Murray blogged about his preparation for 2011 Comrades on Runner's World.It was his first and like this year's run also UP. Truly inspirational! We will be posting his blog entries as part of our build up to Comrades 2013.Running Crazy, Rain Running and Silliness
JANUARY 31, 2011
It’s 4:30am on a Saturday when my screeching, Blackberry arrests my fitful slumber. I have to tiptoe around my drunk, prostrate roommate who has ensconced herself in the lounge (at least one of us is a normal twenty-something). I am on my way to my first run in five days after being on a battery of antibiotics.
At the Virgin Active, my club’s usual start point, runners emerge across my eye line, huddled like fluorescent mussels bunching closer together, shielding each other from the looming tarmac. And then I realise: this isn’t my club. I’ve obviously been left off the group sms, so I turn around and promptly leave. I am not a quivering introvert, but I prefer to run with people I know, or else run solo.
Running to me is a sport that is private, but at least if you run with your club, you can share a few words, a nod, a slight grimace or smile of encouragement with your comrades.
So off I set on my own for a hit of LSD. For the non-runners: no, I was not running while chasing purple Chinese dragons that think they are Russian tennis stars. I was off on a long, slow, distance run.
Ambling off onto my usual route, the tar guillotines itself through green obnoxious swaying banks of smug sugar cane. I continued on step after step, grateful for the flanking avenue of blooming koraalbooms that accompany me on my run into the countryside.
The only company or visible signs of life on the road were the odd hitchhiker, farmers and laborers on their rounds, an abandoned car and phalanxes of whirring cyclists. Even the prostitutes aren’t up that usually favour this section of road. When the run comes to an end after 23 kilometres, I feel good.
If only I had stopped here for the weekend but no I ran an hour and half the next day in the pouring rain with a buddy this time.
In answering one of my Runner’s World facebook questions: yes, I do run in the rain and it’s awesome. Except for the week after the run. After my past two weekends of rain running and new mileage targets, I ended up with a recurring throat infection. This might be coincidence or just overdoing the training. And no, it’s not man flu. It’s been frustrating, especially when I was keen on the Johnson crane. I have subsequently bought more vitamin C, B and every other letter, but stopped at the luminous pink juju salt crystals.
I am positive that there are many other cooped up, miserable runners in the same predicament. What do you do? Do you take an enforced rest or sneak out the backdoor for a quick run? Do you finish your antibiotics? Guzzle Berocca by the bucket load? I did rest, and I did I finish my antibiotics but as I soon I could, I pulled a schoolboy error. Too hard, too far and I was not quite ready – but damn, I still smile remembering the past two rain runs.
Maybe, it’s simply the elemental joy of running in the rain, knowing that you are being naughty. Seeing clouds stall and dither, spit and move, watching sunlight die and live and trying to outpace the rain as which seems as you’re setting effortless personal bests.
It’s Friday morning and my last run was on Sunday. I am itching to run but I am a little gun shy. Should, I lace up my up my takkies this morning, and head out for a quick forty minutes. I’ll decide later this afternoon and go fight the road. Then, I will see should I run the Johnson Crane this weekend. A road trip to see friends and squeeze in a photo-shoot on the Monday saddled with a sneaky marathon to gauge my fitness.
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