It may be said that as you get older, speed is something you may lose with time, but that is not the case for local marathoner Liz Vanderkruk.

By day Liz is a nurse at the hospital in Cranbrook whose husband operates A&W in Invermere.

There is another side to Liz and it is found through years of training for some of the biggest marathons in the world.

Liz ran her first marathon at the age of 45 in Kelowna and has done one a year since then. Over time she had also started doing triathlons to help her train for running marathons. She thinks the three different sections of a triathlon help her become a better marathoner.

Originally it was her friends and family that got her into running but she quickly proved how capable she was.

After completing the marathon in Kelowna Liz found out she had qualified for the Boston Marathon. Originally she was not sure if she was even going to go to Boston to compete.

After a little family encouragement Liz and her husband packed up their children and headed to Boston to take part in the race.

It was a hard race for Liz and she said she did not do as well as she had hoped she could. For someone going out and competing for the first time in the Boston Marathon both the weather and experience were against Liz, the first time around.

She made the decision to try to qualify again for the event. Liz qualified for Boston the second time with her brother in Niagara Falls and was happier with her results in Boston the second time around. But this was not going to be the end of her racing career. After all there are many big marathons that she has yet to compete in. One of these was the New York Marathon. Recently the chance to qualify for the New York Marathon came to Liz's attention and her and some friends took the plunge.

Liz qualified for the New York Marathon after a race in San Francisco. She went with a group from the hospital in Cranbrook who took part in an all-women’s race.

The challenge in San Francisco were the hills but that did not stop her from getting her best time ever at 3 hours and 48 minutes.

She does not know why she is getting faster as she ages but tried to explain it off with good genes, health and experience in knowing how to run through a marathon. Liz also quickly pointed out how much the support her friends that she runs with, and her husband/manager have meant to her over the years.

When talking about her husband she said, “He is my rock and biggest supporter.”

Liz said her family “pretty excited to run the race and also to see family in the city who have wanted her to visit for some time.”

When asked what are the best parts of being in such a large race, Liz said, “Big races are great because of the level of support you receive. You get involved with the crowd. You give them high fives and the energy they give you gives you the energy to keep going.”

She also enjoys hearing other people’s stories about why they do it is also something unique to being in a race like this.

It is the local support that helps Liz get through her training because during the lead-up to the race, people want to hear about it and that encourages her to stay training and get there in shape.

With a 16-week training period leading into the race, her goal is to be under 3 hours and 50 minutes for the marathon in New York.