Podcast

“People need people and everyone is just trying to make it through their day - so the next time you see someone in a running event standing on their own, just reach out to them…” 

Have you ever wondered about the limits of the human spirit? Our guest today has, and she experienced the absolute potential of it!

For today’s chat, David is joined by Anna Edwards - founder of CommunityHoster.com, an experienced marathon runner and an all-round passionate human being when it comes to helping others run their dream events! 

Anna reveals that her interests and desires would change from week to week as she was growing up - from taking up political journalism due to her love of literature on the one hand, to thinking about fashion design on the other, yet she always wanted to be a professional runner. 

Her day job these days is a contractor for Lockheed Martin in Adelaide, and although the work is very challenging, with long hours involved, it also brings a tremendous learning opportunity and great satisfaction. “It’s really interesting to learn how things work and just to understand that what we do on the daily basis, every minute throughout your day will affect the future of defense in Australia and around the world…”

Anna and her husband moved to Australia in 2016. What drove them to it were the push factors coming from South Africa which meant troubled economic climate and politics, but also a number of pull factors towards Australia such as the excellent education system, really good job opportunities and overall, a very calm and accepting society, 

However, one thing that links these two vast continents for Anna is her love of running. And running, whether it’s in Australia or South Africa, definitely brings people together and lifts up the human spirit.

A shining example of that is her experience of the Comrades Marathon which is the world’s largest and oldest ultramarathon race, and for that event, although it took her four years to prepare for it, it was the best experience of her life. 

“On race day, over half a million people sacrifice their whole day to support us along the road, to give us food, water, encouragement. It shows the absolute spirit of humans, mankind, how people can stick together and how sport can bring a country that is still very much broken in many ways together… Because if you line up at that start line, there’s no black, there’s no white, there’s nothing. There’s just 23,000 people who want to make it to the finish line alive.”

The welcoming attitude towards life that Anna and her husband Brandon share led to creation of a passion project, providing community hosting and lodging for runners around the world which later turned into a full-blown business with a purpose to help people run their dream races!

Anna’s challenge for YOU over the coming week: Communication! “Reach out to someone, put the phone down and have a normal conversation with them. There are a lot of people incredibly lonely, as we often see the same faces, but don’t really know the stories behind them, yet, a conversation could mean the world to them.”