07 | February | 2015 | Quietly Terrified

Running Scared …

Just over a year ago, if you had suggested to me that I voluntarily get up earlier than is strictly necessary on a Saturday morning, and then willingly drag my weary rapidly-disintegrating carcass to the local park in order to take part in a communal sporting 5 km romp every week, frankly I’d have run a mile. This is ironic, granted, but it would still have been an over two miles net gain if it got me out of doing a 5 km run, i.e. I’d only have to run one mile not the three and a bit I’d be compelled to cover otherwise… Well, that was then, and this is now. Now I am a complete convert, and Parkrun has become such an embedded part of my weekly routine that it is the one thing I know I’ll miss when I’m in Vietnam.

For the uninitiated Parkrun is a really simple idea. Across the UK – and internationally as well, groups of people come together at the same time and same place each week (Saturday mornings 9.00 a.m.) and run a 5 km route, timed. If they have pre-registered (free and online) they can take along a bar code which is unique to them, and on completion they’ll be handed a plastic token which gives their finishing place for that run on that day. This finishing token and the runner’s bar code are scanned, and ‘voila’ you have a finishing time recorded, which you can then seek to meet or beat in subsequent weeks. It is so simple, and genius.

I’ll be honest, I started stalking my local Sheffield Hallam Parkrun about a year before I went. Initially my thoughts were along the lines of ‘who are these peculiar people in lycra?’ and ‘what are they thinking?’ I’d pass them on my way into town, and always only really noticed the very fast very fit athletes at the front of the pack. I watched them with a mix of incredulity and admiration, but I never imagined being part of them. I’m the end of the sporting spectrum that always got picked last for the netball team in games, and perfected the art of mysteriously vanishing from school en route to distant playing fields when the seriously mis-described afternoon of ‘games’ was timetabled. What’s more, our games teacher colluded with this by apparently never noticing. I think she was seriously relieved I was a no-show week after week.

This photo is taken from BBC news website, but it is my local Parkrun

Essentially, I was not a likely candidate for voluntary engagement in sport, self-conscious in exercise gear, I like walking, horse riding, cycling even, but running – no sports bra had ever been invented that would make me consider that. So what changed, well, bodily decay for one thing. It really does seem to be true that as you hit forty and beyond, bits of your body start falling off (not flab though), failing and the waist line it shall groweth beyond your most disturbed imaginings. That was my experience anyway. I was about to start a new job, and I wanted to reverse the decline. In a fit of desperation I went along to a fantastic place – hello good people of Northern Bootcamp – and there enjoyed climbing; hill walking; body-boarding; cycling; boxing; kayaking; yoga; circuits; all sorts really. There were great people running the camp who were passionate and inclusive about exercise but also non-judgmental, encouraging and made being active so much fun. It helped that my fellow bootcampers made me laugh til I cried. A key part of each day was a morning run along the stunning beach at Bamburgh. The trainers (pathologically friendly enablers with seductive Newcastle accents) did all they could to provide variety within the discipline of running. I was trying to explain this to someone, and said ‘well, one day it might be intervals, one morning hills, another high intensity, then endurance – basically, the first part of each day is running, but in different guises‘. The person concerned was puzzled ‘I don’t understand why you would have to run in fancy dress‘. Good point, well made. I have since done this (what’s a little light racial stereotyping to celebrate Le Yorkshire Tour de France after all), but that wasn’t what I meant at the time.

It wasn’t that I found the running easy, far from it, but it began to seem possible that I might learn to enjoy doing it badly. We were quite a continuum of ability when I was there, some people were very significantly overweight, and when I was struggling up a sand-dune, I looked across at one guy in particular and was inspired by his tenacity. I found it hard, but this guy was effectively trying to run up hill carrying the equivalent of me in excess weight, if he could do it, so could I. Then there was the super svelte marathon runner, but she too was pushing herself to her maximum with pain and effort etched on her face and I suddenly got it. It really didn’t matter the speed we ran at, all of us were just doing our best. Well they were, I think I still have a tendency to keep something in reserve. Also, none of us were judging each other, we were too focused on doing what we could. Surprise surprise, for the most part, runners know it’s hard when you start and they don’t give a toss what other runners look like. I have since refined this perspective further and think by remaining essentially rubbish at running, I’m providing stronger runners with someone to overtake, this can only increase their motivation and provide positive reinforcement making them feel even better about their athleticism, someone has to follow up at the back, why shouldn’t it be me? Honestly, I still prefer the smug feeling I get afterwards more than the actual running bit, but it’s a start. Also, I’m still putting in more effort than if I’d stayed in bed.

So, inspired by Northern Bootcamp friends I plucked up the courage to go and try Parkrun for the first time. My pact with myself was simply to ‘try it once’ and that’s all I did. I couldn’t even run the whole thing in one go then, my time was 35.36, but I was pleased just to get round. I wasn’t last. More to the point everyone was so friendly. It’s like being part of a benign cult! As I went to the run I was reminded of that scene in the film Close Encounters of the Third Kind, when people suddenly appear from nowhere and start to congregate as if compelled by an invisible force to gather at the same place at the same time. The Sheffield Hallam Parkrun is huge, 500 or so people. It was a bit overwhelming. I approached someone who looked well ‘approachable’ I now know this individual to be a local legend, who started doing Parkrun after a heart by pass. He was so welcoming and encouraging, said he’d be behind me as he was always last (not strictly true these days) but advised me to ‘just keep running to the next tree, and if you need to walk, then walk‘. There is no great mystery to this you just have to give it a go. If you can walk 5 km, and face it, most of us can, then you can build up to running it. It was great. I felt super human for just having turned up and tried. Despite thinking I wouldn’t care what my time was, I find I do, it gives you a base line, and you do want to progress and improve, you too will travel in pursuit of the ever elusive new PB – that’s ‘Personal Best’ to the uninitiated. I feel evangelical about Parkrun, it is joyful, find your local one and get stuck in.

But wait there’s more. I don’t come from Sheffield, I only moved here a couple of years back. One day at Parkrun I saw a familiar face, ‘Hello’, I said, ‘hello’ she replied. I’d bumped into someone I was at school with over 30 years ago! We hadn’t kept in touch, and frankly all those years back we had equaled each other in our lack of sporting prowess and exercise evasion techniques, and yet here we were, meeting at a 5 km run, literally hundreds of miles away from our childhood home (well, strictly speaking about 168 according to route finder, so not really literally at all, but you get the idea), both having relocated at different times, and yet instantly recognisable to one another after three decades had slipped by. We went for breakfast together, and rekindled an ace friendship and now are settled into a routine of weekly parkrun then breakfast. She also conveniently happens to be a super networker so I’ve been able to parasitise all her lovely friends, despite being largely devoid of social and interpersonal skills myself. And, although she’s always going to be a stronger runner than me, we have since enjoyed much off-road yomping together (who needs navigational skills on the moors if you have a sense of humour?), and even the odd organised running event! A. Maz. Ing.

Selfie lost in the peaks – a 5 km yomp turned into 18 km, but what a hoot eh?

I have running buddies, breakfast buddies, and I even have a new PB 28 mins 11 seconds, which is still feeble by many standards, but a lot more impressive than a lie in which was my default position not so very long ago. What’s more, I can now die happy, as I got to tick off one of the things on my bucket list by shamelessly pleading myself onto a Radio 4 item on Parkrun earlier in the year – those of you who are curious can find it at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04stc5v the feature begins around 45 mins but ‘my bit’ is at 50 mins 10 seconds, I hope its obvious I’m being dry not pretentious, and my enthusiasm is entirely genuine although I think I came across a bit sarcastic, but frankly I don’t care, it is enough to have been on air. Job done!

I have found myself accidentally to be part of the ‘running community’ and found myself taking part in organised runs even joining the friendliest running club in the world. Shout out to Smiley Paces can’t believe I stumbled on them on my doorstep. They are an inspirational, supportive and funny crowd. If I could just stop stumbling around and start running in a straight line I might even get to improve my PB along with my technique!

Oh, I still look shite in my running gear by the way, but you know what I no longer really care about that either. And when I took part in the run which is something of a Sheffield institution – the Percy Pud (instead of a medal, at the end of a blisteringly cold 10 km you get a Christmas Pud – what’s not to like?) donned in my Smiley Paces vest I have never felt prouder to be part of a gang. Around 50 Smileys took part, so you get all their supporters cheering you on too, I’m beginning to get it. Through Smiley’s I also got to marshall at the Red Bull Steeplechase in the peaks last year. Wow, that was incredible, I was out of breath walking up to the marshalling point, but these runners are hard core – 21 miles and an elevation of 1,400 metres (by the way a Smiley won this in 2012 and 2013 yay, can’t believe I get to wear the same vest as her! Just goes to show runners do really come in all shapes, sizes and abilities.) So this post is for all my running buddies out there, I’ll miss you, and I’ll do my best to do a run in my Smiley Vest with the Hash House Harriers in Vung Tau! In the meantime, I will always be with you in spirit on a Saturday morning, so no slacking. Mine’s the scrambled eggs and mushrooms on granary toast and a large latte at Jonty’s the first Saturday I’m back…