Powered by Potatoes
Bill Skinner is a marathon runner in his mid-70s whose secret to success is the mighty potato. The Washington Grown crew interviewed him in 2019 at Bloomsday, Spokane's famous 12K run.
How old were you when you started to get into running long-distance races?
I started actually only about 14 years ago, at age 60. I was getting a little bit heavy, but I thought I needed to do something, so I started to run. And within two or three weeks, I started feeling better physically and mentally.
After I ran the first half-marathon, I thought I could never do a marathon. But then I trained for a marathon and was able to do that, and I qualified for Boston in the first marathon, so that was fun. I mean, you have to qualify. You have to be fast. Some people like to golf or ski — I like to run.
How are you powered by potatoes for running?
Well, usually, I take some of the potatoes that we raise on our farm, and I chop them up into little chunks and roast them in olive oil and put some herbs on and salt on, and I eat them before the race and sometimes during the race.
What is it about the potatoes, though, that fuels you?
Potatoes are actually higher in potassium than a banana of equal size, and they have a lot of vitamin C, and they're a complex carbohydrate, so they give you energy over a long period of time. And I found they really work. The potato industry has been advertising potatoes as a performance fuel, and there's a lot of research that says it's a good performance fuel for any kind of exercising — you know, whether it's a triathlon or a marathon, or Bloomsday.
The Washington growers are probably some of the best growers in the world — very technologically advanced and environmentally conscious. So Washington can be very proud of their growers. They're just awesome people, and it is a joy working with them.
