents want to get their kids into sports, and we make the time to do it. Then there’s a lot of space, great open areas, and it’s a beautiful country. And I think, really, it started with Arthur Lydiard, who was the first coach to figure out how to run a proper amount of miles. He started the first training group, with Snell and those guys, and they ran more miles than anyone else was doing then, and up in the mountains, too.

I think, also, that we can take on that kind of training more easily because of how hard we work as kids. A lot of New Zealanders start working on farms very young, and they’re used to working hard. There’s a kind of rural, do-it-yourself attitude. Maybe we have a high pain threshold.

NYRR: Did you do that kind of work as a kid yourself?

JH: Yeah, I did. I worked on a cattle farm in the Waikato from when I was six years old until I was 20.

NYRR: Coming from a background like that, New York City must be extremely different.

JH: Totally different. When I visit New Zealand now, it takes me a week to get back to the pace of life there. I start off trying to speed other people up—they’re so relaxed. They’ll be standing in line and not minding it at all.

NYRR: Would you ever move back to New Zealand?

JH: Maybe, but not for a while. I’m loving it in New York at the moment. I’m enjoying the rush.

Interview conducted May 14, 2008, and posted May 15, 2008.