Coach Bob
Here you can read all about Bob Empson, his running journey, his path to becoming a Coach and at the bottom of the page, you’ll find his personal running history in numbers.
Bob loves running! Being a licensed coach is his opportunity to support others to get the most from our sport whether that’s working towards a Personal Best, targeting a new challenge, getting back into it after time out or injury, trying to reduce the risk of injury and/or just having more fun!
He has always run; it’s been part of his way of life. But he didn’t join a running club until 2013, and he started with his first coach in 2014. In 2016 he joined Fulham Running Club where he has been Co-Captain and Chair, and he is currently Coaching Development Officer, responsible for the development of coaching and coaches at the club.
His route to running coaching started when he became an England Athletics licensed Leader in Running Fitness LiRF in 2019. He subsequently qualified as a Coach in Running Fitness CiRF in 2021 before achieving England Athletics’ current highest grade with the Event Group/Endurance badge in early 2022. The Professional Certificate in Coaching which he gained from Henley Business School (Reading University) in 2014 is also a relevant qualification.
Since becoming qualified Bob has coached athletes for distances ranging from 5k to multi-day ultra marathons (see case studies).
Bob lives in London where you will often find him running by the river Thames, along the canals or in the Royal Parks. Further afield he loves running the South and North Downs trails as well as those of Norfolk (not as flat as you might think!) and the Alps (not flat!).
His personal running career has included:
9 ultra-marathons
His first ultra was when, aged 17, he walked 50 miles in a day during the hot summer of 1976 (although this effort isn’t counted in the total above!). In 2018 he was looking for new running challenges and completed a 50-mile trail race. Of the 8 subsequent ultras, one of which was 100 miles in less than 24 hours, he finished 1st in his age category for six of them and second in one.
17 marathons
His first two marathons probably rank in the disaster category; he learned the hard way that you don’t start marathons with niggling injuries and under-trained. With the support of his coaches he has successfully completed 15 further marathons including all 6 of the World Marathon Majors (including the iconic Boston marathon 4 times).
40 half-marathons
This is probably Bob’s favourite distance! Races have included, for example, the Great North Run (the world’s biggest!), Barcelona, the Scottish Half, Cambridge (where he got his latest PB) and a handful of trail races. In 2020 he was selected to represent England at half marathon in the England Athletics Age Group Masters Team (v60).
18 ten-mile races
Sadly there are nowadays relatively few 10-mile races from which to choose; but it’s a great step up from 10k! Bob so values this distance that, trying to preserve it and give more runners opportunities to do it, in 2017 he founded an annual 10-mile race which is entirely free (with support of sponsors) and open to any England Athletics athlete.
280+ parkruns, 5k
Parkrun is a global phenomenon with free events every Saturday in over 25 countries worldwide. Bob has not only completed over 280 of the 5k events (at 63 different venues in the UK and abroad), he has also volunteered over 90 times.
