if I can do it, so can you (maybe)
The missing ingredient.
When I ask you; what makes a good runner?, you will throw all the usual suspects at me. Something like:
talent
work ethic
drive
toughness
genes
Vo2 max
speed
strength
form
And so on. There’s is a word you probably haven’t mentioned. It should be on the list. And it might need to go straight to the top.
Battersea 5km is Brilliant race. Loaded field, pancake flat. No wind. I get dropped within the first mile.
Coach Ken is cheering me on the best he can;
Keep it respectable Russell!
I can’t.
last year I did this race and finished 2nd. A hamstring tear later, and now I’m outside the top 20, moving backwards. Ego crusher.
Not even halfway, hurting, way off PB pace. There are people ahead of me I would usually expect to beat. We are near the car park now. Come on, let’s call it a day. I’ve had a go. It isn’t my day. Stop this pain, get in the car, go home, regroup for next time.
I am still trying to nail all my 2022 goals (see further below) but am also adding the following:
I reach Rhosydd quarry, fifty miles and sixteen hours in, it is the dead of night. A scary enough place in daylight, where young men worked and died, deep in the hillside tunnels. Slate ruins loom silently around me. The moon shadows play tricks on my eyes, ghosts are closing in from all around.
I’ve reached a crossroads. If I turn right, down the hill, towards my home town of Blaenau Ffestiniog, I could get in my warm, safe bed, and make all this end.
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In the movie Gladiator, the evil Emperor Commodus confronts his nemesis, the noble warrior, Maximus, who is bound in chains. Commodus stabs Maximus in the ribs, then challenges him to a fight to the death.
Maximus is put in armour, to hide the blood, then released from his bonds. The two men are stood on a platform, which is raised from the dark under belly of the stadium up to the brilliant sunlight and chanting crowds of the arena floor.
As the thousands of spectators cheer, they know nothing of Maximus’ mortal wound. He must fight anyway. He reaches slowly for the floor and feels the dirt, steeling himself for battle.
…fast forward two thousand years, and here I am, the modern day gladiator, making my way through the crowds of Blackheath, towards my arena…
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