Gary the Gremlin pulled out his pompoms and started to gyrate across his living room, belly hanging over his Y-fronts as he crowed, 'Thank you, Albal! No running today!'
Kiddo and I were staring glumly at Albal, our aluminium foil-coloured car, as she wheezed and refused to roar into life. We were an hour's drive away from our first trail event, and unlike Albal and Gary, we were raring to go.
Our lovely 89-year-old neighbour came out, and dug through the piles of junk in his garden before solemnly handing over a car battery and jump leads to me. "It's new," he said. "You should be able to start the car with that".
It did! I leapt with joy and kissed Yves noisily on both cheeks, then we all jumped into the car and set off for Caveirac. Caveirac is not far from Nimes, and has a very classy castle, whence ( or "from where", if you prefer) the 1061 nutters in trainers were to set off in hot pursuit of enlightenment, runner's highs and PBs.
Kiddo was looking forward to the event - he trains on hilly, difficult terrain so this was going to be right up his street. In my case, I would be happy just to finish the 10.2 km race - even if it meant coming in last - without going arse over tit or having to walk. I had signed up in a frenzy of enthusiasm and self-confidence, then Gary the Gremlin had silently pointed at the altitude graph, made a motion of slitting his throat with his TV remote, and bitten triumphantly into a doughnut. He was right: there was 7km of climbing 110m up a hill on gravelly, unstable tracks, then 3k back down. My fall last week had done nothing to reassure me. And the very cold temperatures while we were waiting were not any help, either.
Once we were off, everything felt better. Kiddo disappeared in a puff of teenaged testosterone, and left me to my own devices. The climb was very long, and a lot of people were doing a walk/run to make their way up to the top. Apparently the views along the way were fabulous, but I was too busy keeping an eye on where I put my feet and on other runners who pulled out to overtake without looking behind them first to see much of it. While I'm on the subject, the lady who was running with her hands on her hips was a right pain in the bum.
Gary buckled his seat belt and got his sick bucket ready when we settled into a good pace around km 4, and we made it to the finishing line without a hitch. Unfortunately I didn't have my Garmin with me (in all the panic, it was forgotten on the kitchen table), but I loved the run.
Kiddo finished in 50 mins 50 seconds, and I bowled over the finishing line at 1h 11mins and 37 seconds - the last runner came in at 1h31 mins, and I bet she was as proud of herself as I was.
Lesson learned: get more hills into my training. There was something a little masochistically fun about the challenge. Gary, needless to say, does not approve....
I have no idea, but she was sticking her elbows into everyone's ribs. Then there were the ones who ran in front of their friends, kept turning around to talk to them, and bumping into other people in the process. And the running couples, too. Agggg. 
Eight weeks and 20 training runs to go to the trail marathon
The Rother Valley (er, hills) 10k
First trail race signed up
10K Pomphrey Hill run
