Jock Semple and I began appearing at speeches together and he came up to me on the start line in 1973 and planted a big kiss on my cheek. He said in his Scottish brogue: "Come on lass, let's get a wee bit of notoriety." He never said he was sorry but that was his way of saying it, I'm sure.

Life is for participating, not for spectating.

I forgave Jock Semple his action on Boston race just around the time I got to Heartbreak Hill. I had 24 miles to go and you cannot run 24 miles and stay angry. That's the truth. When we go out and we're mad at our boss or mad at the world, when we run, we get it out of our system.

What I've done in this older part of my life is I started foundation called 261 Fearless, named after my old ,1967 Boston Marathon, bib number.I thought we could create training and a communicative, non-judgmental platform, in a movement to let them know they're not alone. Then fearless women can reach out to help women who are fearful and take that first step using the vehicle of running because it's transformational. It works for every woman every time.

Women were afraid and they would never even imagine running a marathon in 1967.

Five years after Boston 1967, I went to the Munich Olympics. I realized that major sponsorship could help me create the opportunity. I wrote a big proposal to Avon cosmetics on how creating a global series of women's races could lead to getting women in the Olympic marathon. People thought I was smoking poppy at the time. The longest event in the Olympic Games was 800m.

There is an expression among even the most advanced runners that getting your shoes on is the hardest part of any workout