How it started

22nd July 2008

I got bored talking about what I used to do when I was younger, how much I loved my running and how my life changed when I injured myself. I don’t remember exactly when I made the decision, but I did, enough was enough; it was time to stop living on past glories, get out there and find the buzz again.

First of all the smoking had to go, I’m still clean after a year and am very chuffed with myself. Next I stopped walking the dog and started running with her instead. Then when I moved jobs, the wonderful people that I worked with bought me a Garmin 50 and all of a sudden I knew how far I was running. Not far, as it turned out, 2 miles of huffing and puffing was about my limit; but it didn’t matter, I was hooked again.

Then last weekend at a family BBQ, things changed. I was chatting to my cousin Simon about the Exmoor coastal marathon, by all accounts a pretty impressive 28 mile run with 10,000ft ascent thrown in for good measure. The article I had read enthused me and I was waxing lyrical to Simon about it and an 85 mile run along the Ridgeway, which happens to be where I run with the dog; when he upped the stakes and said he would run them with me.

Oops, now I have a target and someone to run them with me. My bluff has been called so I thought I would start this blog to track how I am getting on. As the saying goes, for better or worse.