Monday 22 February 2010

18 km and now I'm a cripple

Woke up Sunday morning and it was a typical dreary day in London. My running buddy had to back out last minute, leaving me to run the long 18 km route all by my lonesome self.

At 2 km I encountered Buckingham Palace and the thongs of tourists who had gathered there to watch the changing of the guards. Note to self - do not attempt to jog through Buckingham Palace during the changing of guards because

a) if you happen to accidentally run into a picture as the tourist is taking a photo, they might actually chase after you shouting profanities, luckily it tends to be in another language

b) baby strollers are lethal and you can't 'accidentally' kick them because that just makes you a bad person

c) if you happen to stray off the sidewalk and run onto the street, a policeman on horseback will shout at you, and if you happen to ignore them because your ipod is too loud, they might get a little angry (oops.) Another note to self, pissing off a policeman on horseback, never a good idea...

At 5 km, I was in Hyde Park, ready to keel over....

10 km and I was back running down The Mall and trying to avoid all the horse crap on the street left by aforementioned police officers

14 km and I'm running along the Thames and it's flipping hailing on me.

At 15 km the hail has thankfully stopped and the sun is peeking through the clouds. Unfortunately an earlier rain shower had left lots of wonderful puddles for me to splash through, am now thoroughly soaked.

17 km and I'm close to the end and decide to pick up the pace

17.2 km, I decide that picking up the pace is a horrible idea

17.5 km I think to myself, seriously, if this were the half, I'd still have another 20 minutes of running - that blows

Wheezing and limping, i make it to my 18 km mark, then somehow made it to my flat where I pretty well spent the next few hours lying on my flatmate's futon watching episodes of 'The Good Wife'

I should probably stretch or something next time.

Oh, and standing for 3 hours waiting for and watching the men's hockey team get their asses kicked by the US probably didn't help

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