Beatie Deutsch: The Marathon Mother

Beatie Deutsch is the four-time National Marathon champion of Israel, veteran of several international competitions across the world- and mother of five. Her incredible journey to the heights of long distance running began surprisingly late, only taking up long-distance running at the age of 26 after giving birth to four of her children. 

Beatie described her route into running as “not the traditional path”, as she had not grown up running or competing in any sport apart from some basketball and taekwondo in high school. The sport appealed to her as something she could do freely and alone, as a mother with limited resources. After just two years of running, she had successfully won the 2018 Jerusalem Marathon for women.

Going into the Jerusalem marathon Beatie “just wanted to win for Israeli women '', and still did not see herself as a serious runner. She surprised other runners at the tournament, being the first woman to run a marathon in a skirt as a mother of five children. 

“Once people know you then you have a lot of external pressure because people are expecting you to perform”, Beatie said. After running a half marathon in December 2018, she said that she even felt motivated to keep going and run a half marathon. After these original competitions, Beatie said that she set her sights on qualifying for the 2020 Olympics, which would require her to set a time of 2 hours and 45 minutes in order to qualify for the competition. In her first international competition, Beatie won the Latvia half marathon in Riga, successfully winning on a hot race day. Once the criteria for the Olympics was changed, she finished 8th in the women’s category at the Cape Town marathon in 2019. 

When asked how she manages to balance her career as a long distance runner alongside her family, Beatie said that “It’s not always easy but being a professional athlete is not a full-time job. If you’re clear about your priorities then you can get anything done”. This was one of the inspirational pieces of advice that she had for other young Jewish athletes developing their careers, along with saying that athletes should try to have a mentor to consult on issues relating to Judaism and other personal issues. Furthermore, Beatie stressed that success was not something which will come overnight, and that athletes should be “willing to hit rock bottom before you make it there. This is part of the process”. 

“(athletes) only share their successful moments and people don’t see the struggle that it takes to get there”. Beatie said that she has experienced some of these low moments in her own career herself. In the summer, she was training to qualify for the 2024 Olympics in Paris, recovering from an injury which had sidelined her in 2022. She had recovered from this injury and calibrated everything towards the Berlin Marathon, only to be ruled out at the last minute with a tendon injury. She was then not able to use alternative routes to the Olympics through Israel’s national marathon in Tiveria, which was cancelled due to the war. At that moment, realising that she would not be able to qualify for the Olympics, Beatie said that the whole experience was “psychologically frustrating”, however she said that the resilience that she has picked up throughout her career had helped her to overcome this issue, affirming that “we have so much more strength than we realise”. 

Finally, when asked about her aspirations for this coming year, Beatie said that unlike in previous years, she was going into 2024 with no major goals as such, but to “find the joy in running” and to continue striving to represent Israel on the international stage, through this summer’s European championships in Rome, as well as still holding onto her aspiration to represent Israel at the Los Angeles Olympics in 2028.