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A PERTH girl through and through, Marg (asshe is usually called) grew up in MountLawley and Karrinyup. She was a high schoolPE teacher for about 15 years but now teachesBusiness Ed/Information Technology. Family lifewas athletics oriented with her brother arunner and her parents being officials.Marg and her younger sister firstwent along to meetings to watchbut they then also became‘runners’, running the raceresults from the judges to thetimekeepers and then to theannouncer. Marg was about10 at the time and as a ‘littleofficial’ she learned therules of the sport and themany different rolesinvolved “from somewonderful and veryknowledgeableofficials”. She wasan official herself formany years,including being incharge of wintersenior season fora couple of years.

She joinedMount Lawleyathletics club atage 12 or 13, inthe era beforeLittle Athleticsand, as she says,“certainly beforefemales could dodistance running before they turned16 years of age”. So she did sprints,hurdles and long jump, “not very

well”, being generally “last in last division”.However she loved the sport and enjoyed the

friendship of other athletes.Marg competed in her school athletics team and

later, at 23, in her first appearance in the statecross country team, she beat long jumper Eileen

Hindle and decided she should take traininga bit more seriously. She improved, and,

in national track and cross countrychampionships, she achieved sixthplaces in both disciplines.

At school her coach had beenBeryl Byrne, who had greatlyinfluenced Marg’s athletics career.She had taught her coachingstrategies by teaching her tocoach hurdlers. So, when Margdamaged a nerve in her foot in

1979 and then, in the early 80s,suffered from chronic fatigue

and had to give uprunning, she coachedinstead. She did notrun for many yearsexcept to warm up orcool down with herathletes, but has

been coaching eversince. Her philosophy is

still based very much onwhat she had learned from

Beryl when she was veryyoung. She has coached

many senior athletes and alsoa number of masters. As a

distance coach she hasachieved level 5 and amongst her

successes is Ray Boyd, one ofWA’s best distance athletes.

CONTINUED NEXT PAGE

Love of athleticsMargaret Saunder’s

In focusWith Christine Oldfield

Photo: JACKIE HALBERG

Margaret tacklesthe hurdles as ateenager at PerryLakes.

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At fullstretch

FROM PREVIOUS PAGESHE has been the teammanager/coach of many state teamsin cross country and also track andfield and has also been involved intwo Australian junior teams as acoach. She takes great pleasure fromcoaching and watching how juniorathletes learn so much from theirparticipation in the sport.

And as if that wasn’t enough for oneperson, Marg has also served onvarious club committees – starting atage 17 as club registrar and thentreasurer with Scarborough WomensAC. Both Stirling Swans and AWArewarded her service with lifemembership.

After a car accident in 2003 Marghad trouble walking very far for manyyears and thought she would neverrun again. But she started joggingslowly and over a very short distancewith her training group in 2007. Shejoined masters for the Sunday runs,

knowing that the range of abilitieswould mean she would have a groupto run with. She had no intention of“doing any racing or championships”.But she is grateful to Niamh Keanefor encouraging her back into racingwith a challenge to compete in thestate masters championships in2008. She surprised herself with theresults she achieved and so enjoyedthe experience that she continued torace. She has competed in all thestate and national championshipssince then, being “very surprised torun well and actually win a race in2009”. Despite having torn herAchilles at Easter in 2011 she wasdelighted not only to qualify for thefinal of the 800m at the worldchampionships in Sacramento but tofinish it – as 5th in the world. All herrehabilitation work in the gym and herwater running had obviously beenworthwhile.

In the 2012/2013 Club Tops, Margcame 1st in her age group by quite a

way in the 200m, 400m and 800m.And she passes on useful training tipsto others by way of her coachingcolumns in both TFNL and Vetrun. OnSunday mornings she just runs howshe feels, soaking up “the friendshipand camaraderie of other mastersathletes”, many of whom were verysupportive when she was injured.

In the 2013 World MastersChampionships in Brazil she againreached the final of the 800m andfinished a creditable fifth. And shewas “absolutely rapt” to win gold andbecome world champion in only hersecond ever attempt at the 2000msteeplechase. As an added bonus,she was part of the W55 team whichtook silver in the 4x400m relay.

Marg says “I just love the sport andenjoy being fit. I am not driven by myresults, but enjoy training and racing”.Having turned 60 in December, shemight now just become a little moreinterested in results.

Margaret Saunders stretchesbetween events at the WorldMasters AthleticChampionships in PortoAlegre, Brazil.

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