Walk, don’t run

On this, the 40th anniversary of my best athletic achievement, I’ve finally decided to stop running badly and focus on walking brilliantly. Here’s why.

“Earth has not anything to show more fair”

I agree with William Wordsworth that there’s something rather special about Westminster Bridge, but for a completely different reason. It’s where, 40 years ago today, I posted my best-ever marathon time of 3:22:07. It was easier in those days. With a field of only 15,793 runners, compared with more than 40,000 expected at next Sunday’s event, we didn’t need sharp elbows to carve a path between a rhinoceros and Dennis the Menace.

I returned 20 years later to post my worst-ever time of 6:07, and while I was having a nice post-race massage in the Marie Curie hospitality area the therapist asked:

“Will you come back and run it in another 20 years?”

“But I’ll be 71 by then!!”

“So…?!”

That simple word “So…?!” put next Sunday in my diary and kept me motivated for many years, but my hopes started to fade when I became slower and slower, and dropped out of running because I just couldn’t keep up.  

After my Parkinson’s diagnosis in 2019, I realised why I had slowed down, and defiantly started running again to prove that I still could. I went back to basics, but remained closer to the couch than to 5K. Things looked up when I started interval training with Eden Runners, and found I could put in surprising bursts of speed. So surprising that my Garmin started sending alarm messages to my nearest and dearest.

But I couldn’t run all the way round the parkrun. I’d start off well, then slow to a shuffle, then to a walk. By about 2K my body was hunched over, and my hips were screaming in pain. My brain told my arms to swing, but my arms weren’t listening. I worried that if I did put in a turn of speed I would go a**e over t*t on the gravel path.

My road to Damascus moment came two weeks ago when I turned up to run the parkrun after a long break. A visitor taking part was walking with poles because she was recovering from injury. I tried to stay ahead of her but finished way behind. It was just a ghastly, demotivating slog.

This week I took my Nordic poles and oh! The difference!

It’s so clear, I don’t understand what took me so long. At last, I have ditched the mindset that walking with poles is somehow a cop-out, a poor relation to the running I have enjoyed for so long. It’s powerful, purposeful weight-bearing exercise that gets me out in the sunshine, which both help bone health. I was a little bit slower on Saturday, but you can put some of that down to hugging and thanking the marshals on my last parkrun in Penrith for a while.

Meanwhile I will follow with admiration and respect my fellow Parkies who are still running and improving, raising awareness and mahoosive sums of money. Particularly David Little from Carlisle, who will be in the London Marathon next Sunday.

Play > Walk don’t run > The Ventures