ten years a runner

 

This weekend will mark ten years since I have been — sometimes to my own surprise — a runner.

In that time, I have run a parkrun 229 times (230 on Saturday) and volunteered at parkrun in 141 separate roles over 117 separate occasions, including 50 times as Run Director.

It is worth noting that it took two years of regular, personal invitation before I finally turned up to my first parkrun; and another year before I fully committed myself.

If we are away over a weekend, we’ll take our running things with us so we can turn up at the nearest parkrun — or not, but we have the option — but if we are at home, we are at Silksworth, week by week.

Two years in, and again by personal invitation, I joined a local running club. Jo, who had followed me to parkrun after a year (which helped me commit to it) joined on the same day.

Our running club, Sunderland Strollers, knows a thing or two.

Knows that if you want to run, you really need to run on a regular basis.

Knows that it is easier to keep running with other people than on your own.

Knows that it helps to run with people of similar stamina and pace, to be able to run with those who are a little faster to bring you on, or a little slower when you are coming back from injury or just not feeling it.

Knows that not everybody can make the same day or time.

Knows that different people are looking for different things: do you want to run an ultra-marathon on mountain trails, a road marathon, or shorter distances, 10 kms? Are you training for an event, or are you more of a social runner? A beginner, or a seasoned veteran?

So, members of the club organise runs throughout the week. There are evening runs on Monday (trail; a social road run), Tuesday (track), Wednesday (main club night, a programme of different sessions run in five ability-graded packs; a steady pace 5 mile alternative), and Fridays (road); fitness training on Thursdays (Pilates; strength and conditioning); and morning runs on Sundays (one gentle and accessible for beginners; one longer).

I prioritise the Wednesday night sessions over other commitments (Ash Wednesday aside), and, currently, aim to get to the Monday and Friday night runs as often as I can.

Over the past eight years, I have run with C pack, stepped up to hang off the back of B pack, been a regular leader of D pack, and run with D without leading. My fitness levels have gone up and down. Injuries, just needing to step back at times, and other life circumstances all have their impact. I’m working to get back to running with C and leading D.

It is a community I love.

Sometimes people ask, why do runners feel the need to talk about their running all the time? And the answer is in what I wrote above: that it took two years of regular encouragement before I took the plunge. I know for a fact that my running and volunteering has encouraged other people to take up running and/or volunteering. Several of them have gone on to do things I have never done (marathons, for example) which delights me.

This weekend also marks fifteen years since I became an Anglican priest. Perhaps if we invited more people, more often, to join our churches, they might come, eventually, when they are ready, when they feel they can’t hold out any longer. Perhaps if we made sure they were accompanied in their ‘running the race,’ as saint Paul described life, they might commit.