my jogging hero - Haruki Murakami
I'm not sure if this'll become a regular feature or anything, but I'm willing to give it a chance.
JOGGING NEWS UPDATE:
I'm not one of the world's natural long distance runners. I'm more of a sprinter. Anyway, I still have the remnants of Asthma Lung and whatever else is in there when I was pretend-kung-fu-ing old asbestos garage walls on our council estate in the north of England when I was a young lad with more energy than sense.
Over the last few years, in an attempt to increase my stamina in my forties, I've been pushing myself to jog a bit. And jog a little bit further every time.
I've jogged back from town (about 1.5 miles) in fifteen minutes. I've done this several times in either direction and every time was like a marathon, for me. I really don't have the stamina. My muscles are okay, but my lungs are just garbage. Then, one angry afternoon, I discovered PUSHING MYSELF UNTIL DEATH and not dying.
What is this?
Well, it seems that it's the first mile or so that's the hardest for my body. It's EASY to stop while jogging within this initial distance. But, I realised that if I fought the urge to die on the spot and kept on running (at any speed, fast or slow) I would not die, and in fact the breathing became far less laboured over the following distance.
The other afternoon, I tried about four miles, at my own pace, and it worked out really well. I got back, a bit tired, but not really knackered. Got my breathing under control, during, and set my sights on the GREAT BIG PROMISE - my first 10km run. There's one in Oxford every year, and I thought it'd be good to have a god one day.
Today, after mapping out a course from Botley to Port Meadow and back again, I realised I was able to do 5.5 miles. That's as close to a 10km run as I've ever done. Total circuit time 55 minutes, non stop.
