A stroll in the park.

After stocking up the fridge I spent the next few days just messing about on the river between Kingston and Chertsey killing time. My eldest son Steve is a keen runner and regularly runs in the weekly 5K parkrun at Peterbourough - he's completed 50 and us currently training for the Edinburgh marathon. Bushy park, near Hampton Court, is where the very first parkrun was staged 10 years ago and I had arranged to moor at Hampton Court on Friday so Steve could stop overnight before running on Saturday. I carelessly mused aloud that as this was the home of the first parkrun I ought to enter making it my first parkrun. Steve was very encouraging, I'm not sure if he is hoping the exercise will extend my life or enable him to claim his inheritence early. So after supper and a bottle of wine I duly enrolled and was soon in possession of a freshly printed barcode which would identify me as a competitor.

As I drifted to sleep on Friday night I realised that the last time I ran more than 10yds to catch a bus was in the school cross country some 40 years earlier - sleep did not come easily. Saturday morning arrived all too quickly and I remembered that I do not actually possess any running wear. Option one was to run in my underwear, the penalty for forgetting PE kit at school, this was quickly dismissed by both Steve and I as our minds shared a vision which almost saw our breakfast make an unwelcome reappearance. I therefore settled on option two, my normal clothing - let's face it I don't think drag coefficient matters at my standard. It was therefore with some trepidation that I strolled through the Hampton Court grounds to the start next to the beautiful Princess Diana fountain in Bushy park. Thankfully the field was large, almost 1000, and as I spotted several people much older than me my worries of crawling over line in last place subsided. I began to feel confident that I could certainly give a few of these a run for their money and not disgrace myself.
After a safety brief, which I couldn't hear, the run was started and as I began to jog along with the crowd I found Steve was behind me for the first 2 yards. However, he quickly moved through the pack leaving me to jog along with the bulk of the runners. All went well for the first 100 yards after which I realised I was breathing quite heavily and being overtaken on all sides. I wasn't too worried, the majority of the entry were both younger than me and much fitter so I should expect to be passed by many. The first kilometre is dead straight and as I spotted the leaders making the turn ahead I realised the first milestone was in sight and slowed to a fast walk while I recovered my breath. A glance over my shoulder set alarm bells ringing for two reasons. Firstly there were not as many people behind me as I had expected and secondly, the start was much closer than I had hoped and a quick glance forward and back again suggested I was only about halfway along the 1K straight. Not to be detered I walked for a couple more minutes before settling back into my rather slow jog which was frankly little above walking pace. It was with some relief that I reached the turn at the end of the straight and could tick off the first kilometre only 4 more to go. I dropped back to my fast walking pace and was immediately passed by a nice old lady who could probably give me 15 years. My heart was lifted when I saw she was wearing a T-shirt proudly stating she had completed 250 park runs. Clearly this was a serious runner who's training programme was probably more strenuous than mine, which comprised of lying in bed muttering "I should get some exercise". It was around this point that I found I was humming the Paul Simon song "I can't run but I can walk much faster than this" and realised I had a running anthem to keep me company.
The next 3k were completed in a similar pattern of slow jogging and fast walking until I was met by Steve around the 4k mark. He had of course already finished, had a rest and retraced his steps to find me. So I completed the final kilometre in company with my son to finish in 42:24 minutes. Quite honestly an appalling time which saw me finish in position 973 from a field of 983. I never thought when Steve was born that I would run with him in a London park at the age of 56. And I wouldn't have missed it for the world - it was a great day and while I've not got the running bug, I won't be throwing my bar code away just yet.