Friday 6 April 2007

Paralysed

Dougie lives next door to me. I know very little about him as he works away a lot with the RAF. Last night was warm enough for Miche & I to be sat outside after the kids were to bed. Dougie was in his garden too, so I thought I'd say hi over the fence.

We got to chatting. He seemed like a really nice guy. He said,

"Scott, I've seen you run past my house sometimes, are you a keen runner?"

"Yeah", I said, "I get out pretty regular, it's something I enjoy." I was feeling pretty smug about it, to be honest.

"Yeah me too", said Dougie, "Though I don't get to run as much as I'd like"

"Well, I'm going for a scarper tomorrow morning, if you fancy joining me?" I offered.

He seemed up for it. We agreed to try an 8 miler, of course, we were sizing each other up and like any bloke, neither of us would be trumped. I'm surprised we didn't end up planning a half marathon.

So this morning at 8:30 we set off. And at a fair clip too. Certainly faster than I would ordinarily. I kept my mouth shut about that, of course.

After four miles I began to sweat, and my legs began to protest. But we carried on.

He & his wife have recently divorced, sadly. This morning however, it was a blessing. Dougie obviously wanted to spill the beans and recount the whole story. He chatted, barely out of breath the whole time. All I had to do was concentrate on not passing out and offering the odd, "Yeah?" or "Hmn..".

Somewhere in mile seven, I asked,

"So, what do you do in the RAF then?"

"I'm a Physical Training Instructor." He told me, without even a bead of sweat on his forehead.

No fucking wonder then. I felt like a reet tosspot.

I'm sat at my desk now, barely able to move, as me legs have all but seized up solid. I've just checked my Garmin for the run stats; 8.3 Miles, average pace 7:36 minute/mile.

Never again. Never again am I going to let my male pride get in the way.

I'm going out for a few beers with him next Saturday. I've already told him I'm a wimp when it comes to drinking...

2 comments:

Stew said...

When I lived in the UK I did a fair bit of running. I used to run with Bracknell Forest Runners. pb for 10K was 39:40, but that's 8 years ago now :(
Anyway, 7.5 minute miling is a fair old clip for a Sunday friendly!
Club running was excellent because you can still do the solitary thing, but it's also a real blast running with a big group, chatting & laughing as you go.

jamon said...

Hi Stew,

Yeah, I've often thought of getting back into club running. As ever, it's the time, or lack of...

Welcome to the atheist blogroll BTW :-), and thanks for dropping in.