I haven't been riding my bike much recently. I was a bike commuter for 6 years but a change of job means lugging tools around rather than pedalling. What cycling I have been doing has been with my kids and as a family. The kids are mad for it, I suppose we will be doing loads more.
So to close my activity gap, I have been doing a bit of running. To lose a bit of weight and to improve my climbing grade. Climbing has always been my one true exercise love and I guess it always will be. It engages your brain as much as your body, think of it as outdoor chess, with pull-ups. It has gotten me to places few have been and I have a lifetime's worth of memories already. I write on a climbing blog here if you want more about that game. Running though makes you feel off the scale good, even when your pavement pounding near your backdoor. It turns out your bodies own endorphins produce a better high than any chemical you could ever put into your body, who knew?
I re-started running after a long break as Mrs Cycle Harrogate had caught the bug, joined a club and it's something we can do together when we get the chance.
She joined Nidd Valley Road Runners and Saturday night was their annual dinner at Harrogate Golf Club. I expected a load of young emaciated stick insects talking about times and PB's that would bring me out in a cold sweat. I was very wrong. At 45 I was one of the younger ones there and there were all shapes and sizes. Everyone did talk times actually, runners do but I was expecting to feel chronologically inadequate and I really didn't.
I got taking to a guy in his late 70's. he had done 26 marathons and didn't start running until he was 40. His marathon personal best was 3 hours 17 minutes which is proper good and he posted it when he was 56. He talked about a Berlin Marathon in the early 80's when the wall was still up and about sneaking behind the East German side the day after as he had connections. He had a twinkle in his eyes and he still puts in the miles every week. I hope I'm half as vital when I'm his age, I might just look forward to my old age if he can be my inspiration.
His wife was near by, she has a terminal cancer diagnosis, but she was there amongst friends and seemed to be loved by one and all. I thought when she is gone the guy would have this club, a place to be amongst like minded people and although he looked a bit scared, his future looked a dam sight better than a comfy but bleak and lonely chair in a nursing home, which will be many of our fates.
I got nattering to a guy who had just done his first marathon. A year after he started doing the excellent Harrrogate Park Run. A 5K challenge on the Stray 9am every Saturday. There are over 300 of these across the UK. We did one down in Nottingham after a gig last month. Me with a medium sized hangover, still good fun. A new one has just started at Fountains Abbey which would be a cool place to spend a Saturday morning. We talked Park Run times (runners do), he was a tad slower than me, but I could no more run a marathon than I could free Syria, respect. If you have never park ran you should. Its free, register online and simply turn up. There are all shapes and sizes there too. I sound like I'm on commission, I'm not.
What shone thorough from the whole evening at the golf club was the, lets call it shared, individual endeavour. Everyone was competing but against themselves and they were doing it as a group, mutually supportive and having fun. The exercise will keep them alive a lot longer than clean living and self denial and its all free at point of use. We need more of these type of clubs in Harrogate. We are an ageing population and we need to get people moving if we are to impact on our stroke and heart disease rates. They have a junior section which has just started. When I have finished brainwashing my kids into the joys of mountain biking, camping, climbing and the outdoors. I might try and get them doing a bit of running with this lot, they could do worse.
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