The Brooks Running C.E.O. on Beating Cancer, and Leading With Purpose
To find out what it takes to get fit, healthy and feel happier – even when you’re sick – we’ll run through our favorite running experts.
For many women it may be a time of the year when we begin to feel a chill or a lump in our lung. If we’ve got a few extra dollars to spend, it may be a time when we opt for the latest gym membership and the latest fitness trend. Or perhaps it’s a time when we might have a little extra cash left over from a holiday. Whatever the case may be, it’s common to have a desire to get fit, which is great, but what comes after the desire to get fit? What comes after fitness is confidence. And what comes after confidence is a better life.
When we asked Jane Kettler Brooks, C.E.O. and founder of Brooks Running, to share her thoughts, we discovered that she didn’t begin her career in running and fitness. In fact, Kettler-Brooks had never run at all when she was seven years old.
Kettler-Brooks went on to train for her first marathon at the ripe young age of 18, but she first went running in a different way. Her mother was a champion distance runner, and her dad was no slouch either.
Now, as a mother of three teenage daughters – one of whom is in college now – Kettler-Brooks runs with a few key principles in her own running.
For starters, she’s a woman of a different generation. She believes that the running community has a long way to go to inspire younger women to run for longer distances, to run faster or to run for the purpose of health and fitness.
Kettler-Brooks’s story illustrates the benefits of being fit and healthy. She’s never had to worry that her running career is at risk due to a family situation. She was able to pursue her competitive career and become a