Stability Through Motion

Inspirational run today -  along the Malvern ridge from North Quarry down to British Camp and back. It should have been a bit further, but I didn’t print out enough map, so was worried about getting lost! That was far enough anyway, what with the 1700′ ascent, and some of those ascents were hard work. Two groups of walkers shouted wierd things at me, something about a license plate (? – didn’t understand that one), and something else completely unintelligible in the gale force wind on the ridge. The promised snow didn’t arrive, so it was a glorious sunny and freezing day with views for miles around. This reminds me, if I ever need reminding, why I run – you’ve got everything you need to hand, you can travel distance with no car, no bloomin’ shopping bag, no jacket, not worry about getting muddy or wet because it simply doesn’t matter. Just some dried mango, or jelly babies, and a bit of water, though I didn’t touch a drop today. Oh, give me the hills!

A whole line of parked cars in a muddy field spew a huge variety of people in tracksuit bottoms, hats and sweatshirts with numbers. You escape the attractive tracksuit bottoms, start jogging slowly around the field, doing a few token stretches, and a token pee into a not-so-discrete bush, ahem. After ten minutes, people start to gather at one end of this field while supporters disappear into cars to escape the drizzly, windy conditions. Now it’s just hairy legs, lycra and muffled conversation. A short communal walk up a muddy track and a whistle goes. Suddenly everyone starts running, the conversations stop and everyone around starts breathing more deeply.

That’s the start of your typical race – and it’s still a strange environment. There’s a weight of personal expectation in the air, but no crowd pressure and most of the time you’re totally alone chasing some figure ahead of you, or trying to escape from the heavy breathing behind you. At the other end is a very sweet encouraging line of spectators cheering you to the finish line, and you enter your very own personal Olympic stadium moment.

Yes, I ran the Andy Reading 10k race today near Bicester, and got a PB of 41:30. A nice end to the year, although still a way off the 40 minutes I’m aiming for if I want to be confident of a 3:15 marathon time in Antwerp next spring. No more racing now until the New Year, but plans include running trips up a few north Welsh mountains in the New Year.