Having been feeling so lethargic, I needed to get my act together for my pre-arranged run with my friend Jon. In the end it was a run with a tumble!
I drove over to Harpenden to meet Jon at his new pad. As I followed his directions, this involved driving down a hill just before I reached his home and I thought “I bet we are running up this hill in a minute” and sure enough, we were.
Jon had a route in mind and I was hoping it would allow us to run alongside each other, social distancing of course. He nailed it, absolutely perfect. We went through little country lanes, a few trails, along the side of fields and passed the millionaire houses (they’re ten-a-penny in Harpenden).
I like to think in previous times, we have been well matched in terms of our fitness. Nowadays Jon seriously has the edge on me – but was very gracious when I gasped “JUST SLOW DOWN WILL YA!!!!!”
In the second half of the run, where the surface was very smooth and slightly sandy, I managed to trip up and went flying! It was almost like one of those Tom and Jerry films when I flew through the air, suddenly suspended in midair and then crash landed. Of course it all happened in a split second.
Jon stopped, looked concerned and asked if I was okay. I was a bit winded and just sat there for a minute or two.
“oh mate” he said “you’ve done it again! Remember the last time?”
I did. We had been running my favourite hilly run and less than half a mile from home I tripped up on something, managing to skin the palm of a hand and forearm, with some blood for good effect. Now I’ve stopped of accusing Jon of being jinxed or anything. Nevertheless I did, just for a moment, wonder whether running with Jon was such a good idea. Then I remembered all of the other times I have fallen over on my own.
So I got up, though feeling a bit jolted and bashed around and dusted myself off. I suggested we restart by walking and after a hundred yards I started to jog and then running. I was feeling like I’d run into a brick wall.
The conversation picked up again. Something about property development, capital gains tax and things like that. Actually, we talk about a million things when we run together; that’s the nice thing about someone like Jon and how we can, unconsciously, meander through many different topics as the miles drift by.
Talking of miles, we did almost 8 miles and the pace was good for me at 9:17mins/mile. Jon was clearly dragging me along and I was undoubtedly holding him back but somehow or other we found the happy medium.
Happily we finished by running down the hill I had huffed and puffed my way up at the start. We chatted outside his front door and both mulled over how we could scoff the 1,000+ calories we had just burnt off.
We agreed that Jon would drive over to Dunstable for our next run in a couple of weeks. That’ll be nice, providing the broken rib has healed.
Footnote: yes I am 99% sure I have broken a rib. Second one down, under my collar bone, left hand side. Flippin hurts especially if I sneeze, cough, lift anything, bend over…..