The Inside Lane

I've got the Winter Olympics on in the background while I tap away on the keyboard. I've always been fascinated by normal people doing super human things. If you've seen cross-country skier Johanes Klaebo in action, you'll know what I mean. There's something slightly unsettling about watching him charge up an 18% incline like a Viking Beserker. Speaking of super human, I was reading about Jasmin Paris recently. I was vaguely aware of her breaking the 268 mile Spine Race ultra marathon record in 2019. I didn't appreciate the enormity of her achievement until I read "Dirtbag Dreams." Paris smashed the previous record by 12 hours. She became the first woman to win the race outright. She did this while expressing milk for her 14-month-old Daughter. Training? 4 am runs in the dark before juggling full-time jobs as a Vet and a Mother. I am in awe. But we all have our own mountains to climb. Mine has been simply to get back to a level of fitness I'm happy...

The weather lately has been depressing. There seems no end to the relentless grey skies and drizzle. This contributed to challenging conditions in the inter-club cross country home fixture on Sunday. The mud was oppressive. Energy sapping. Sections of the course were walked.  I finished around 5 minutes slower than my previous effort on this course. It may have been fatigue from the ski trip, the conditions, current fitness levels, or all of the above. There's a fantastic video from legendary coach Frank Dick. He talks about what it means to be a winner, about being better today than you were yesterday. It captures the essence of our sport beautifully: What it means to be a winner OK, I may have been slower than I was two years ago, but one year ago I was in the trenches with cancer and chemotherapy.  A reminder to be patient, a virtue I have rarely demonstrated in life. I've got the Donfaster 5K coming up in March, the day after my 44th Birthday. As I approach the V45 categor...