Following my last disastrous aborted run, I couldn’t shake the feeling of a job half finished. My ankle hurt and I was demoralised but I wanted to prove I wasn’t getting worse.

After trying to rest it and be all sensible for a day or so, my frustration got the better of me and I went to the local running shop. I got the nice lady there to check the way I stood, and the way I bend my legs and so on and she announced I needed a ‘neutral’ running shoe, whatever that might mean.

Actually, I’d been experimenting the night before with a home waxing kit. As with so many things, my interest had flagged halfway through so I had one smooth leg and one resembling the bottom half of a monkey suit. The nice shoe lady was kind enough not to mention it, even as she ran a hand down both calve muscles, feeling how my legs bend and so on (I’m assured that this reflects a normal fitting for proper running shoes, and not some form of sexual assault).

I tried on several pairs and some specialised running socks (who knew?). They all have exciting names like ‘Super Nova’ and ‘Shock Masters’. I dutifully put on each pair and had a little run around the shop with no clue what I was feeling for. My ankle problem doesn’t start until I’ve been running for about a mile so 20 seconds round a shoe rack really was not representative of a 3 mile torture trail. I plumped for the ones that felt the most squashy around the heel.

Armed with new shoes, the feeling of having not finished my last run became unbearable and I skipped out to the gym (this is not true, of course. I sort of slumped to it, regarded it suspiciously, but went in anyway). I set the treadmill to the slowest setting that could possibly be called ‘running’, and put a nice audio book on my ipod. I decided that I would try to do 3 minutes running and one walking for perhaps half an hour then a nice shower and off home.

Only, well, it felt quite manageable and by the time I got to three minutes running, it was clear I didn’t need to walk yet. I carried on, curious about how long I could run for.

Fify minutes. Five zero real life minutes. I did over 5ks without stopping
With
Out
Stopping.

Other people came and went on the treadmills around me. The nice lady in my ears read me a story and I gazed, mesmerised, at the shadowy reflection of my feet in the dark window in front of me. It was quite hard, my ankle was quite sore but I did it.

And (don’t tell anyone) I enjoyed it. I grinned as I ran, as it became clear I was going to make it the whole 5ks. I was so, so pleased with myself.

Three weeks ago I couldn’t run for 2 minuites, now I can do it for 50.
I don’t even care that it worked out at a 14 minute mile. So what – I did it.