After a week of sunshine it was disappointing to wake at 7am to the sound of rain sploshing on the wooden decking beneath the bedroom window. The prospect of the parkrun wasn’t overly appealing at that moment but I didn’t seriously think of missing it. Running in the rain, as long as it isn’t freezing and persistently heavy, as it was throughout the Zurich Marathon in 2006, can be quite a pleasure. In the normal world we do anything to avoid getting drenched. But when out for a run, the rules change. If the first thing we do when we get home is have a shower and change into some fresh clothes, it really doesn’t matter. In fact it’s quite liberating. Like being a kid, naughtily splashing through puddles. It was still drizzling when I left home but my watch assured me the rain would stop in nine minutes. Disconcertingly accurate. When I parked, ten minutes later, it had indeed just ceased.
Within five minutes of arriving at the start, we’d set off. Although it wasn’t raining now the conditions were difficult. Blustery and wet underfoot. If last Saturday I had no clear strategy, this week I had even less of one. All I had was my physio’s instruction to ‘increase your speed, run fast’. I didn’t reveal that I’m a one-speed jalopy. My head controls the gear lever but a physiological screw has worked itself loose somewhere, and the connection’s been lost. So the gear lever moves up there but there’s no response down below. I have two speeds: plod and walk, and there isn’t much difference in velocity between these two states.
And so, unable to accelerate effectively, I could increase the effort only by striving to remain in plodding mode for as long as possible, and to suspend the previous run-walk creed. The result was good, and a surprise. For the first time since the Berlin Marathon I ‘ran’ for 40 minutes without a walk break. In fact, since before then because I just reread the Berlin Marathon race report and from what I can glean that was a faltering run-walk from start to finish.
A lifetime later, in a different country, in a small windy town by the sea, I was engaged in a similar struggle but here the limit of my ambition was to reach the 1 kilometre mark before needing to walk. I shuffled through that landmark still feeling energetic (these terms are relative, you understand). And then, just over eight minutes later, the second km mark. Crikey. Then the third and — good heavens, what’s going on? — the fourth. I reached 4.83 km, according to my watch, before finally decelerating a shade to ooze into walking mode. I know, I know. If 4.83 then why not hold out another 170 metres, and jog the whole thing? The answer is that I couldn’t. All through I was hoping to get home in 40 minutes but once that figure flashed up on my watch I had nothing left to keep me going. So I walked for 80 metres or so to generate enough spirit to re-establish contact with my legs, and to shamble those last 100 metres into the glorious orange funnel.
Final position was 282 out of 304 finishers, and a time of 41:41. Again, I have zero interest in how I fare compared to other participants; it’s gauging my own progress that matters. On that front, this was a successful outing. Last week was a (literally) staggering 47 minutes, albeit including an unintended diversion. If Mo Farah improved his 5K time by just over 5 minutes, it would be headline news but the world of athletics seems unmoved by me achieving the same feat. It doesn’t seem fair.
Apart from the physio essentially ordering me to try a bit harder, what was different from last week? Well, apart from dispensing with the over-complex and probably over-strict run-walk plan, the main change was me listening to music for the first time since I started performing in public again, back in February. My customary audio diet consists of podcasts telling me how terrible the world is, but today I dusted off an ancient playlist featuring The Waterboys, The Jam, and Bruce Springsteen, which was marginally more fortifying for a fragmenting spirit.
A good experience overall. Good enough to treat myself to a visit to the Downtown Deli for a salt beef sandwich for brunch. Calling it a salt beef sandwich would be too simple so they’ve made the unwise marketing decision to call it a ‘Trump Tower’. I told them I disapproved and had the impression I wasn’t the first person to express disappointment. But that was soon forgotten. Back at home it tasted pretty fine alongside a pot of freshly brewed coffee, especially after that hot shower and change of clothes. As I settled back in an armchair to watch the Championship playoff final on TV, feeling pleasantly fatigued but satisfied with my morning’s work, I could barely think of anything I’d rather be doing.
My final physio session is on Thursday so I need to get my next outing in on Tuesday or Wednesday. I’ll try another 5K along the seafront. It’s a good distance to focus on for the time being, until I feel confident that the calf will withstand a longer distance.. Fortunately the local 10K at the end of June has sold out or I could see myself doing something stupid.
