The good...
Apr. 26th, 2005 07:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lprovenBy about half 5 this afternoon, I was running up a small hill in the spring sunshine, with birdsong faintly audible over the Mesh, Tori Amos and ZZ Top coming out of my MP3 player - which mysteriously came back to life a few weeks ago, after having the winter off due to being apparently dead. Ahead, I could see trees and flowers and rolling grassy slopes; behind me lay a small lake and some wooded wetlands, and I'd run past startled woodpigeons, rooks, jackdaws, magpies and a few rabbits. For as far as I could see in any direction lay nothing but green countryside. When I crested the hill, I stood for a moment, not so much as to catch my breath as to take in the view as the music switched to Losing my religion by REM. Far off I could see some high buildings and a few transmitter masts but apparently nothing much closer.
What's amazing is that I'd run straight from home and I'd only gone 2 or 3 miles. I was down towards the southern edge of Mitcham Common, only half an hour or so from home. I've never explored it before, though I've ridden past it enough times. There's quite a lot crammed into what must be well under than a mile square, from neat open green spaces to bosky woods and delightfully dark and dank wetlands. Last year, I probably wouldn't have been able to get this far on a single run. Today, my legs are still getting stronger, though this is at the limit of my range still - after going round the edge I was in too much pain to continue, mainly from the hips, so I walked back and did some shopping on the way.
A couple of mates (Stef L and James Brophy) have been recently asking me how they can get into this running lark, since it seems to be working for me. I don't really know what to say. Good shoes are essential but that and a personal stereo are all the kit you really need. The first few times are pretty grim, it must be said, but getting hot and sweaty (yes, and achey and tired, briefly) starts to feel good after a while, and being able to get to somewhere so green and pleasant under your own leg power, pounding along under the sun and eating distance in a way no walker can feels so damned good, I wish I'd started doing it years ago. I marvel now looking back at the lengths I went to to avoid going on cross-country runs at school. Given the better asthma drugs available today, I'd love to go back and do them for my teenaged self now...
What's amazing is that I'd run straight from home and I'd only gone 2 or 3 miles. I was down towards the southern edge of Mitcham Common, only half an hour or so from home. I've never explored it before, though I've ridden past it enough times. There's quite a lot crammed into what must be well under than a mile square, from neat open green spaces to bosky woods and delightfully dark and dank wetlands. Last year, I probably wouldn't have been able to get this far on a single run. Today, my legs are still getting stronger, though this is at the limit of my range still - after going round the edge I was in too much pain to continue, mainly from the hips, so I walked back and did some shopping on the way.
A couple of mates (Stef L and James Brophy) have been recently asking me how they can get into this running lark, since it seems to be working for me. I don't really know what to say. Good shoes are essential but that and a personal stereo are all the kit you really need. The first few times are pretty grim, it must be said, but getting hot and sweaty (yes, and achey and tired, briefly) starts to feel good after a while, and being able to get to somewhere so green and pleasant under your own leg power, pounding along under the sun and eating distance in a way no walker can feels so damned good, I wish I'd started doing it years ago. I marvel now looking back at the lengths I went to to avoid going on cross-country runs at school. Given the better asthma drugs available today, I'd love to go back and do them for my teenaged self now...
