Why I did the Shakespeare half-marathon…
I need to begin by saying I’m not in any sense a runner. Until two weeks ago, the furthest I had willingly run in my life was three miles. I’m fairly sure they tried to make me run further than that when I was at school. But I’m also fairly sure that I walked as much of any cross-country run as I could get away with.
Three weeks ago, while I was recovering from the Birmingham International Fencing Competition, one of the Stratford upon Avon Liberal Democrats emailed me to say “you should definitely do the Shakespeare half-marathon”. At any other time I would have definitely agreed with her, and definitely not done anything about it. But I was already conscious that fencing at the club level was demanding less of me than when I started: as I’ve got better at it, I need less energy to win. At the club level that is. In major national competitions, it’s a different game. It was definitely time to start doing something to push my performance up. (more…)