Four-time Olympian Benita Willis is one of Australia’s greatest distance runners.
Benita is the only Australian to ever win the World Cross Country Championship – considered one of the greatest victories in Australian athletics and arguably the hardest race in the world.
Throughout her stellar sporting career, Benita set 11 national records over distances from 2000m to the marathon, competed in four Olympics, two Commonwealth Games and represented Australia 25 times at World Championship level, winning multiple National Championship and World Championship medals.
In 2018, Athletics Australia inducted Benita into the Hall of Fame.
In addition to her remarkable 2004 World Cross Country individual win, Benita led Australia to two team bronze medals at the World Championships in 2006 and 2008.
If not for an Australian Institute of Sport scholarship, Benita may have been a Hockeyroo instead of a runner. Growing up in Mackay North Queensland, Benita represented in multiple underage Australian hockey teams while simultaneously winning National All Schools titles over 800m and 1500m. After high school, Benita was awarded a scholarship at the AIS for distance running which set her on her successful sporting path.
In her post-athletic career, Benita founded her own business Lace Up Running which offers individualised online coaching to both elite athletes and recreational runners. She is also the director of ‘Qrun’, the Recreational Running arm of Queensland Athletics, and was instrumental in developing the current Qrun program focused around building a recreational running community through coach education, localised run group formation, and hosting running races and festivals. The success of Qrun has led to the adoption of the program by other state recreational running associations.
Benita is also on the board of directors for Events Management Queensland, a member of the Oceania Athletics Athletes’ commission and has also served on the World Athletics Athletes’ Commission.
Benita has a degree in human movement and education and a post-graduate certificate in Sports Nutrition. She is also a World Athletics accredited level 3 middle/ long distance coach with two decades of coaching experience to her credit. Benita looks forward to supporting Australia’s female athletes through her involvement with Minerva.
