By Jessica Sisavath

In her podcast, Cherie Louise Turner, Somerville resident and long-time athlete in cycling, inline skating, and running, will be running in the Boston Marathon on October 11 alongside eight other runners in their journey to the Boston Marathon, Strides Forward.

After cycling for a couple of years, running was always Cherie’s way to keep herself occupied when she couldn’t cycle. After her run-in cycling and living in Ireland, she moved to Somerville three years ago.

Cherie started her writing career in college, writing about sports and in the Sierra Nevada Mountains at Tahoe Quarterly, where she was assigned to write a story about ultra-distance runners. Not knowing anything about competitive running, she befriended a woman who did 50K marathons and learned more about the sport. She had completed her first marathon in the early 2000s and has completed a couple of marathons since then.

Over the past ten years, Cherie became a serious runner, completing ultra-running distances, 50Ks herself. “I love doing races, I love doing events, it is what keeps me motivated I don’t understand the concept of fitness without training without having a goal like it just I,” she says. “That is not how I operate, so I always look for something, you know, some challenge to

inspire me and keep me motivated and keep me aiming for something.”

She learned the benefits of running expanded beyond running itself. Her writing and athlete skills came together on her podcast, Strides Forward. What inspired the podcast was the 4% percentage of women represented in mainstream media. Strides Forward’s mission focuses on narrative stories about competitive athletes that are not typically spotlighted in mainstream media. In addition, the podcast is a topic-based show that is concentrating on health and wellness.

Cherie understood and knew how to be an athlete and runner, so naturally, Cherie wanted to have the podcast focus on long-distance running, 5Ks and up, health, and spark confidence through stories.

The series dedication to nine runners across the globe from Massachusetts, Minnesota, California, Canada, Serbia, Thailand. The Boston Marathon has been on pause for in-person races since April 2019. Runners will share their thoughts on the Boston Marathon’s Virtual Marathon in 2020 and excitement for the in-person marathon in October.

Rochelle Solomon, Patty Hung, Yaowapa Hoisungwarn, Marija Desivojević, Nicole Spaulding Pinto, Zarah Hofer, Amanda Watters, and Jonna Maas all are coming from different entry points and occupations. Patty Hung from Orinda, California, who has completed 34 Boston Marathons, enters the race as a quarter-century runner. Amanda Watters from Ashland, Massachusetts, completed 15 Boston Marathons.

Cherie had completed one Boston Marathon; both qualified on time, and others such as Zarah Hofer from Canada and Yaowapa Hoisungwarn from Thailand are first-time runners. All runners come from various work occupations, such as editors, teachers, medical doctors, and nurses.

The first part of the series will show how they live their marathon life, started running, recovering, sleeping, eating well, and healthy living. Also, what motivates the runners is staying healthy, being less competitive, prioritizing mental and physical health, and women’s health issues. In a previous series, Strides Forward covered women’s health issues such as RED-S and other problems that come with running, such as cutting calories and stopping menstruating. The new series will take listeners through an in-depth journey to look into the lows and highs of the runners’ who are training to run the upcoming marathon.

After October 11, Strides Forward will also cover post reactions from the runners. Strides Forward hopes to inspire runners and non-runners who stumble upon the podcast to follow these nine women runners on her new series, Roads to Boston 2021: 9 runners, 1 finish line. To listen to upcoming episodes, listeners can go on to the following website: https://stridesforwardpodcast.com.