"There is an expression among even the most advanced runners that getting your shoes on is the hardest part of any workout." Dixit Kathrine Switzer, the first female marathon runner. Never has a truer word been said. Yesterday evening, I HAD to get out for a run. I could feel it in my bones and in my soul. My body and mind were screaming to blow away the cobwebs after 36 hours of dreadful weather, cooped up inside with kids and hubby as the rain fell, thunder clashed and wind howled. The sun had finally poked its head out from behind the clouds, and my trainers were cooing gently at me from their pen in the entrance hall.
Except Gary the Gremlin had other plans. Gary the Gremlin lives at the back of my mind. He is short and tubby, with a pasty white, hairy pot belly that flops over the top of his grainy white Y-fronts. He spends most of his time griping about how little time I give him to watch TV, and tortures me with images of my cat buried under the earth in my neighbour's garden. He pushes me to pass up on my running, then whispers in my ear that I'm a loser cos I didn't go. Gary would vote Trump if he could. Because Gary is a gremlin.
Last night he was in fine fettle, and suggested that instead of going out for a run we should just swivel on my swivel chair (his favourite game) and do some passive online running instead. Gary scratched his bits and wriggled out of his armchair onto the floor.
"C'mon", he said, fishing his Y-fronts out of his bum. "Let's grab a glass of rosé from the fridge and check out how poppypug is getting on with her training. I bet that will be just as fulfilling and exhausting as going out to do a few K's ourselves. That girl is awesome, not like you."
I argued that afterwards I wouldn't be able to sleep because I'd feel guilty. Gary rolled his eyes. "You have a chest infection, and the local countryside is so full of water that I bet there are sharks swimming through the vineyards. And you are running a 10k with Kiddo on Sunday, and you know that kiddo is a lean, mean, running machine and he's going to get under the 45 minute mark this time, and you will be in the last pen, and everyone else will be budding Mo Farahs, and your bum looks awful in lycra, and your hair isn't long enough for a swooshing ponytail, and you'll only stop to hold someone's hand again anyway, and you're going to come in last swearing in English with a face redder than than your t-shirt, and the French don't hand out medals and goody bags, and this is a rubbish and pointless conversation so let's just go and get that glass of wine and some Pringles and check out how awesome Poppypug is instead".
At which point Mfam tied the little bugger to the swivel chair, put on her kit and her trainers, and set off to prove him wrong. Parts of my favourite circuit were under water, including along the tiny stream that I usually jump over to avoid little kids on bikes with training wheels hell-bent on running me over and grumpy little old ladies with slipper dogs on horrid extendable leads. I'd have needed a kayak to do that part of the run yesterday as the tiny stream had morphed into a full sized river (see pic), so I decided to opt for a short and simple 5K 'out and back' trip.
But when I got to the point where I should have turned back, I decided to push on. And on. And on. And boy, was it good. When I got to the next town I turned around and came back. Result: 10.15 k in 1h 6 minutes. Sod Gary, I'm ready for tomorrow. Last pen or not. Gary isn't talking to me any more, and the 5k comfort zone is now part of the past. Now it's time to get my 10 k PB below 1h (current PB 1.02.19) then up the mileage. Bring it on. Nice tag, there... I seem to have got myself a reputation.
Nope, no news of Murphy... I still haven't been able to check out that pile of dirt. 
New and improved Gary required..
5K - and a ‘Negative Splits’ Gremlin! 😈
First ever 10K for the expert Gremlin Basher! 
The Fall of 'Stripe' the Gremlin and a Steady 4K
