Run 1 (part 1)

The first run of a new running programme is probably the hardest.  As you will see, but not necessarily for the reasons you might expect.

First, you don’t just ‘go running’ again when you are 57 and haven’t ‘gone running’ since 1995.  For a start, you realise that you don’t have anything you can go running in.  I had a mate who used to run home from work in his smart trousers and shoes.  Once he got stopped by the police who wanted to know what he was doing.  My smart trousers were in the wash and anyway I wanted to look the part. 

The first 30 minutes of the time I had set aside for running were spent finding my shorts.  An old pair of football shorts with some paint spatters on them were uncovered eventually under a pile of old National Geographic Magazines.  The magazines had pull-outs about the expanding universe, the Titanic sinking, Mars missions;  they were great and I settled down for a good read. About 45 minutes later, my wife came back from her second outdoor yoga session and asked why I hadn’t gone running yet.  I told her about the Mars lander and that NASA had lost contact with Sojourner in 1997.