Des Linden, who made history with 2018 Boston Marathon win, reveals pressure runners face to ‘get really light as quickly as possible’

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While Des Linden is now a Boston Marathon winner and Olympian, the 39-year-old running icon is recalling the pressure fellow athletes felt to manipulate their bodies to win in her younger days.

In her new book, Choosing to Run, Linden reflects on the moment she discovered that her Arizona State University track teammates would go to dangerous lengths to run faster and get lighter quickly. She noted that "NCAA Division I women's track culture was clearly struggling with a stick-figure body image ideal." (Yahoo Life reached out to the NCAA for comment but did not receive a response.)

"That was definitely my first exposure to it, right as I stepped onto the college campus," Linden tells Yahoo Life. "I remember getting on campus and just noticing it fairly quickly. I wasn't even cognizant of it prior to that."

Linden wrote about runners "limiting their daily intake to a few apple slices or sticking their fingers down their throats." She explained that disordered eating and dangerous habits "were viewed as a necessary passage, something you did if you were 'serious'" on women's teams.

"It's definitely a sport where it's super productive to kind of take those shortcuts and get really light as quickly as possible," Linden explains. "It tends to lead to really great results in the short term, so there's not a lot of incentive to get someone to slow down and maybe be patient when coaches and the system, in general, provide positive feedback."

Elizabet Altunkara, director of education for National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA), tells Yahoo Life why this can be an issue in competitive sports.

"The emphasis on body weight and shape and the pressure to win can create a toxic combination for athletes and can put them at risk to develop disordered eating," she says. "The emphasis on thinness in our culture, societal expectations that athletes should look a certain way, perfectionism, which is a common attribute among athletes, as well as body dissatisfaction that may arise from all these factors can lead athletes to disordered eating behaviors, which can rapidly turn into an eating disorder."

Linden had fortunately been raised by her parents to view food "as necessary fuel for sport," and wouldn't take part in such behaviors. While it's been several years since she was a student, the athlete says she believes that there have been significant changes in the openness around athletes and disordered behaviors.

"I think there's a lot more people talking about it, and I think that helps a ton," says Linden. "It's not necessarily a rite of passage by any means. I think it's still probably fairly prevalent, but the conversations should be making an impact."

Despite being able to eschew those habits, it's nearly impossible to avoid comparing yourself to others as a professional athlete. While Linden says she's "always been really comfortable in her own skin," she recognizes that she can occasionally fall victim to it herself.

"You can really paint a perfect picture, but that's not reality. I think we have to remind ourselves, that the comparison trap is a trap, for starters. It is tough, but then the longer you're in it, you're like, 'I can only control what I can control. And that's me,'" she explains. "My general happiness is a high priority, my general health, that's super high priority."

She's keeping those things top of mind as she sets out to tackle her 10th Boston Marathon on Monday. Although she's going in with a "sense of relief" after having made history in 2018 as the first American woman to win the women's race since Lisa Larsen Weidenback crossed the finish line in 1985, Linden says there's still plenty of work to be done.

"It still has an element of pressure and stress. But there's always the perspective of like, this is actually a really fun job," she says. "So you can't get too weighed down by the seriousness of it. I've accomplished the big thing, but then you start doing the work to get ready for another one."

Linden plans to fuel up pre-race with a bagel with peanut butter and a bowl of white rice. "Food for function, not for fun. That's the before," she says. But once she crosses the finish line, she'll be ready to celebrate with a jalapeño cheddar burger, truffle fries and a beer or two.

"I'm aware that I'm not in my peak," Linden says. "But I'm also super comfortable with that."

If you or someone you know is struggling with an eating disorder, call the National Eating Disorders Association hotline at 1-800-931-2237.

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