FROM SOFA TO START LINE
HOW I LOST 15 STONE & STARTED RUNNING MARATHONS
by
Mike Hare

www.tismenterprises.com
THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN
ENTERPRISES LTD
PUBLISHED BY TISM ENTERPRISES LIMITED
33 Admiral House, Viersen Platz, Peterborough PEI IES
www.tismenterprises.com

TISiVT and 'The Incredible Shrinking Man' are registered trademarks. All rights are
reserved. No use or reproduction in any format without prior written permission.

Copyright © Mike Hare 2009

Mike Hare has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs
and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

ISBN 978-0-9562479-0-2

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or
otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the
publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than
that in which it is published and without a similar condition, including
this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

The publishers have made every effort to contact those persons having rights in any
of the photographs reproduced here. Where this has not been possible, the publishers
will be pleased to hear from anyone who recognises their work, and will make
every endeavour to provide credits in subsequent editions.

Design by Julia Lloyd
Printed in Great Britain by the MPG Books Group, Bodmin and King's Lynn

To Gayle, Rosalind, Natalie and Veronica

(Number One, Number Two, Number Three and Number Four),
all together a unique demonstration of the diversity of perfection.
Mixed Sources
Product group from well-managed
forests, controlled sources and
recycled wood or fiber
s> 1996 Forest Stewardship Council

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I PARTICULARLY WANT TO OFFER MY GRATITUDE AND SPECIAL THANKS TO A small number of wonderful people who have collectively provided me
with the inspiration and support to achieve the transition to what I am
today.
Para Handy, who said "Big Jim's using some tablets from his Doc,
why don't you have a word with your doc?"And later said "Oh my
god, it's The Incredible Shrinking Man". Also my best mate, my long
time co-conspirator, my lifebelt in stormy seas, and to whom I have had
to promise that I will never write THAT book!
Doctor Ken Rigg, of the Deepings Health Centre, who said "Yes, I'll
help you, if you seriously want to lose some weight."And later said "I
think it's time you did a run."
Mr Malata, Consultant in Reconstructive Surgery at Addenbrookes
Hospital who said "Yes, we can remove all that loose skin"and later
said "Why don't we do your thighs as well."
Mr Gillespie, Consultant in Reconstructive Surgery at Addenbrookes
Hospital who said "You are OK to start to run again" and later said
"There's nothing more we can do for you. It's remarkable."
Auld Thai Tarn, who said "I'll bring a large jar to the Great North
Run so we've got something to scrape you off the road into."
The Poseur, whose own battle inspired all my fund raising efforts for
The Prostate Cancer Charity. A survivor, a gentleman, a pretty good
driver, and the best kitty holder you could ever hope for!

The Auld Git, who said "I've never been to Athens. Can we come too?"
The Realbuzz bloggers, too numerous to mention by name (and I'm
afraid I might inadvertently miss one or two). My 'running family', who
have freely offered me their support, knowledge, advice and friendship,
and welcomed me into their midst without reservation. They can have
no real concept of just how much they mean to me, and their contribution
to my becoming 'a marathon runner'. I will, however, specially
mention Kitten, Martin H, Runningbee, Laurajehane, Man in the Stand
and Russell Nimbus who all left comments on my first couple of blogs
in March 2007 and with whom I have since run numerous races.
Finally to the Ladies of 'team tism'.
Sue Blake, without whose belief, dedication, knowledge and unwavering
support this book would never have been written.
Leda Sammarco, whose guiding hand and light editorial touch have
kept my ramblings in some sort of order.
Julia Lloyd - last, but by no means least - for having the immense
talent required to actually make this all look good.

FOREWORD

ALTHOUGH IT MIGHT SEEM LIKE THE PATHWAY OF AN ELITE MARATHON runner and a 27.5 stone, highly stressed, inactive businessman have very
little in common, in reality the personal journeys that each of us have
travelled to reach our health and performance summits contain some
remarkable similarities. Mike's journey resonates strongly with me because
it clearly demonstrates his ability and willingness to step outside
of what he'd previously thought possible and take positive action towards
achieving dreams. His qualities of determination, patience, discipline,
hard work and unfaltering commitment are the same as those required to
win medals and compete at the highest levels of world sport. We're both
marathoners and I count Mike as a runner just like me, it's just our quest
to complete 26.2 miles has different meaning, objectives and outcomes.
Mike's journey starts with a car accident, too much time in the office,
way too many extra puddings and ends with his remarkable change in
body shape, a 15 stone weight loss and transition into a 'real authentic
marathon runner'. It is an open, frank and honest account of the challenges
he faces mentally, physically and emotionally as he embarks upon
and completes the Athens Marathon.
Mike's story is a truly inspiring one that strikes right at the heart of a
'can do attitude'. As an athlete physical limits and boundaries simply
don't exist. Mental and physical barriers are there to be cracked, attacked
and overcome. Not in a particularly aggressive or confrontational way
but in a way that brings real personal fulfillment, reward and satisfaction.
This is true regardless of ability, talent or target and Mike demonstrates
the ways in which his own weight loss and marathon running goals represented
a journey for him of Olympic proportions. He provides clear





FROM SOFA TO START LINE
examples of the ways in which he set himself clear and realistic goals
that will have meaning and relativity for many readers.
Real change doesn't take place in a climate of comfort and neither
does personal improvement. In this book Mike regularly steps out of his
comfort zones and shows others how he achieves this. He makes it have
meaning and seem real for others to do the same.
In the Beijing Olympic Games I arrived at the start line in the best
shape of my life. I'd run personal bests all year including a 2.28
marathon clocking earlier in the year at the London Marathon. I felt this
was my time. I confidently led the race for the first 10 miles and waited
for the pace to really kick in. Just before it did my race literally hit a
major stumbling block as I was tripped and hit the Beijing tarmac with
crashing impact. Bruised and battered and with what I later found out
was a fractured rib my game plan changed. It was now about finishing,
getting my head down and hurting my body and my pride and aiming
for completion. Finishing in the Bird's Nest stadium wasn't quite as I'd
imagined but giving up simply wasn't an option. The road to personal
success is rarely smooth and frequently peppered with falls and setbacks.
What matters most is the action you take when you fall and as Mike so
capably demonstrates time and time again getting up, getting going,
keeping going, time and time again brings results.

"I did not die in the car crash. I should, perhaps, have died in the car
crash. If so, this was, currently, a second chance. If I was to be given a
second chance, then for heaven's sake, make better use of it"

I challenge you to read Mike's story of his own Olympic journey and
not believe that you have the potential inside you to accomplish something that you've previously pushed to the back of your mind and thought
ridiculous and out of your reach. Don't wait for a trigger moment or a
second chance to force your hand. Take a personal lead. Find the way
forward that works for you. Hold your head high in pursuit of your
dreams and never, ever give up.

I HAVE WORKED AS A GENERAL PRACTITIONER FOR 23 YEARS. IN THAT TIME I have had the fortune of helping people deal with all manner of life's
challenging problems. A particularly difficult area is in helping people
change their behaviour or lifestyle in order to improve their health.
People find it hard to change their ways. Mike Hare's story is an extraordinary
tale of dedication, hard work and total commitment to
change. He came along following "a shock to the system" and adapted
a new way of living with a zeal seldom seen. His account of the changes
he has made is an open, honest, revealing story of the rollercoaster of
emotions he faced in becoming "The Incredible Shrinking Man". Along
the way he has developed a following, especially from documenting his
progress online. He has helped many along the way and has become a
true inspiration to all.

DR K. S. RIGG



Commonwealth marathon medalist, two times Olympian and British Champion.


ONE MAN DIES EVERY HOUR OF PROSTATE CANCER IN THE UK, WHICH IS something that Mike Hare is more than aware of, after losing three of
his closest friends to the disease.
Mike's commitment to The Prostate Cancer Charity has been outstanding
and it has been incredible to see the personal journey that he
has taken over the years.
He has become one of the Charity's most loyal and vocal supporters,
both by raising awareness of the disease and by generating much needed
funding through his participation in countless events.
Mike's partnership with The Prostate Cancer Charity began in 2007
after he shed an impressive 15 stone to take part in the Great North
Run. Since then, he has not stopped going the extra mile to help the
Charity battle the disease.
All of the team at The Prostate Cancer Charity are hugely grateful for
the amazing support that Mike has shown and wish him every success
with his future activities.
FROM SOFA TO START LINE






JOHN NEATE


Chief Executive
THE
PROSTATE
CANCER CHARITY


CHAPTER ONE

CRASH & BURN

SOMETHING WAKES ME FROM MY BRIEF NAP. THERE ARE STRANGE RED DOTS in front of my eyes.
What are they? Oh, they're brake lights.
BRAKE LIGHTS! "I'll never stop in time.
Go left? No, there are trees and water. Turn right, the road seems clear.
I swerve right and brake.
Shit - it's a bend. Something big is coming straight at me.
CRUNCH. Then, silence.
When I open my eyes this time, there are no red dots, just a grey
foggy haze.
What is it? Oh, it's smoke.
SMOKE! GET OUT! Can't move, can't open the door, can't release
seat belt.
Smoke means fire. Get out.
I CANT.
I swear my feet are getting hotter. Oh no, I've had it here.
My girls! Sorry girls. Oh GOD, what a way to go. GET OUT I
CANT. Oh, ssshhhiittt!
This is going to hurt, really hurt.

it's true what they say. your life does flash before you in those
few seconds before...
I'd arrived at this crunch point following a 50 year journey just going
along with what life threw at me. After school I spent a couple of
decades clambering up corporate ladders and chasing the salary cheque
each month until redundancy at 40 catapulted me into the world of

CRASH & BURN

self-employment. Certainly I had played the game by all the normal
rules. Married young, I spent some time out of the country working in
the Channel Islands, managed to produce four gorgeous daughters, and
had been lucky with the housing market at each move. But by this time
all that mattered was being able to earn enough to keep the house going
and provide for my girls.
Life had sneaked past me in recent years, and the last person on any
list of priorities was me. I ended up running my own business and got
caught up in helping another one to the extent that I would often work
from 9 in the morning till midnight, with breaks in between to pop
home and cater for the family. Having four girls and living in a rural
town meant that taxi driving was often on the agenda as well.
I'd always been a big lad, played as a forward in the school rugby
team, and then briefly for the local rugby club when I left school. I had
never taken much notice of my weight, but for some strange reason I
have always had a memory of being 12 stone 12 lbs sometime during
senior school. I have no recollection of when I was weighed, or why
I was weighed, just this figure of 12:12 stuck in the back of the mind.
For a couple of years after leaving school I had played a bit of sport,
always getting involved in the wrorks team for any local league be it
5-a-side, volleyball, table tennis. You name it; I would make up the
numbers. It was not completely unknown for me to enter fully into the
after match socialising either.
But then I spent some time helping to run a youth club, and the sports
side began to fall away. Along came daughter number one, and with my
other half working shifts at the local hospital I threw myself into the
deep and abiding joys of bringing up the family. Perhaps, now that I start
to reflect on the course that life has taken, it was at this point that I said
goodbye to my sense of self, and drifted without conscious decision into
the surprisingly satisfying role of servitude that is fatherhood.
I've always had a strong belief in doing what I can to help anyone wherever
my skills or experience may be of benefit. It's probably a product
of being brought up in the fifties and sixties in a home where Christian
principles ruled day and night without question. So it came completely
naturally to me to give up anything remotely selfish where the needs of
family were concerned.
Daughter number two came along a short while later, and I took the
chance to upgrade to a better job. By now virtually all participation
in any sporting activities had ceased, but I got the chance to get a bit of
exercise through gardening and occasional DIY. A couple of years later
with my third daughter on the way, I felt it was time to move on from
the insular environment of Guernsey and get back home to England.
In the autumn of 1986 we moved to Hertfordshire, where I had been
offered the chance to become the managing director of a brand new
division being launched by a company based in the area. It was going to
be a fascinating challenge introducing a new product to the national sales
force, but I also had to endure a 60 mile roundtrip on the Al, daily.
The new job involved not only long hours setting up the new division,
establishing the systems, and recruiting the administration staff, but trips
all over the country running seminars and making presentations to the
main company's existing field sales force. At the same time, the girls were
starting off their school lives, and the house and garden needed knocking
into shape. It was around this time that I first became vaguely aware that
my shape was not quite what it used to be and that I no longer looked
good in swimming trunks! I vaguely recall having a crack at a diet, but it
interfered with the ability to do the corporate entertaining things, and
rapidly got left on the shelf. But in your thirties, with a good job, a wife,
three lovely daughters and a nice house you really don't spend time
thinking about what may be waiting for you further down the road.
Three years later another change of job led to a very senior position in
one of the largest and most established insurance companies in London.
Even though this was at the very end of the eighties, the company still
served its senior employees a three course lunch every day, with a drink
from the bar as an aperitif. Not only that, but I was very quickly advised
that it was virtually compulsory to attend, as it was, they told me, "an
important forum for exchanging ideas between different departments
at a senior level". Not one to rock the boat, I did as I was bidden, but
the combination of trying to eat with the family every night was pretty
disastrous, in retrospect.
The company then relocated to Peterborough, so we did too. We
avoided the new houses being built around the new business park, and
bought an old place in an outlying village next to a river. The kids loved it.
Meanwhile I was back to work not finishing until around midnight. I had got to the stage where I
would actually use the car to go to work, even though my office was
only about 300 yards from home. My excuse was that I might need to use
it, and before long our fourth and final daughter was with us. But within
a few short years the company was taken over, and I found myself
redundant as the new owners brought in their own top people and started
to re-shape the company's strategic direction. In fact on reflection, I
believe it was not called redundancy, but outplacement (although I have
personally never understood this particular piece of corporate jargon). My
whole industry was in a state of flux, and I rapidly discovered that while
no one was employing top personnel at that time, lots of the competitors
were keen to take advantage of my experience and I decided to set up
my own company. And this is where it all started to go pear-shaped
(quite literally, as far as my body was concerned!).
I had four daughters, the oldest rapidly approaching university, a
massive mortgage and a wife who felt that spending money, at the same
rate as when I was on a corporate salary and expenses, was a God-given
right. When I wasn't spending time ferrying my girls around I felt that
I had to be working or I simply wasn't doing my best. I couldn't possibly
take two weeks off for a holiday, what if a client wanted something?
Food became whatever was to hand and quick, or otherwise it was
wasting time. To make matters worse, most of my clients came from
the industry where I had been employed, and still saw me in the same
light as when I was on the inside, so a degree of excessive entertaining,
be it on their budget or mine, was still a basic expectation.
For the last few years, this became a downward spiral. I worked hard
to keep my girls grounded and spent as much time with them as possible.
I had always been the one who read to them at night or helped them
with their homework. If a good meal needed cooking, I cooked it. In fact
my Christmas lunches, complete with handmade stuffing from an old
recipe I was given by my mother-in-law, became a legend in the family.
By now my wife had virtually withdrawn from social events, always
having some excuse not to attend, and was taking less and less interest
in the fundamentals of everyday parenthood.
Without realising it, I had totally lost all focus on me. I had not
weighed myself for years, probably for fear of what I might find out,
and as long as I didn't know the details, I wouldn't have to deal with it
directly. I fell into a routine of getting the girls off to school, going to
work, popping home for dinner around half past six and then going
shoot off somewhere quickly and it would save time if the car was
handy, plus it wasn't a good idea to be walking home through the town
centre late at night.
This all led to a tendency to fall asleep during the day, which wasn't
so bad if it was just me at my desk. However, when it happened, a couple
of times, during staff meetings, the excuse that I was just zoning out to
think an idea through, rapidly wore a bit thin. It is still something of a
standing joke at my local Rotary Club that I could be virtually guaranteed
to doze off during a meal, especially if a glass of red wine was involved.
But at least it was just a bit of fun, they all knew me for the way I had
brought my daughters up, and the efforts I put into my company. They
also knew that if an extra pair of hands was needed, I was your man.
It was that old ethic of always helping out whenever I could. I knew, of
course, that I would only ever doze off in comfortable surroundings. I
was absolutely secure in the belief that I would never, ever doze off in
dangerous circumstances, like driving a car. Oh GOD!! I'm going to burn.
My feet are hot.
What's all that smoke billowing up out of the dashboard? Then a face appeared at the car window.
"Tell my daughters I love "
I was brutally interrupted,
"SHUT UP. That's NOT smoke. It's the gasses escaping from the
airbag as it deflates out of the way. You're NOT on fire. Everything will
be fine and the ambulance is on its way. Sit tight."
My feelings of terror started to recede, but I was a gibbering wreck,
begging to be released from the crushed metal.
"We can't get you out, so the fire brigade is coming to extract you."
Eventually, as I heard the distant sirens, some semblance of reason
gained a foothold and I asked
"What about the other vehicle?"
"It's fine. No one was hurt, they're very strong vans - yours is a mess
though."
You should see my underwear I thought, but bit my lip.
Blue lights appeared, quite a few of them in the end. Three types of
uniform, all buzzing round at once. I will freely admit that there are
times when I enjoy being the centre of attention, but not on this occasion.
The police sorted out the traffic, the ambulance men waited around,
while the firemen seemed to quite enjoy cutting up the remains of the
car with some amazing power tools. Finally there was a gaping hole,
where there used to be a car door. The two burly medics worked their
way over my various moving parts, and were incredulous that nothing
appeared to be broken. I carefully extracted myself, and slowly stood
upright. Feeling extraordinarily good to be alive and out of what I had
thought was my death trap, my mood was instantly deflated by the
nearest ambulance man saying quite firmly
"You will have to get into the ambulance by yourself, you're too
heavy for us to lift!"
What a great way to make friends and influence people. I didn't forget
that remark in a hurry.
I did manage to get into the ambulance, with much support and by
being shoved up the steps and was feeling pretty knocked about as I finally
lay down on the trolley and we took off for the hospital. Casualty was
not much better, with some initial caustic remarks on my size, but they
went about checking me over in a thoroughly pleasant and professional
manner. It appeared that I didn't need to be admitted and they sent me
home with a large supply of pain killers.
By now I was as stiff as a board and so battered and bruised that I
couldn't really tell where the pain was actually coming from. I could
stand up and walk after a fashion though, and was acutely aware that
I was probably the luckiest guy alive at that moment.
Arrival home was accompanied by an excess of feminine fussing (quite
pleasant under different circumstances I've no doubt) and brewing of
coffee. I finally persuaded them that all I needed at this time in the small
hours of the morning was a lie down and some rest. I then discovered
that our narrow staircase was out of the question in my condition.
Seconds later quilts and pillows appeared to make up a temporary resting
place on the large leather sofa. At this point, I discovered that it was
acutely painful to even try to lie down, and that the only way to get
remotely close to comfortable was to sit in an armchair with a quilt
draped over me. And so I settled down for the first of very many nights
in that armchair, and began the long, slow process of understanding
American football, baseball and the myriad of strange and wonderful
things that constitute all-night television.
I sat in that armchair, ironically almost unable to doze off, now that
I really wanted to and watched the impressive bruises start to appear in
an outline of the seatbelt. The lump, that would eventually grow to the
size of a tennis ball just above my heart, was making its first tentative
growth spurts and a stiffness that would impair my movement for days
was setting like concrete across my body. Underneath all that something
else had begun to take shape, deep within my subconscious. It would
take weeks to be recognised and accepted, but it was there, a subtle
invasive force intent on setting up home in my mind.
The project had germinated, and was starting to take root.


CHAPTER TWO

THE STORY SO FAR

IT WAS A BEAUTIFUL AUGUST MORNING IN 1991, AND I WAS HEADING TO The Oval for my very first Test Match against the West Indies. Armed
with my corporate invitation (courtesy of a new supplier and typical of
those heady days in the City), I was heading for the main pavilion in
ample time for the champagne breakfast before the start of play. The
Order of the Day in my pocket detailed the breakfast, lunch (with many
courses), high-tea, post-play early supper and waiter service for drinks,
whilst watching play on the pavilion terrace. This was going to be such
a good day. I approached the entrance with eager anticipation, walked
up to the turnstiles, handed over my ticket, had the stub removed and
was about to go through.
"Excuse me, my good fellow. This turnstile is clearly designed only
for small children. Where do adults gain access?"
"What're you talking 'bout, mate?"
"This turnstile is too small for a normal adult. This is ridiculous.
Kindly arrange to let me through."
"Everyone else gets through OK. Get on with it and stop messing
about."
"Don't adopt that tone with me. This turnstile is too small. Show me
where I can gain access to the ground."
"Come on, get out of there. Here's your ticket back. Go down the
end there to the gate."
In high dudgeon now, I grab the ticket and storm down towards
the indicated gate at the end of the row of turnstiles. This is completely
intolerable, how do they expect to get away with treating people in this
way! The man on the gate, innocently going about his duties in the time
honoured fashion, received the full blast of my anger.
"You there. Come and open this gate."
"Err - wha'd'you want?"
"I require to be given access immediately. Your turnstiles were clearly
and thoughtlessly designed for children only, so get this gate open and
let me in."
"Where's yer ticket?"
As I went through the ticket presentation process, the opening of the
gate and final access to the ground, I gave this poor chap the full run
down on how it was so totally inconsiderate of the world at large not
to cater for normal, ordinary people like me.
The arrogance that gave rise to this outburst was fuelled by the culture
of working in the City. When a lad brought up in a council house in
Hampshire finds himself in a position where moving about London
between meetings is not accomplished by tube or taxi, but by calling
downstairs for one of the Jaguars and chauffeurs at his disposal night
and day; where a PR lunch with a journalist can be taken in one of the
private dining rooms, preceded with a discussion with the catering manager
as to the menu accompanied by a selection from the corporate wine
cellar; where test matches, the rugby at Twickenham, the Proms, the
opera at Glyndebourne, front row seats for the British Open snooker
final suddenly becomes the stuff of everyday life, it is dangerously easy
to start to think way above your station. I was long gone from the City
by the time the bonus culture took over, but I can look back and readily
understand how this heady atmosphere, totally removed from the everyday
lives of ordinary hardworking folk, has got so out of hand on such
a global scale.
If, by some strange quirk of fortune, that fellow on the gate at The
Oval that day should ever come to read this, I would now like to offer
my abject apologies. But this is one of the defence mechanisms of the
obese. It is far easier to blame the world at large for being ill-equipped
to service the larger members of the population, than ever to admit that
it might possibly be our own fault.
For the next few years, the situation got worse and I was in denial to
the point where I became able to completely ignore my condition, and the
potential consequences. Redundancy in the early nineties came as a total
shock, the result of a hostile take-over of the company and the replacement
of a number of senior personnel by the new owner's own team.
So I found myself just turning 40, with four lovely daughters, a massive
mortgage and no job. Not the sort of situation where you can find the
time to worry about yourself. Every waking moment was spent worrying
about keeping the house and how to feed and clothe the family. The after
effects of the stock market crash of 1987 were still being felt in my section
of the financial community - mutual funds - and it proved absolutely
impossible to find another job anywhere. There simply weren't any.
Luckily a number of companies I knew found that they had a need for
some of my skills in this field and so I decided to form my own company
and got back on the merry-go-round.
Whilst this meant that at least the mortgage and the financial needs
of the family were again being catered for, curiously something which
they were able to take entirely for granted, it did nothing to reduce the
stress on me. In retrospect it multiplied. My working hours crept up
and up, fuelled by the ever present fear that if I didn't do everything
humanly possible to look after my client companies, then they could
easily take their business elsewhere. That fear eventually became almost
paranoia that a single missed phone call could easily prompt a client
to try to find their answers elsewhere. At the heart of this was a basic
insecurity and lack of confidence in my own skills. I could never bridge
the gap between this paranoia, and the simple fact that I had twenty of
the largest companies in their field, household names across the country,
paying very good fees for access to me. Anyone who has been self
employed (in a one-man band), with immensely powerful clients, who
are the dominant partners in the business relationship, will understand
how I felt being in that situation for the first time.
At this point the personal computer came along, and although I
started to use one fairly quickly, I found it was a two-edged sword. It
may seem strange now, in a world totally dominated, in every way, by
the computer and the internet, to think that in the early nineties I set the
company up and commenced operating in the highly advanced world of
the personal investment industry, without a computer. When I think
back to my first job working at a tiny country branch of Lloyds Bank,
we tallied the tills in Pounds, Shillings and Pence each day on adding
machines. Enter was achieved by cranking down the handle on the side
of the machine; Save meant keeping the little printed roll of paper that
churned out of the top of the machine.
Reflecting now, I have certainly lived through interesting times.
The computer enabled me to become even more self-sufficient. I no
longer had to use the bureau facilities in my serviced office building,
but was able to type my own documents, do my own invoices and I
soon learnt how to use spreadsheets. On the face of it, this was a good
thing in every respect, and I kept abreast of the advances as this new
phenomenon moved from DOS to the brilliant Windows environment.
But as time went on, I found that this good thing was actually a wolf
in sheep's clothing, a Trojan Horse bearing a multitude of gifts from
Greeks. This new found ability to operate independently from any form
of assistance from support agencies gradually sucked me further into
the quicksand of total isolation, and reinforced the need to be constantly
available without a break. By now I had started to build up a base of
clients in Edinburgh too, and this meant almost monthly trips up to that
beautiful city, almost the exact opposite, in style and grace, of London.
But day trips were impossible, meaning two or three days away from
my desk. This led to a huge amount of debate with myself, ending in the
decision to move out from the serviced offices I had inhabited since going
it alone, and setting up in my own office, with a personal assistant. The
finances made sense, as it was considerably cheaper to rent directly,
rather than through a serviced office set-up. The place I found was much
closer to home, but this also had a big downside as it was suddenly much
easier to pop back to the office for a short while after dinner. This became
a habit as I constantly tried to provide the best I could for the family.
This had now become the general state of play; the canvass on which
my life was being painted. I had sunk into a self-induced state of high
stress where the only thing that didn't matter was me. Yet if only I had
glanced in the mirror I would have seen that the one thing I should have
been taking the most care of was actually me. The future of everything
I had created depended upon my well-being, but in those circumstances
it becomes impossible to see the wood for the trees.
I had always been fond of my food, and my mother had made sure
that I could cook from quite an early age. I developed my skills further
through a series of weekend and evening jobs, during the latter stages
of my school years, as a waiter in a high class restaurant. Years where
I quickly picked up the skills needed to flambe steaks at the table, create
Crepes Suzette before the discerning diners' gaze, and fillet and serve a
Dover sole with a fork and spoon in one hand while holding the silver
dish with the other hand. This transformed itself over the years to becoming
the cook at home, and to passing on most of the skills to most
of my girls. Unfortunately, my wife had chosen over the years to use
her time for other tasks, and had slowly reduced her involvement in this
side of domesticity. Now that I had so little time to devote to this side of
things, the quality of my eating habits evaporated almost without trace.
Ten years previously, not long after returning to England in the late
eighties, I had actually taken a look at myself, and decided to take
action and lose some weight. The favourite diet of the day had been the
Cambridge Diet, and I had gone for it in full style. I can even remember
attending a corporate function in London, and sitting down with a
large number of colleagues for a fine lunch. While they tucked in, as
usual, I actually sat with them and ate a meal bar instead, such was the
initial commitment. Ultimately, (in my opinion) a 'radical diet' of this
type is simply not sustainable, and can never be a substitute for basic,
healthy eating. Sadly I could no sooner face a lifetime of solely eating
meal replacement bars and drinking meal replacement shakes than I
could fly to the moon. Eventually you have to stop (and I did) and the
effect on the body is dramatic as it reverts to its initial weight with such
a strong bounce that it inevitably ends up worse than when you started.
This little episode was soon forgotten, and perhaps left a small negative
attitude toward the effects of dieting in my subconscious. Circumstances
took over, and it's only really now that I have even recalled the attempt.
But it was interesting to come across some research recently that perhaps
goes some way to explaining this bounce phenomenon:

Over millions of years of evolution, the human body learnt to adapt to its
environment. In order to survive, it had to learn to store energy to cope
with lean periods like winter, so it developed a simple system. It learnt that
after every period with plenty of food (summer) there came a period with
very little food (winter). Over time the body developed special cells so that
when there was plenty of food it would automatically store as much energy
as it could in these 'fat cells', because winter must be coming.
Nowadays we find ourselves in a world where (at least in the developed
half) food is relatively plentiful. But evolution is such a slow process that the
body has not yet caught up and is constantly expecting that a food winter
is about to follow. So it is always trying to store as much as possible in the
fat cells, but never getting the lean periods to use it up.
When we go on a 'diet', we effectively give the body the chance to use up
this stored fat, by making it think it is in the food winter for which that fat
has been stored. However, when the fat cells release their stored energy, they
do not cease to exist, but simply sit there waiting until they can be filled
again. If we come off the diet, and return to a food summer, the body reacts
by not only starting to refill these waiting fat cells, but it tries to increase its
efficiency for storage by creating a few more fat cells. Therefore the net
result, in the end, is to have used the 'diet period' to actually end up with a
greater capacity to store fat.

By the late nineties then, I had lost all sense of proper eating, but
without having realised it. It was not something that occurred overnight,
but it had crept up on me since becoming self-employed. I had started
this period pretty heavy anyway, but that is no excuse either. It became
more difficult to find clothes to fit, and I became quite adept at finding
branches of High and Mighty and catalogues which catered for the fuller
figure, and learnt to cope with a really poor choice of styles and colours.
I reached the stage where I simply couldn't properly fit into a normal
train seat, but put this down to the modern world's inability to cater for
normal, decent people who were a little on the large side. I could actually
fit into the seats with the armrests up to accommodate me, (but with
sympathy for anyone who had to sit in the reduced space next to me),
but it was totally impossible to lower the little table to have a coffee or
read a book. It was relatively easy to overcome this inconvenience simply
travel first class where there was enough room. Since most of
my clients had been paying for first class travel for their top executives
for years, they didn't think twice about paying similar expenses for me.
It took embarrassment to a whole new level when I travelled by
plane. I remember an occasion where I found it virtually impossible to
fasten my seatbelt. The damn thing simply wasn't long enough to meet
in the middle, and I started to sweat wondering if they would have an
extension and if not whether I would be ignominiously asked to leave the
plane. In the end, I managed to heave up my gut far enough to get the
belt done up underneath it, just in the nick of time before the stewardess
reached me on her seatbelt checking round. The simple response to this
problem? Don't fly anywhere. I added airlines to the ever-growing ranks
of what I considered to be anti-social institutions.
In fact by now it was becoming natural to avoid anywhere that had
seats and tables that were fixed, which included most cafe's, bars and
wine bars with booths which I could no longer slide into or anywhere
that only had chairs with arms. The list just grew and grew.
But this was almost insignificant in the final analysis, as a far more
pernicious element came on the scene. Luckily this is now becoming
well researched, and much more widely recognised as the potential killer
that it is - and I speak, of course, of what we now call sleep deprivation
or far more technically sleep apnoea (it's funny how acquiring a clinical
name gives something a whole new air of gravitas).
Self-denial (read totally fooling myself) had now become an art-form.
I first started to notice this problem when I was in the middle of typing
something on the computer in my office. Suddenly fourteen pages of the
letter h would appear in the blink of an eye. Or perhaps, when putting
pen to paper, I might suddenly realise that in a flash of inspiration I had
obviously just acquired the ability to write in some ancient Egyptian
sign language, even though I couldn't read it yet! Around the same time
I am told that my snoring had reached epic proportions, but the layout
of the house and the old stone walls meant that at least the girls could
still get some sleep. Obviously this was just down to the length of time
I was working, and the stress I was under, and it would ease off as soon
as things got a little easier - or so I thought. It was clearly nothing to
worry about and hurt no-one but me.
It could easily be countered by a good supply of coffee, and this
became almost a standing joke as everyone at work or at home, whenever
they made a cuppa wouldn't even ask me but just automatically
make one for me as well. I dread to think now of the amount of coffee
I consumed on a daily basis at this time, but it was certainly more than
15 mugs a day. This meant that I was also consuming around 40 or 50
spoonfuls of white sugar a day! Food by now had to be fast as I preferred
not to spend time eating or cooking, even considering breakfast a waste
of time as I needed to be at the office early in case a client called.
Then the situation progressed to the point where I found myself tuning
out of the conversation during meetings in the office. My ever loyal staff
had the good grace to accept that I was sufficiently confident in their
abilities to handle things, while I backed off to think more strategically,
or mull over the germ of an idea that had occurred to me from the
conversation. What they must have thought in reality I shall hopefully
never have to know. The one thing this did do was to make me a little
more aware of it, and to make sure I really concentrated that bit harder
at external meetings. Strategies were adopted wherever possible - some
of them relatively simple. I would always sleep on the train when going
to client meetings in London or Edinburgh. During meetings I would
always pick the most uncomfortable chair, sit near an open window,
accept a coffee immediately or wear my tie too tightly to ensure the
discomfort kept me awake. All these little tricks put together would get
me through most of the time.
The one thing that I did not realise at the time was that this was a
serious condition, and that no amount of tactics would get me through
unscathed. The sheer weight I was carrying (not that I had the slightest
idea what that actually was) had reached the point where it actually
stopped me breathing during deep sleep, forcing my body to react to save
itself, and therefore waking me up constantly through the night. As a
result I was constantly tired, meaning I fell into the deeper sleep more
readily, which in turn meant that I stopped breathing ever more quickly.
An extremely vicious circle indeed when left unrecognised and untreated.
By far the most tolerant people at this time were the excellent bunch
of guys at my local Rotary Club. I had been invited to join them a couple
of years earlier and the Monday night dinners were the only time I spent
socialising. It became an ill-concealed standing joke that I would, at some
stage, fall asleep during dinner. No amount of tactics could overcome this,
as my defences would be down in such a relaxed and friendly atmosphere,
and I'm also certain that my glass of red wine with dinner did absolutely
nothing to aid the situation. They knew full well that I was working
extreme hours, and that I could be counted on whenever help was needed
on any projects. Strange as it now seems, one of the regular events of
the year was organising The Deepings 10k and Fun Run. One of our
members, Tony, had experience in this field and took responsibility for
setting it up and organising it all. The rest of us turned up on the day and
did as we were bidden while masses of athletic beings came along, ran off
down the road and returned a bit later in various stages of exhaustion.
I recall that my job would usually be something like handing out the
reward mugs (emblazoned with the logo of the main sponsor - another
of our members) to the runners as they crossed the finish line.
Another favourite event was turning over our garden, which included
a nice stretch of the river bank, for the annual summer Sunday afternoon
of jazz, provided by another member who ran his own little jazz
combo. This was the one event of the year that my wife attended,
mainly because she would have had to go out to avoid it, and it was also
a favourite of the girls who would invite their friends who then gained
free entry as our guests.
So there I was, by now massively overweight, but under no circumstances
prepared to admit to it, denying like mad that I was suffering
from sleep deprivation, trying to make a living and keep my home and
family ticking over more or less single-handedly.

My four super daughters were growing up rapidly, and were starting
to fly the nest. Somehow, we can never clearly work out why or when,
it became a standing joke in the family, which then ended up as normal, for me to call the girls Number One, Number Two, Number Three and
Number Four in order of their original arrival. All their friends know
that this is the case, and it has somehow never seemed odd. Number
One was living in Liverpool having gone to university up there, Number
Two was at university on the south coast, Number Three was at the
local college and Number Four was working her way through school
(she is the thespian in the family, happiest on stage in anything from
Shakespeare to Summer Holiday).
In fact, I had just dropped her off at the Tuesday rehearsal on that
fateful night, and had almost reached home, after a very tiring day,
when something awoke me from my brief nap. I could see strange red
dots in front of my eyes.
CHAPTER Three

A SECOND CHANCE

AS THE WEEKS HAD PASSED BY AFTER THE CRASH, AND MY BRUISES HAD
slowly died down, I was still unable to sleep lying down as it remained
too painful. I had moved into what had been the girls' playroom when
they were younger, and also set up my computer in there so that I could
continue to work on some current projects. The long nights in the armchair
dragged by, as a lack of physical activity meant I wasn't too sleepy
at bedtime. The mind had an infinite ability to wander quite randomly,
and luckily for me it appeared to have no need to re-live the short sharp
nightmare of the few moments after the impact. A lump the size of a
tennis ball had developed just above my heart, and I had a curious bone
spur developing on my left hand, but apart from this, some spectacular, but
short-lived, bruising and the inability to lie down, there was remarkably
little else to show for the experience.
But the events of that October night had clearly nudged those subconscious
thoughts from their hiding place and as the weeks went by
they came to the surface. I didn't have any blinding revelations, but
became aware of them gradually. In the run up to Christmas there was
plenty to keep my mind occupied anyway.
Normally, just before Christmas, I would take a trip up to Edinburgh
for the Fuengirola Residents Association Christmas Lunch. Now however
official this sounds, believe me there is absolutely nothing official about
it at all. The FRA is just an extremely diverse collection of old mates
who have been taking a weeks holiday together in Southern Spain each
year for more years than we care to remember. How it all started is
probably lost in the mists of time, but it started with one of the boys,
Para Handy to his friends, buying an apartment out there before it
became the thing to do, and the boys' weeks took place there. He had
acquired the nickname as he had a boat in a marina near the apartment
in Spain, and Para Handy is the fictional Scottish captain of the SS Vital
Spark in the Neil Munro stories about a Clyde steamer. As time moved
on, three of the boys bought places there, and so the Fuengirola Residents
Association was born. Alongside the week in Spain, the annual Christmas
lunch was the one other time we all get together, and it is always held
in Edinburgh as that is where all the boys, except me, live. I had first met
them when Para Handy and I had gone to Spain for a week to play golf
very badly together. My company at the time had employed his Advertising
Agency, and we had got on like the proverbial house on fire so
had decided to get away together for a week. We had realised too late
that the other boys had also arranged to be there at the same time, so
we just went ahead and spread into the next door apartment which Para
Handy's sister had bought. Luckily I had got on with them all really
well, and had, over the years, been assumed into the group as the 'one
permitted Englishman'! I was going to say Honorary Englishman, but
to the boys there is absolutely nothing honourable about being English,
and even to this day I can still have trouble cutting through the accents
on the relatively rare occasions when they may find themselves a little tired and emotional very late at night!
This year, it was going to be impossible to make the trip given the way
I was still feeling, so I made my apologies. A day or so after the lunch,
Para Handy called me to report on the gathering, and let me know how
everyone was. He was very impressed that Big Jim had lost a lot of
weight by taking some tablets prescribed by his doctor, and was looking
exceptionally well on it. Thinking nothing more of it the conversation
moved on, but another piece of information had been filed in those dark
recesses of the mind reserved for storing information, ready to surface
when appropriate.
I called in to see my doctor on two or three occasions between the
accident and New Year, mainly to check that there were no further
effects, but also to check the lumps were OK. An X-ray gave my hand
the all-clear and the tennis ball on my chest began to shrink very slowly.
Apparently it had been caused by a large clot from a small blood vessel
which burst just under the skin from the pressure of the seat belt, and
would break down and disappear in time. Although I had not seen him
for some years, he obviously thought it best to concentrate on getting
the immediate problems sorted out, and so did not broach the subject
of my weight at this stage. I have no doubt that he was simply biding
his time and waiting to pounce when I was least expecting it.
Christmas came and went, and with it the family ritual of spending
time from late afternoon on Christmas Day till the early hours of Boxing
Day playing Monopoly. But not just any Monopoly, Star Wars Monopoly with my Special Edition set. This was now reserved exclusively for
Christmas, as the girls knew full well that it was a capital offence to even
think about touching it at any other time. As the evening progressed,
this would be put carefully away, and we would turn to Texas Hold-em
Poker to finish off the night. This is a long held tradition, to the extent
that if any boyfriend is to be invited for Christmas, they have to endure
training nights if they are not already familiar with the game. They soon
learn that this is one family tradition not to be messed with.
New Year's Eve is never what it ought to be, for me. While everyone else
is happily celebrating, literally, a New Year, I quietly have my birthday,
and lament the fact that I cannot go out for dinner, because every eating
house in the country has a special banquet or set meal at an outrageous
price. So I usually end up going out for lunch, but the simple fact is that
you never get a great lunch anywhere that day, as the good chefs are
either already busy preparing the special gourmet banquets for the
evening, or are off having a quiet lie down before the storm. So on that
lunchtime you are virtually guaranteed to get the apprentices experimenting.
Anyway, the family evenings of the past years had faded away
as the girls grew up and had better things to do on New Year's Eve, so
this year it was a quiet reflective evening at the end of a tough year.
I dozed in front of the same ghastly excuse for entertainment that
fills the TV schedule this night each year. My defences were down and
the thoughts that had been gradually fighting their way up from the
dungeons of my subconscious, decided that now was the time to make
their bid for freedom.
Excuse me... shouldn't you be thinking about making some New
Year Resolutions?
Don't be daft, I've tried that before, and it's the one time you don't
think clearly about the consequences. So failure is a guaranteed result.
This year is going to be different
No it isn't!
Yes it is. This year is going to be very different. You nearly didn't
have this year.
What on earth are you going on about?
You could have died in that car crash. If it HAD caught fire, you
WOULD have died. It should have caught fire. You have no idea why
it didn't.
And so the first seed was sown. The first stirring of the thought
process, which would finally lead to my doing something positive, had
started. The little conversation inside my head went no further that
night, but it had started me thinking more openly about it. Over the
next few days it took shape and finally I knew clearly what it was, and
what it really meant. It might sound just a little trite now, but it was very
real, and it took a firm grip and never let go.
I did not die in the car crash. I should, perhaps, have died in the car
crash. If so, this was, currently, a second chance. If I was to be given a second chance, then for heaven's sake, make better use of it.
Once fully formed, this rapidly became a very strong feeling. It was
hard to grasp at first, but once I realised it was completely futile to conjecture
over why I had been given a second chance, or indeed to wonder who had given it to me, it became imperative to understand exactly
what making better use of it actually meant, in practical everyday terms.
This was not in any sense a Road to Damascus moment, or a Close
Encounter of the Fourth Kind. It was just a straightforward acceptance
that, for whatever reason, and from whatever power, it was a second
chance, and I should make better use of it.
So what should I do? Thinking about this logically, (Spock would
have been proud of me), the first thing to do was to make sure that it
didn't come to a ghastly halt before I had really got it going. Therefore
the first step was to lose weight, so that I wouldn't keep falling asleep
and so have another crash.
Right then, I must go on a diet, that will make a first class (late) New
Year's Resolution.
I'll start today. In fact right now.
Err, excuse me, but if you are going to lose weight, you will need to
know you are losing weight. In order to do that, you need to know
what you weigh now, and then see if it goes down.
Sounds logical. I'll get upstairs and get on the bathroom scales right
now, and find out what I weigh.
There was, however, a little devil hiding in the detail and waiting to
scupper all these good intentions, but I managed to struggle upstairs,
and stand on the bathroom scales. To say that I gave them a nasty turn
is a bit of an understatement. I gave them such a turn that they shot right
round, straight up against the buffers of their maximum of 20 stone.
Oh, not so good, I obviously weigh a little more than 20 stone. No
wonder I've had problems.
What should I do now? It would be no good going on a diet, and
not knowing if it was working. I'll find another way of weighing myself,
and then I'll be able to start the diet. Procrastination is a powerful block
to getting started, especially when it is in partnership with deeply rooted
fears of what might lie beyond the boundaries of my comfort zone. So
I could now perfectly rationalise putting it off till tomorrow - no diet
today, you can't start without a starting point.

MY NEXT STEP WAS TO FIND ANOTHER SET OF SCALES SOMEWHERE THAT
would give me my proper weight. I tried one of the big chemists in the city centre. This would do nicely thank you, as they go up to 25 stone.
So I slotted in my money, boldly stepped on, and felt quite bad really
when they did their version of the nasty turn, and flipped right round
against the stoppers. This really is not good. Why can't someone simply
have a set of scales which an ordinary guy like me can use to weigh
themselves? But by now that line was beginning to pale, as I realised
that if I was actually way over 25 stone, than I had forfeited all right to
think of myself as an ordinary guy. This was unsettling, to put it mildly.
I felt like I was heading out beyond the borders of my self-perception
into completely uncharted territory. Or maybe I should start referring
to it as self-deception?
Within a day or so I had finally found an old fashioned set of scales
in a small independent chemist shop away from the city centre. You
know the type of scales, with the weights that you move along the
swinging arms at the back and able to measure up to 30 stone. Now I
was really scared, what if I was over the top here too, that would be
disastrous. No, not disastrous, more like appalling, or disgraceful maybe
even shameful! Setting that fear aside, I got on and moved the
weights around till it all balanced nicely.

On the 7th January 2005, now aged 51,
I weighed 27.56 stones, or 386 pounds, or 175 kilos.

This was, indeed, shameful, but at last I could start to lose weight.
Now all I had to do was to decide how I was going to lose weight, and
then put it into practice. Now let's not go mad here I told myself. A
simple and straightforward way to get going was just to cut out all the
snacks and nibbles between meals, and cut down a bit on the portions,
second helpings, and extra puddings. Just doing that lot should get
things going, while I think about a proper plan. Not sure whether I
should tell the wife and the girls, they might get a bit funny about it, and
if it doesn't work, I don't want them thinking I'm a failure. I'll just do
what I said, keep a low profile, and nobody will probably notice for a
day or two. I'll just tell them I'm not feeling great, and therefore not that
hungry - that'll put them off the scent for a few days at least.
That night, when I settled down in the armchair, the thoughts would
not let me rest. The brain was fairly buzzing with the realisation of just
how unbelievably overweight I really was and it was now blindingly
obvious that I really did have to do something about it very quickly in
order to make this second chance work for the best.
What was that about losing weight quickly?
I have to get on and do this quickly, and properly, before something
else happens, as a result of this weight.
No, that's not what I meant. Someone else lost weight quickly recently,
someone told us about it. THINK!
Bloody subconscious was developing a mind of its own, and a voice
of its own. Have to crack down on that or I'll start to go mad.
Now what was it going on about?
Got it! Para Handy told me about Big Jim at the Christmas lunch,
he'd lost a lot of weight quickly - something about tablets from his
doctor. I must phone Para Handy in the morning.
I made a phone call to Para Handy, and then the doctor to get an
appointment. A day or so later I walked into Dr Ken's room, sat down
and took a deep breath "Hi
Doc, I've decided I need to lose a lot of weight. A friend of mine in
Scotland has been prescribed something called Xenical by his doctor, and
he's lost a fair bit of weight. Is this something I could have to help me?"
From that precise moment onwards, he was terrific. He never pushed
me, never judged me, but just quietly supported me all the way. He
began by telling me that he was really glad I had taken the decision,
because if I hadn't he would have had to start trying to persuade me to
lose weight. He thought I would stand a better chance if it had been my
own decision, and if I had now properly decided, then he would indeed
prescribe the Xenical for me. First, though, he warned me about the side
effects, which Big Jim and Para Handy had kept quiet about! The tablets
would work, in simple terms, by blocking my gut from absorbing a lot
of the fat in my food, and that this might cause a sort of diarrhoea from
time to time. If I suffered any other adverse reactions, I was to stop
taking them and go back to see him. In the meantime, I was to come
back and see him in one month to check on how things were going, and
make sure I was still OK not only with the tablets, but with the after
effects of the accident. Armed with my prescription I popped into the
chemist next door. In no time at all I was heading home to take the first
of many of the blue pills.
It was also now the right time to tell the family, and seek at least some
semblance of support. I did detect, I thought, a rather healthy scepticism,
but at least there was an underlying promise of all the support I wanted,
if I actually stuck to it myself. I told them about the pills, and as far as
they were concerned, if Dr Ken prescribed them, then they must be OK.
To begin with, the pills worked their way up to full effectiveness
gently. The first day or so, it was mildly inconvenient to have to make
haste to the toilet now and again, but not unworkable, not something
to worry unduly about, and certainly not enough to put me off taking
the tablets. However, once they built themselves up to full strength, they
were capable of testing the patience of a saint.

At this time, I was now working full time from home, and I'm really
not sure how I might have coped if I had been taking these tablets and
trying to work normally in an office. I'm assured that not everyone has
exactly the same reaction to them, but it seems that, perhaps because of
my extreme obesity, I was naturally selected for the full side effects. I'm
not going to beat about the bush here, but explain things as they were,
(but try to keep it gentle by going for the black and white' version,
rather than the high-definition, wide screen, full glorious technicolor
intimate details...).
Let's just back track a little, to the bit about blocking my gut from
absorbing a lot of the fat in my food. To cut a long story short, and believe
me, at that time, many things got cut short. If the fat wasn't absorbed
in my gut, then it had to go somewhere, but being fat, it didn't stick to
the normal rules, and made its slippery exit just exactly when it felt like
it. Also, being essentially, by its very nature, fat (i.e. greasy and slippery),
it was problematic to try to stop it from making its exit at whatever
pace it chose on each occasion. I made a mental note to ask the doctor
when I next saw him whether he could add extra underwear supplies to
the prescription, but luckily it escaped my mind again before I could
get into trouble repeating it. At this stage, it would have been the simplest,
and probably the most understandable, reaction to stop taking the
tablets and seek alternative solutions. But I managed to survive for a
couple of weeks and then weigh myself again, and was so impressed
with my success that I decided to stick with it a while longer. I had managed
to stay with my decision to cut out all snacks between meals and
during the evening, reduce the size of my meal portions, and stop having
seconds, so I was still uncertain as to what to put the weight reduction
down to - eating habits or tablets. I just knew that I would continue
with both for now, but keep an eye on progress.
When I went back to see Dr Ken in early February, I was down to
25.7 stone, a loss of nearly 2 stone in the first few weeks. Now I know
that this sounds spectacular, but when you look closely at it, it really
wasn't that wonderful. Given the astronomic weight levels that I started
this with, even losing a small percentage represents quite a large actual
weight. However, it is only really similar to losing a few pounds from a
12 stone body, and I had the distinct benefit of the extra boost you get
when the tablets first go to work. Nonetheless, it was still a great result,
psychologically and more than enough to keep me on track, keep me
taking the tablets, (and keep me buying the washing powder).
At that second session, he checked my weight, blood pressure and pulse
rate, and being satisfied with the findings he duly prescribed another
month's supply without hesitation. At this point I asked him for how long
he could continue prescribing the tablets, and the answer was basically
that he could do so for a very long time, as long as he was sure they were
still working for me. This seemed fine, so off I went with another batch of
the magic blue pills and an appointment to see him again next month.
These first few weeks were really just a trial period for me, finding
out for myself if I could sustain a longer term without the extras which
for so long had been part of my everyday existence. It wasn't easy,
especially being surrounded by the family who were not on a diet, and
for whom it would have been totally unfair of me to ban any of these
extras just because I didn't want to have them. To be honest, they did
not flaunt anything in front of me deliberately, but respected what I was
doing and tried to play reasonably fairly with me. The early weight loss
was sustained into the second month, and by the time I saw my doctor
in March I had lost almost 2 more stone, and was now down to just
below 24 stone. He was again delighted with progress. The checks were
performed and gave the right outcomes, and another month's supply of
Xenical was duly prescribed. But by now I was starting to become a
little unsettled by this straightforward approach, and questions were
starting to form in my mind.
I recalled the brush years ago with the Cambridge Diet, and how the
thought of continuing with that regime was impossible. Worst of all, I
recalled the resulting bounce effect on my weight after coming off that
plan. I began to reason that if I was to achieve a long term weight loss,
that was sustainable without bouncing back up to a high weight again,
then it had to be achieved by adopting a plan which I could live with
permanently. This also meant that I would have to stop taking the
tablets, because I clearly couldn't expect to take them for the rest of
my life, nor would I have wanted to. The only problem was that they
were working so wonderfully well that I really didn't want to stop
taking them at the moment. So I was in a quandary, and needed to find
a logical escape route.
Problem solving has always been something I was good at. I've no
idea why, but anytime a problem arose, I was usually the one to be
asked to find the solution. So I set to thinking this one through. How
could I sustain the effect of the tablets in the long run, without pumping
the chemicals they relied on into my body? Once I found the answer, it
was obvious! The tablets created a block in my gut which prevented
the majority of the fat in my diet from being absorbed. By stopping the
absorption of the fat, I was losing weight fast. Since my doctor had
prescribed them, he was saying that the NHS approved the blocking of
fat absorption as a suitable way to combat obesity. Therefore the best
way to lose weight, and sustain that weight loss, was to block fat
absorption in the gut. But that meant I had just come full circle again,
because I didn't want to have to keep taking tablets for the rest of my
natural life. So actually I hadn't found the answer at all! This thought
process was getting me nowhere, and was starting to tie me in knots.
At this point, it somehow became appropriate to take slightly more
interest in what was actually not being absorbed, which was relatively
easy to do, as I was producing a fairly regular supply, mostly at quite short
notice. The most noticeable fact about what was not being absorbed, is that it was actually pretty disgusting, if not totally gross. Without
overdoing the detail, it was an orangey shade of yellow, and had a
consistency not unlike the tapioca pudding of the 1960's school meals
variety. This immediately led to the awful truth that without the tablets,
this disgusting stuff would be accumulating inside me and actually
becoming what I was made of. This was a truly horrible thought, which
immediately mutated into:
There is NO WAY I want that stuff inside me, keep taking the tablets!
But I'd been there, and I didn't want to keep taking the tablets.
OK, if you don't want that stuff inside you, and you don't want to
use chemicals to block it, the answer is obvious - don't eat it in the first
place, then you won't have to block it!
Oh sweet simplicity! Simply, stunningly, obvious! In fact so blindingly
obvious, why on earth had it taken me so long to work it out?
By now April and May's appointments had passed, and I was almost
down to 21 stone, a loss of over 6 stone in around 5 months, and I
could really start to feel the benefit beginning to have a positive effect
in many ways. It had become easier to walk around the place, I was
certainly sleeping more peacefully, and in some indefinable way I just felt
as if it was doing me good, and I mean physically felt it, not mentally.
So now I commenced my own little campaign to work out what parts
of my diet were responsible for supplying this fat in the first place, so
that I could determine what I needed to stop eating. The simple idea in
the back of my mind was to change a small part of my daily food intake,
and see if that change had a positive or negative effect on the unabsorbed
output. In my untutored way, it seemed to me that 24 hours would be
enough of a time lag to be able to notice a difference, and that proved
to be true for big changes, but it would take longer for the smaller, more
subtle changes to take effect.
To be fair, up till now, I had not really made any changes to what was
my core diet, as I had been achieving the desired effect just by cutting
down the overall level of input, and removing the snacks. Actually, that
was not entirely true! I was still having the odd snack, especially during
the evenings, but had switched them from the who cares, just go for it varieties like chocolate biscuits, crisps, bite-size Mars Bars, Twix, Milky
Way and the like, to the so-called healthy option type snacks like rice
cakes, and anything that claimed to be like crisps but healthier. Complacency
ruled now, as I was getting my weight down dramatically with
very little effort, thanks to the pills, prompting me to fall into the trap of
thinking that this was actually a very easy ride. If I could lose 6 stone in
six months, then within a year I would be down to a perfectly respectable
weight, and I would hardly have broken sweat getting there.
I began to wonder why on earth everyone thought this dieting thing
was so difficult, but then realised that these pills were actually quite a
new thing for the NHS to be offering at this time. They would change
the world as we knew it and the magic blue pill revolution would sweep
away obesity in a tidal wave of health across the Western world. I really
was feeling positive and relaxed about things when I pitched up to the
doctor's surgery for my June appointment, anticipating breaking
through the psychologically important barrier of the 20 stone mark for
the first time, and probably getting a pat on the back too. I almost
bounced in to see him, and strode confidently across to the scales, to
register 21 and a half stone.
DISASTER! I HAD PUT ON NEARLY HALF A STONE!
Shattered, I barely realised he was doing the usual round of checks.
He started to talk to me, and I pulled myself together a bit, as it was
clearly going to be important. I needed to get a handle on this and to I
needed to hear him give me an excuse for this unbelievable situation. He
didn't give me any excuses, but explained that up till now had been the
easy bit, the time where very little effort would achieve maximum results,
for a short while. From this point on the going would start to get distinctly
difficult, and it was only now that we would actually find out whether
I really was tough enough to get on with it and achieve any degree of
success at all.
Back home, I slunk off into my corner, and licked my mental wounds
feeling quite depressed for a while. This was really not how it had been
supposed to progress today. In my twisted frame of mind I came to the
conclusion that I had effectively put on a stone and a half that day (as
I had expected a loss of at least a stone), therefore the pills were no
longer working for me. Luckily, I had to make a dash for the toilet at just
that moment, with a stark reminder that the pills were still working
perfectly well! So what wasn't working? What had changed? What on
earth was I to do about it? This was some sort of crunch point, a turning
point along the way, time for some clear thinking, a new strategy, and
a need for a proper commitment to it. The realisation I had reached was
probably the flashpoint which finally ignited my blue touch paper and
got this project off the launch pad.
The only thing that had changed from the time of the accident up to
now, was that the blue pills had successfully skimmed off the top of the
problem, exposing the true size of the REAL issue. If I had thought I had
been successful for the first six months of the weight-loss plan, then I
had been utterly deluding myself, as I had not made much personal
effort at all towards it. If I had thought that simply by popping pills
I could make a better go at life second time around, then this was the
wake up call telling me that second chances required effort and commitment.
It was high time to stop debating it with myself, analysing why
and how it had been like this. It was now time to put in some effort and
commitment, and start to actually do what I had been kidding myself I
had been doing for the last six months.
It was time to make an effort and lose some serious weight.

CHAPTER Four

THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN

BY 21ST JUNE 2005 I WEIGHED  21 1/2 STONE;.
Yes, my weight had fallen by 6 stone in five months, and yes, I should
be delighted. But basically it felt like cheating, and there was no way I
was going to give myself any credit for it. It would be fair to say that
I had cut back on some of my intake, and reduced portion sizes and
things, but I had not really put myself under any stress, and relied totally
on the tablets. I still snacked from time to time and ate roughly the same
things as I had always eaten at home. Even though I had not visited a
fast food outlet for a while, it was more because I wasn't encountering
any in the current routine, than because I had the determination to drive
past them.
Putting on half a stone in the last month had made me realise, with a
vengeance that this was not going to happen if I continued in this way. I
needed to get back to where I was at the start, not physically, but mentally.
And this shock had knocked me right out of the comfort zone I had
sunk into, and reminded me what this was supposed to be about. This
was my second chance, and I had to grasp it now, before it escaped. I
would certainly never get a third chance!
Stop dithering. Stop getting all emotional. Cut to the chase and get
a plan!
Right then, Plan B coming up.

Although, on reflection, Plan A was good, I just forgot about it and
slid off sideways.
Where was I again?
This took me a few days, but eventually I found my focus and got
back to the job in hand. I simply had to find a way to lose weight, but
by doing so in such a way that I could sustain it permanently, and that
meant getting off these tablets as soon as possible. So I came back to the
idea that rather than take these tablets in the way that they were intended,
which was basically as a substitute for hard work and dedication, I would
experiment with them to see what I should or shouldn't eat. At the same
time, I would finally get serious about cutting out everything that remotely
resembled snacks, or treats, or extras in any way.
In some ways, I can now see that the June weigh-in was almost a
mini-repeat of the car crash, psychologically. It knocked me right back
to the idea of grasping this second chance, and really making more of
myself than I had the first time round. I had no idea what that might end up being, but I certainly knew what had to be done in order to make the
chance real, and open up the options. I had to get right back to square
one and get myself down to the sort of weight I was before the family
came along. I had to set myself a proper target, get down to around 15
stone, and fast. I wasn't getting any younger, after all.
The object became clear again on the food front. I had to keep taking
the tablets, but I had to change what I was eating until the horrible byproduct
ceased to be produced. My logic remained simple, but was now
even clearer. If I could reach a stage where my usual food intake was
pleasant, sustainable and not weird in any way, but the tablets no longer
produced any side effect, then this would mean I could stop taking
the tablets without a detrimental effect. This would also mean that my
regular diet would be more or less correct because, my twisted logic
ran, it would be NHS-approved by definition. It had to be, because they
approved these tablets to stop me absorbing what was wrong, so if they
had nothing to stop being absorbed, then I couldn't be eating anything
wrong. Now I no longer saw the tablets as fat absorption blockers, but
as a food approval system, and a temporary one at that.
I started to take a closer interest in the output, making small sustainable
changes and watching for the results. I didn't automatically write-off
things because they were widely regarded as being wrong, or unhealthy,
or fattening. I chose to completely ignore any conventional sources of wisdom on the subject, mainly because many of these seemed inevitably
linked to the requirement to pay money to those who created them.
Rather, I chose to use my blue pills as the sole arbiter of right and wrong
in the 'shall this pass my lips' stakes, and before long I was able to see
obvious ground rules emerging.
The most obvious thing of all was fat. Now there's a surprise! If the
primary purpose of the tablets was to block fat absorption, then I
needed to eat less, or virtually no, fat. The secret was in spotting where
fat was present in food, and although most fat is pretty obvious, it is a
devious component of some seemingly innocent foods. I had long since
become responsible for the main weekly shopping, and I now found
myself becoming a student of food labelling, and this was long before
the introduction of the new traffic light symbols on packaged food in
supermarkets, and fancy DEFRA inspired alternative labelling systems.
I rapidly got used to doing without butter or margarine, or some of the
other vegetable oil based spreads, on any sandwiches or toast, and much
as I regretted it, cheese was reduced to a very rare treat. Strangely though,
and this has applied over time to any number of things, reducing it to the
status of rare treat has significantly enhanced the enjoyment when the
appropriate occasion does arise.
Now it was time to face my nemesis Dr Ken at my July visit. This
time rather than the assured bound onto the scales of the fateful June
visit, it was more a cautious, timid creep onto them. But the bounce in
my step was back as a weight of 20 stone exactly was announced. I
made my first (and last) attempt at a Dettori Dismount from the scales
which did not end as gracefully as I might have wished! This show was
clearly back on the road. The blood pressure and heart rate were both
as good as they had been, and nothing untoward was indicated, so a further
prescription was written out. At this point I decided to explain to
my doctor what I was doing, that is, using the tablets to indicate good
and bad changes to the diet. He saw no problems, and thought it was
an interesting approach, and endorsed it as long as I kept on losing
weight and maintaining good pulse and blood pressure.
Slowly, very slowly, I was making the first tentative steps towards a
healthier eating style, but as it often does, life was planning other little
traps in the hope of catching me unawares. The whole second chance
assessment plan was growing stronger as it fed on the success in the
weight area, and I began to think about other changes to complement
the progress. For many years now we had lived in a large house with a
very large garden, on the bank of a small river. I had managed to bring
the garden under control over the years, from the starting point of a
total wilderness, with the help of a wonderful retired stonemason from
the East End of London who had moved up nearby years ago. Recently
he had found himself a new, special lady and had left me to fend for
myself as he moved away to live with her. Unable to find a replacement
I was rapidly reaching the point where I no longer saw any beauty in the
garden, just a list of jobs a mile long in every direction. The house itself,
which had barely been big enough when bringing up the four girls, was
now becoming a shell of empty and unused rooms with three of them
having moved out, and had been quite beyond any motivation that my
wife had, to maintain it in anything remotely resembling good order.
So the next decision was to sell the house, and move to something
much smaller and very much easier to maintain. In the light of what
has subsequently happened to the housing market, this was a very lucky
piece of timing, as I would certainly not have wanted to try to sell it later.
However, having both agreed that this was the best course of action, and
approached some local agents to value and market it, neither of us was
really prepared for an offer at virtually the asking price within a day of
placing it for sale. In fact we had received the first offer before the sign
was erected, closely followed by a second offer, but with strings attached.
This more or less coincided with my August visit to Dr Ken, and the
happy news that my weight was now down another 9 pounds, with no
bad signs anywhere, so again it was 'keep taking the tablets' (but only
on my terms).
As we drifted into September, with the lawyers beavering away on the
paperwork, and me beavering away sorting out the house, and trying to
make more sense of my diet, professionally it was proving an interesting
time as well. I had started working with a new contact introduced to me
by a mutual friend, and we were getting on extremely well as we had
very different, but entirely complementary skills. One of the effects of this
collaboration was the decision to launch a new company trading exclusively
on the internet, and at the launch at the beginning of September
we almost immediately received an offer for the company from a
large group with aspirations in the same area. The decision to accept the
offer was simple, and I was subsequently embroiled in the immense
amount of paperwork that these deals generate, especially when the
other party is employing a top London corporate law firm, for the next
few weeks I was under an enormous amount of pressure dealing with
lawyers in every direction, trying to get the house sorted out ready for
a move, and still trying to cope with the weight loss programme. At
first everything went smoothly, no major hiccups anywhere, and I was
even more encouraged when September's check showed another 9
pounds off, down to 1854 stone (262 pounds or 1 19 kilos). I had now
lost cumulatively almost 9 stone, or 56 kilos.
As October arrived we reached an agreement to complete on the house
sale at the end of January, so as not to disrupt the Christmas holidays.
The purchasers were a local couple who had recently sold their business
and they were in absolutely no rush to complete as they were not going
to move in straight away but make some serious alterations to the place.
Unfortunately, once everything had been signed up, I was confronted with
the fact that I was virtually going to have to deal single handedly with
sorting out the house, downsizing its contents, and making all necessary
arrangements, as all practical domestic support had been effectively
withdrawn. This also now applied to my efforts to lose weight, something
which I had been trying to encourage my wife to join in as her
own health could certainly have benefited significantly from a similar
loss. However, for her own reasons, she took the view that it was not
the right time for her to do that, and also decided that she was not going
to be a party to disposing of the mountains of weird and wonderful
stuff she had collected and hoarded in the spare rooms in case they were
ever needed, or for when the girls started making their own homes.
I am not including details here in order to judge or be judged, but
simply to explain how such extreme stress led to the derailment of the
project. For derail it certainly did.
October's weigh in showed a gain of 1/2 a stone, accompanied by a relaxed
piece of advice from my doctor that I should not expect a constant
drop, and the odd occasion where it fluctuated was only to be expected.
The following three months were a slow spiral downwards into an
emotional quagmire which I am most definitely going to skirt over with
an alacrity born of sensitivity for the various participants. I distributed
enough clothing from the various hiding places around the house to a
variety of charity shops in the area to keep their shelves and racks filled
for months. The local auction rooms gave what assistance they could,
and I lost count of the number of skips that departed loaded to the
gunwales. Along the way, over 30 years of marriage sank into a decision
to have a period of separation, accompanied by the decision to rent a
small house for her and the cat and dog, and a small flat for me and Number 4, who took no time at all to decide who she wanted to live
with. The other three took the decision in their stride and expressed the
view that in their opinion it had been too long in the making and they
were relieved that it had finally been taken. Sad really, that they had
seen it coming long before we did.
The only respite in this difficult period was my insistence on making
the annual trip to F^dmburgh for the FRA annual Christmas lunch. I set
off with some trepidation, especially as I was facing the prospect of a
night in a hotel when I was still not able to sleep in a bed. I was hoping
that there would be a substantial armchair in my room so that I could
at least try to spend the night in some sort of comfort. Although I was
acutely aware that I had not seen any of the boys since long before the
accident, it never occurred to me once to realise that they had not seen
me in weight loss mode. As usual, as I had travelled the furthest (at least
on the day), I was the first in Mather's for the pre-lunch drinks. It was
then that I finally realised that I had a new and different appearance, as
the boys arrived one at a time and at first weren't certain that they
recognised me till I spoke to them. When Para Handy finally turned up,
there was quite a gathering already, and in his inimitable style he encapsulated
the moment by declaring:
uOh my God, it's The Incredible Shrinking Man!" By now being pressed from all sides to explain, I told them about the
accident, how Para Handy had passed on the information about Big
Jim's tablets, and how the rest was becoming history now. The saddest
part about that day was seeing that Big Jim was still Big Jim. He had not
been prepared to cope with the side effects, had stopped taking the
tablets and rapidly reverted to his original size and shape. As usual, the
rest of that day quickly passed into a haze of typically epic proportions,
but it was rapidly becoming clear that my group nickname had already
changed by popular acceptance to The Incredible Shrinking Man, and
this was born out in all the email chatter from that day onwards. I will
not deny that I was perfectly happy at this turn of events, not so much
from the nature of the new nickname, whose eventual ramifications
were still unknown, but from finally and legitimately losing my old
nickname which derived from my surname Hare. Yes, I had always been The Pubic. After a relatively quiet, but short, alcohol-sedated night in
the armchair in my hotel, I returned home suitably refreshed.
A truce was declared for the last Christmas in the family home, and
the year eventually drew to a close. January saw the final clearing out of
the house, which suddenly, with all of the clutter gone, seemed enormous
again. The agreements were signed for the two rental properties and the
lawyers actually managed to complete on the sale of the house without
a single solitary dot out of place. The new owners came round a few
times, and while the ladies discussed what ladies discuss in the house, I
gave the necessary lessons in driving and using a ride-on lawn mower, and
how to use the various raking, slitting, spiking and rolling implements
that dramatically impaired its ability to mutate into a poor man's five
speed quad bike. I managed to repatriate all the sets of keys that the girls
had been trying to avoid handing back until the last possible moment,
and we were finally ready to move out.
We had rented the new places with a few days overlap, so that by
the time the final handing over of the keys ceremony came to pass there
was nothing to do but literally walk away. I had already made certain
that everything was properly set up in both places, and everything was
in full working order. We had both actually moved out a day or so before
completion, so on the appointed day it was purely a question of
turning up, have the lawyers confirm everything was in order, hand over
the keys, shake hands and walk away. So that's exactly what we did.
/ had begun by thinking it would be a wrench to leave the house after
18 years, but when it came to the crunch, I just walked slowly and
quietly away. A line had been drawn in the proverbial sand.

I had begun by believing that it would be a wrench to leave the marriage after 30 years, but when it came to the crunch, I just walked
slowly and quietly away. Another line had been drawn in that same
proverbial sand.
There was nothing but the future now, not that I really had a single
clue as to what it might be, but that was what made life fun.
Oh my God - when was the last time I actually thought that life was
fun! All right, then - lets see if it turns out that way!
And so it was that one of life's chapters drew, quite literally, to a close.

CHAPTER Five

GOING IT ALONE

MY WEIGHT HAD RHMAINHE) CONSTANT AT AROUND 19 1/2 STONE FROM
October through to the January of 2006. Nothing more came off, but
at least nothing went back on again which is quite amazing given the
circumstances, as my weight had hardly been high on the agenda
throughout that difficult time. But now I found myself in a completely
new environment, playing to a new set of rules which, to be honest, I
hadn't even written yet. Change is too simple a word to describe the
next few weeks. It was like being parachuted into a new world without
a guide book.
Bizarrely, the first significant change I made was to buy a bed. Nothing
fancy, just a plain simple, yet sturdy pine frame with a very firm mattress,
and some newr bedding to go with it. It was delivered flat packed, but
was extremely easy to knock together. The key to the significance of this
purchase lay in the fact that I had not slept in a bed since the accident,
15 months previously. It was somehow a symbolic purchase, and I was
delighted when I actually slept comfortably and peacefully the first night
in it. It was almost as though I could finally rest easy again after a very
traumatic series of events, and this seemed to set my mood for the next
few months.
I was now in total control of shopping, cooking and eating, and the
interest I started to take in food labels again could see me taking hours
on a simple shopping trip. This control meant that I could completely
dedicate myself to the task of adjusting the diet until the tablets were
rendered obsolete. So I started to take more notice of the ingredients of all
my purchases, and every now and again found a little spare time to scour
the internet for what I hoped were sources of unbiased but technically
correct information on nutrition. There are about as many sources of advice out there as there are people prepared to pay for them, so I studiously
and carefully avoided anything which called itself advice or help,
but required the purchase of branded goods or special supplements.
The early experiments with a very low fat diet were doubly successful.
The most immediate effect was that I could start to spend longer periods
of time further than two minutes from the nearest toilet without the
requirement to carry spare underwear. More satisfying, though, was that by the February visit to Dr Ken I had lost about most of a stone and
was down to 18 1/2 stone, and by March I was right down to just over
17 1/2 stone. This was almost 10 stone in 14 months, and I was ecstatic.
However, I had begun to really struggle now with one major problem
I simply hadn't thought about at. I had virtually nothing to wear. Now I
am well aware, ladies, that this is usually taken to mean nothing suitable
for the occasion, but in my case now it was entirely literal. I had long
since passed on the clothes I was wearing at my peak, either to charity
shops or to scout troops to use as small mess tents for camping trips.
Now I was finding that the clothes that I had previously grown out of
(but kept in hope), and had then grown back down into, were now too
big in every respect too. The problem was how to replace them. I don't
mean that it was a problem to find clothes to fit, as I had gained years
of experience finding jumbo sized clothes. The problem was that I was
extremely confident that I would lose more weight yet, so virtually anything
I bought now would have a very limited lifespan before moving on
to the Salvation Army or Age Concern. The real problem was therefore,
how few clothes I could get away with, to save having to spend a fortune
every few months on a complete new wardrobe.
That spring and summer were spent avoiding anything remotely like
a 'Formal Dress Do', and keeping a relatively low profile in jogging
pants and sweat shirts. Track suit bottoms and the like had an extended
lifespan for me solely down to the drawstring waist and acceptable floppiness.
And remember, I also had the distinct security of knowing that
absolutely nobody I knew expected me to look sartorially elegant in
any way, shape or form! Another advantage I had going for me was
that I had reduced social contact across the board mainly from the move
to a different part of the locality, although partly because my strong
desire to avoid any sort of food or meals that didn't match my new low
fat regime meant that I resigned from the Rotary Club.
The other characteristic of that period was the highly desirable side
effect of the weight loss meaning that I had a good deal more energy
than I was used to. The result was the easy decision to spend a little spare
time every day going for a walk along the riverside path that passed in
front of the flats. I had never seen this area before, and was fascinated
to find a whole world of sports fields, meadows and nature reserves
virtually on my doorstep, and leading out from the very heart of the city.
From the early lunch time strolls of a few hundred yards, these rapidly
became voyages of exploration into unknown territories, and unwittingly
they took on the guise of what I later calculated were 3 to 4 mile
walks on weekend afternoons. I found myself making regular checks
on the progress of the nesting swans, looking out for the herons and
caught fleeting glimpses of kingfishers as I got to know their individual
hunting grounds. The psychological benefits of this inadvertent private
time for me, and the physiological benefits of the exercise I was getting
from these outings, produced a powerful cocktail of positivity that I
had not really experienced before. I actually began to make significant
strides towards feeling good about myself, and it was only when I realised
what was happening that it even began to dawn on me that maybe that
had not been the case lately.
By now I had become confident enough in the changing nature of
both my eating habits and my toilet habits to start making rules. Now
by this I mean that the few changes that I had made to my usual food
intake had reached the point that I was now confident that they were
achieving a positive contribution in their own right. (The toilet related
output had seen significant improvement!) The changes became my
rules. They may not sound like earth shattering revelations, and in most
cases they are now accepted wisdom. But my innate cynicism about the
world of dieting and weight loss had led me to believe that all advice,
on any aspect of eating, had an equally powerful and diametrically
opposed lobby, and that both sides had an agenda behind them. It
had been fundamental to me to test them out myself before becoming
completely comfortable with them.
So my first set of Ten Commandments became:
Semi-skimmed milk only
	No white bread, only wholemeal, preferably with wholegrain as well
	No potatoes. Substitute wholegrain rice, and wholemeal pasta
	No cheese
	No butter or margarine
	No puddings, only fresh fruit
	Absolutely no snacks of any kind
	Eat three proper meals a day
	Go for a walk every day
	Do NOT weigh yourself more frequently than once a week

April's visit to the doctor was a delight, as I weighed in at 17 stone,
down just over half a stone again that month. This meant that I had
now officially, and clearly by some margin, broken through the 10 stone
barrier at last. He continued to express amazement at my steady and
determined progress, and confirmed that once again there was nothing
wrong showing up anywhere physically. My blood pressure was fine, I
still had a pulse, and he would see me next month as usual. By now
I think I had seen him more times in the last 15 months than I had
actually seen him in the previous 15 years, and although it might seem
strange to be visiting him to confirm that there was nothing wrong with
me, these visits were still essential to my peace of mind. I needed someone
of his experience to tell me that I was doing well, because most of the
time everyone else saying it came into the category of they would say that
anyway. I also needed to know that I was not inadvertently creating any
other problems that were going to crawl out of the woodwork and bite
me when I was least expecting it.
As April passed into May that year, the evenings (and my heart) lightened,
and I extended my nature walks to the extreme limit of the time
I could spare for them. By now I was able to pass by a burger stand and
experience the aroma without feeling the need to buy one. I could sit in
the same room as someone eating chocolates and not want one myself.
My diet felt good, I was full of energy, and I began to wonder about
what I could add to the mix to keep up the momentum. That was when
my mind strayed off down a new secret passageway I had no idea existed.
I have no clue about what prompted it initially, as nothing in my entire
experience had ever strayed in that direction before. The thought, that
occurred totally out of the blue and then took up residence with full
nagging rights, was ... shock horror...
join a gym.
What did you just say?
Join a gym.
Don't be daft, why would I join a gym?
To get better exercise than walking, to get fitter, and it will help with
the weight loss.
Don't be so downright stupid! I would stand out like a sore thumb in
a gym and have all those fit young types sneering at me. FORGET IT!
About this time, (the sub-conscious me was getting too clever for its
own good), I began to realise that there was, in fact, a side-effect to this
weight loss that I simply had not considered, in the slightest. It was
something that had obviously lain dormant waiting for the appropriate
moment, and it now decided to show its head. Skin! Now skin is one of
the most amazing parts of the human anatomy, it has almost endless
elasticity, probably best demonstrated by my own experience. But it
does have one or two small shortcomings, if the truth be recognised, and
it was now being recognised full on. When you lose 10 stone it is from
the layers of fat that build up under the skin, and which the skin has
assiduously grown, quietly and efficiently, to keep covered. However,
when you rapidly remove vast quantities of the fat beneath the skin, it
does not suddenly and miraculously turn into shrink-wrap, but begins
to take on the qualities of a duvet kicked back on first getting up in the
morning. It hangs around in strange, wrinkled, bunched-up lumps, or
droops over the side of the bed in a desperate attempt to reach the safety
of the 'fall-no-further' floor. The full truth of this phenomenon hides
behind the joint distractions of the satisfaction of having lost the weight
in the first place, and the beguiling lightness of what is left compared
to its illustrious God-like (I'm thinking Buddha here) predecessor. It
was not a serious problem, but it did lend weight to the thought that
joining a gym might be a good idea. Anything which could assist in
keeping the loose bits under control had to be a good thing.
On the food front, I had begun to try out different cooking methods,
in an attempt to find a way of preparing my food, as far removed from
microwaving low-fat ready cooked meals as possible. The principal
downside of most of the methods was the time they took up in a busy
day, and the need for careful menu planning. I had by now decided that
the wealth of information available on the subject was true. Food was
far better being undercooked than overcooked (with notable exceptions
like chicken I know) and the classic al dente method keeps most of the
vitamins intact until they reach the plate. My method of choice, the one
that satisfied both the time and texture issues, was stir-frying in my wok.
Through trial and error I developed an expertise in the timing of each
ingredient of a meal so that it retained taste, texture and nutritional
value. A decent rack of herbs and spices opened up a wonderful world
of flavour options, and the speed of cooking, in this way, was mind
boggling. The main key to my cooking has always been a strong sense
of freedom from rules - if I have one main rule in the kitchen it would
be: Be the cook, not the critic.
Think about it for a minute. What is your absolute all-time favourite
recipe? Now cast your mind back to when someone, in a kitchen somewhere,
or maybe by an open fire in the countryside, actually put those
ingredients together in that way for the very first time ever, and applied
heat in some way. Do you want to be that cook, or do you want to be the
person who was stood beside them, looking over their shoulder, saying,
"Don't be stupid, that's a waste of good food, it'll taste ghastly".
Now I don't want you to gain the wrong impression here. Cling to
the thought that whatever else I may be, I am still just a guy in his fifties,
with a healthy (?) regard for good food. You will never catch me stuffing
vine leaves with Mongolian tofu, or serving Tiramisu dressed with
a light jus of blended pomegranate and guava berries. I'm quite content
to leave that to the fawning followers of escapees from a tyre factory you
know, the Dunlop people, or is it Michelin? I occasionally like to
watch these people at work, but I think you see them at their most realistically skilful in the sorts of programmes where they are given a set
of ingredients at the last minute, and have to knock out a meal in a few
minutes. That is when I get interested both in the strange combinations
of ingredients, and just how quickly you can cook food properly.
So when it came to the time for my May medical check, I was feeling
good, getting better organised at life in general, and my dietary
habits were coming together in a pleasing way. Yes, the sub-conscious
was starting to pursue its own agenda as usual, but it was still too stuck
in the subtle phase to have any major effect. The scales didn't let me
down and showed 16 stone 9 lbs, that's more than another half a stone
gone forever. Blood pressure was creeping ever further down and my
heart rate perfectly fine. Keep on keeping on was the message I got.
On the way back from the surgery I was letting my mind wander
euphorically through the clouds when the sub-conscious launched
another surprise attack.
Just think how much better, even now, you would feel with some
proper exercise, and you could save all that time spent walking,
But I like that time walking.
Well, carry on doing that as well.
Now a few years previously a large fancy gym had been built on the
outskirts of the city, which was effectively the only one that I knew
existed. Was it fate, was it the mind playing tricks on me, or was it pure
coincidence that this mental exchange took place on the dual carriageway
approaching the roundabout with the exit to that very gym? I
decided to consign that one to life's filing cabinet under lesser mysteries, park the car, and ask for a tour.
Well, to be perfectly honest it was literally the first time I had ever
been inside one of these places, and I was completely staggered by the
facilities it had to offer. The gym was packed with some of the weirdest
looking contraptions that had clearly been designed during an experimental
engineering seminar at the annual convention of the world's
leading authorities on sadomasochism. But the studios, swimming pool,
saunas, steam rooms, spa pools, hair salon, aroma therapy rooms, and
not least the cafe-bar were about as far from my Rocky expectations as
it was possible to get.
Yes, there were almost enough mirrors around the place to satisfy
the needs of the few gym bunnies whose principal purpose in attending
always seems to be to acquire sufficient flexibility and muscle definition
to be safely told that they are the fairest of them all. Every gym has them,
and always will have them! Infinitely more pleasing was the realisation
that there were, in fact, a majority of people to whom the term muscle
definition meant the list on the wall chart in the physiotherapist's office.
My fear of sticking out like a sore thumb amongst an elite gathering of
the city's finest athletes proved to be utterly groundless, and I was still a
little dazed when I left after having signed up for a year's membership.
Had there been a disturbance in the force, had some seemingly innocent
little butterfly in an Asian rainforest casually flapped its wings? Not
only had I joined a gym, but when I got back, I actually got out my
diary and, as instructed, made an appointment for my first induction
session. Then a small problem struck me. I had no trainers, shorts, vests
or in fact anything that was remotely suitable for wearing to a gym.
This could not be happening - joining a gym and going shopping all in
one day?
Oh my God! What if I can't find anything to fit me?
I headed for the big chain sports shops in the city centre with huge
trepidation, but was chuffed to bits when, for the very first time in
donkey's years, I actually went into a high street shop and bought items
of clothing off the peg that fitted me. This was turning into one hell
of a good day! I bought shorts, some T-shirts, a pair of simple basic
trainers and some white socks on special offer that day - five pairs for
3 pounds or something like that. I even had the sudden presence of mind to
buy a sporty looking hold-all which looked so much better than the
supermarket carrier bag I would have been forced to use, but for this
brainwave. Did I need anything else? Frankly, I didn't have a clue.
I did wonder at this point whether I should have consulted my doctor
on this small step for mankind - giant leap for obese kind, but decided
not to worry but remember to tell him about it when I next saw him.
So, trusting that I had indeed covered all my bases, I felt fully equipped
and ready to go.
Off I went for my very first gym session, with my new bag, full of my
new kit, contentedly assured that I would not stand out like a bacon
sandwich at a Bar Mitzvah.

CHAPTER SIX

INTO THE UNKNOWN

I DULY TURNED UP AT THE". GYM AT THE: APPOINTED HOUR, AND CHANGED
into my new kit, suddenly wishing that I had at least washed it a few
times and removed the blatant brand new look they screamed out to
everyone within a hundred mile radius. I found my way upstairs to the
gym floor, and introduced myself to Dave, who would be my fitness
instructor. I was then sat down in a very comfortable armchair, and
subjected to the Spanish Inquisition on everything that could possibly
be relevant as to why I was there, and a whole lot of stuff that I thought
wasn't remotely relevant. I quickly realised that this was all for an
excellent purpose, as quite clearly I didn't want to be thrown in at the
deep end and induce a heart seizure almost as much as they didn't want
to end up being held responsible for it. We agreed, in the end, that my targets would be first of all to increase my general fitness level and
secondly to lose a stone in weight. They were very much against setting
targets too high, firmly believing in the maxim that targets should be
small and achievable. This way success early in the game would continue
to provide a positive background to making further progress, rather
than continually failing to achieve a target that was actually just a little
out of reach. I understand this completely, as it should be the basis for
all weight loss targets. Don't ever try to set out to lose 4 or 5 stone, as
it is such a big thing to aim at. Rather, aim to lose a pound a week,
which is thoroughly achievable for virtually anyone. If you actually
manage to lose a pound a week, on average, for a year, then that adds
up to nearly 4 stone, but with success every week to keep you going.
My initial programme, to be attempted at least three times a week,
but preferably five times, was set up for feeling my way in to this sort
of thing. It involved the use of three core machines designed specifically
to work on my cardiovascular fitness, the rowing machine, the treadmill
and the reclining bike. CV exercise, as it is known, is the basic relatively
simple exercise that targets your heart and lungs. To get fitter, and to move
onto any form of more intense exercise, you have to start by making
sure that your heart is strong enough to pump blood round your body
to carry the extra oxygen to your muscles for their extra work. CV
work allows you to push up your heart rate in gentle steps. As the heart
is essentially just a complex set of muscles, regular CV exercises will
build up those muscles in the same way that you can build up your
biceps using weights.
Each session would comprise:

	5 minutes on the rowing machine at resistance level 5
	10 minutes on the treadmill, walking fairly fast, with a 1 % incline
	10 minutes on the reclining bike at resistance level 4

Depending upon how I felt, I could gently increase times, resistance
levels or both over the next few weeks, but I should talk to Dave from
time to time and let him know how I was getting on with it, and what
increases I was achieving.
The first couple of times that I went through the programme I was
really just getting used to the machines, and soaking up the ambience
of the place. I continued to be pleasantly surprised at fitting in quite
easily to the type of clientele that frequented the gym, and the friendly
banter that generally went on most of the time. None of my fears proved
to be grounded in any way, and even now it would be fair to say that I
have never felt out of place, or uncomfortable (in the social sense), at
any session I have ever done. By my third session I was ready to up the
ante, as there was no point in going there and using the equipment if I
wasn't pushing myself even a little. Clearly the lengthening walks along
the river had given me a base to work from, but if that was the case
then I had better 'work from it', rather than just maintain it.
In my first week I did five sessions, and I started my second week with:

	15 minutes on the treadmill
	10 minutes on the bike (resistance up to level 6 now)

	7 minutes on the rower
	Another 15 minutes on the treadmill
	Another 15 minutes on the bike (once again at resistance level 6)

Already my 25 minute workout sessions had become 62 minutes. As
each day went by, I began to feel my spirits lifting; I had a lighter step
and my movement was easier, as if an unseen hand was gently easing
some hidden weight off my soul.
Essentially I spent that first month at the gym finding a level of good,
strenuous exercise that I could maintain over the weeks and that would
push me by just the right amount, and progress it as my body kept pace.
I also got to know all the fitness team, and quite a few of the other
members who seemed to find themselves there at roughly the same time
as me most days. The whole experience had turned out to be a lot more
sociable than I had ever dreamed possible. Another benefit was that it
was getting me out of the flat more frequently, and I was slowly gaining
a whole new circle of acquaintances, all of whom knew nothing of my
past and simply accepted me for what I was now.
With all this going on I settled for a simple maintenance of my current
eating habits, and didn't bother with any more trial and error changes.
I could no longer be sure whether any results would be because of
dietary change or the new exercise programme. The only way to know
for sure was to only change one thing at a time, and as I was definitely
changing the exercise side of things, this required dietary stability. So I
was eating the same as I had been before, sticking to my three meals a
day and nothing in between, and with the exercise programme now swinging into gear with a vengeance I was expecting big things at the
monthly check up in June. I knew it would be good, as I was already
starting to feel that the exercise was doing me a power of good, and I
was definitely detecting a small change in the way my current crop of
clothes fitted. I headed for the doctor with hopes of a really good weight
loss result this month.
16 stone 1 lb the scales told us. I was just a tiny bit disappointed, to
tell the truth. Yes, it was just over half a stone off again, but in the back
of my mind I was definitely hoping for more. Blood pressure and heart
rate checks followed. Just as I was thinking that I must tell my doctor
about starting to go to the gym, he said out of the blue, as if he was

reading my mind:
"Well Mike. When did you start properly exercising then?"
I was dumbfounded, but managed to mutter something about the

gym.
"I thought that might be the case. It's a great idea, and will back up
what you're doing, tremendously."

How on earth did he know? Had he seen me there and not said? Had
a mutual acquaintance told him in passing that I was there?
"How did you know I was exercising?"
He then explained that he had been able to spot it immediately from
my blood pressure and heart rate readings, together with the fact that my
weight was still reducing really well. The truth is simply that even with
just the simple exercise routine that I had been doing, a little fast walking,
a bit on the rower and a bit on a bike, the effect on my heart was
immediately noticeable. He also pointed out that it should be becoming
harder to lose weight now as I was long past the point of shedding the
easy stuff and was beginning to get down into my hardcore fat reserves.
I want to stress this point here and now. This was a big lesson for
me, but is a clear message to everyone. I know we hear all the time that
exercise is good for you, and we all probably think that this true. But I
guess we all think that good for you is just a figure of speech, not a
quantifiable reality that has the power to change lives. The plain fact is
that a few short weeks of doing some of the most basic exercise was so good for me that a doctor could tell straight away by just checking my
blood pressure and heart rate. This taught me a lesson in no uncertain
way, and please let it be a lesson to you.
At this point I also raised another small problem that had been getting
a little on my nerves, especially since starting the gym programme. The
skin left on my stomach was beginning to hang down worse than ever,
and whilst it was a wholly acceptable by-product of my efforts (and
I preferred that to its predecessor), it was starting to cause little rashes and
itching to develop beneath the flap. This had become more pronounced
with the exercise, as it was made worse when I worked up a bit of a
sweat. I had mentioned it in passing a month or two previously, but
with little conviction, and no response. This time, however, he decided
to have a look at how the droop was developing and after prodding
and much humming, he told me it was now time to refer me up the food
chain to the reconstructive surgery team and see if we couldn't have it
removed. Stunned silence from me. Finally, I asked:
"What? On the NHS?"
"Of course. You have done so brilliantly with this whole weight loss
project. You are sticking at it and doing exercise to help it go further,
so of course we will help you."
He went on to explain that it would essentially be up to the surgery
team, but he would refer me and I could expect to hear about an
appointment in a few weeks time. If the surgeon was happy that the
operation would be a success, then I would go onto his list and the
droop would be consigned to memory. I was absolutely flabbergasted
that this was possible. The thought had crossed my mind vaguely in the
past, usually prompted by some extreme TV show stumbled across by
accident, but I could not accept that what I was achieving was in any
way special or out of the ordinary, I was just a guy who had got way too
big, and was putting it right. The thought in the back of my head had
always been that surgery of that nature was something that people paid
to have done privately, and at enormous cost (and well beyond my
humble means and wildest dreams). Things like this simply did not
happen to me! The 15 minutes with the doctor had been so full of startling
revelations that my head was buzzing fit to bust. Thoughts and
feelings were fizzing together in a frenzy of expectation and unexpected
delight. I was... I was... lost for words!! (Probably a first for me).
In this euphoric state I threw myself even more into the exercise
programme, and by the start of July I was managing a total of:
	37.5 minutes on the treadmill at 4.5% incline (Fast walk, obviously)
- split into one lot of 20 minutes, and one of 17.5 minutes
	35 minutes on the bike but now up to resistance level 7-2 lots of

17.5 minutes
	20 minutes on the rowing machine at resistance level 5-2 lots of 5 and
one of 10 minutes
During this time Number Four was doing her GCSEs, and to make
life easier for her she had been spending a few days mid-week at her
mother's which was much closer to the school. I was still on a high from
the visit to the doctor, and had come to the conclusion that I had earned
myself some form of reward for all my hard work I had been investing
in myself. For no apparent reason I was checking my diary and came to
the realisation that I had absolutely nothing in it for the whole of the
following week. This was a very rare state of affairs indeed. I racked my
brains and simply could not remember the last time I had a completely
empty diary for a whole week. Eventually I decided that it could only
have been the last time that I had been on any sort of holiday, and that
was a very long time ago.
Holiday!! What a brilliant idea. Why didn't I think of that?
You just did.
Shut up, I was going to say, if I hadn't been so rudely interrupted,
why didn't I think of that BEFORE?
This was actually a Saturday morning, so I literally grabbed my
jacket before I could change my mind, and headed straight into the city
centre to find a travel agent. There was a choice of three, but I hit
Thomas Cook and sat down next to the first, unoccupied consultant.
"I have a free week in my diary next week, so where am I going on
holiday?"
You could see that old expression cross her face in a flash - that why
do I get all the nutters? - resigned look.
"No, I'm deadly serious. I have a sudden unexpected opportunity to
go on holiday for a week, and need to know what you have as last
minute availabilities."
She visibly perked up, and kicked into gear with a string of all the
right queries, such as how many people, how far away, did I want a city
or beach resort and somewhere cold, warm or hot.
"What do you mean only one person?"
Travel agents, if not the whole holiday travel business, are completely
thrown when you want to holiday alone. Everything is designed for two
people sharing or as a family package, and as soon as you mention the
words single traveller, the rate book goes out the window and in comes
the travel agents guide to how much you can surcharge sad loners. Once
I had got the message through to her that I only wanted to know what
it was going to cost me, not what it might have cost if two had been
going, we could start to get somewhere on a list of choices. Within half
an hour I found that I had bought and paid for 8 days self catering in a
beach side apartment in Stalida, Crete, leaving on Monday evening from
Gatwick. I now had 48 hours to acquire suitable clothing for a holiday
(jogging bottoms and sweatshirts were simply not going to cut it in the
Greek Islands), get some currency and travellers cheques, buy suntan
lotion, tell people what I was doing, pack and get to Gatwick Airport.
No problem.
To their credit, the girls thought it was a wonderful idea, and greeted
the plan with enthusiasm. It didn't take me long to realise that Number
Four's particular enthusiasm was largely based on the realisation that
she would have the flat to herself for the following weekend, and plenty
of mates to keep her company, but I decided I could trust her. The shopping
could be a problem though, and it was going to force me to break
with my master plan of not buying too much in the way of clothes while
I was still losing weight. Then I realised that I would be heading for
Spain with the boys in October, and anything I bought now, provided I
kept it all on the reasonably tight but still comfortable side would have
a dual purpose anyway. This depended upon finding a shop that would
sell clothes my size, and I knew that this would be a problem from years
of experience. I headed in to the shops on the Sunday, and thought I
would at least start with a success and get some underwear. The first
shop I came to with men's clothes was M&S, so in I went to buy some
socks - never a problem. It got interesting when I spotted some light
linen trousers which looked particularly suited to mediterranean climes,

and I thought
Why not at least try on the largest pair and see how close you are to
getting there.
The little beauties only fitted me! WOW! I was actually buying real clothes off the peg in a major high street store, not just sports kit this
time - a blinding vision of a whole new world spread out before me.
Who cares about the Road to Damascus - give me the first floor of M&S
every time! I was like a pig in a swamp - Charlie in the Chocolate
Factory. I was surrounded by endless racks of clothes of all shapes and
styles and colours and I could have any of them I wanted.
Then it struck me like a bolt of lightning. I didn't really have a single
clue what I did want. I didn't know what colours were good or bad on
me, what sort of style would suit me, and worse, I hadn't even thought
about what I actually needed for the trip. It dawned on me that I had
actually gone out shopping for clothes in the full expectation of having
virtually no choice at all, and doing what came naturally, buying what
little I could find to fit me, if anything. This was a whole new ballgame,
and I had not the slightest notion of the rules. So I made my mental excuses
and left empty-handed, wandering immediately down to my local
Italian cafe and taking solace in a large cappuccino. Deflated, and at a
loss as to how to proceed, I nursed my coffee and watched the world
walk by. This was not me - I didn't do cop-outs! Pull yourself together. OK, let's start by working out what I physically need for the trip,
how many pairs of trousers? Trousers! I'm more likely to need shorts in
Crete in July. Good decision. I'm only going for 8 days, more like 6 on
the ground, so I'll probably get away with two of each. The list gradually
grew to a small yet manageable and practical list to get me through the
week. As I compiled this mental list, I was beginning to take extra notice
of the passing shoppers and again coming to the realisation that it
didn't really matter what styles or colours I bought as I had two major
advantages firmly and securely on my side. Firstly, everybody in the
developed world knows, without fear of contradiction, that the British
male on holiday in warm countries has zero dress sense. Secondly, I
would know nobody in Stalida, and nobody in Stalida would know me.
Therefore it didn't matter what I bought and wore, as long as it kept me
cool and decent during the day, and warm enough at night.
I had another cappuccino, smiled wryly to myself, gathered my wits
about me, and went shopping. It had been a close call there for a moment
or two, but I finally returned home with a holiday wardrobe ready to
wear, whipped all the labels off, packed everything except what I would
be travelling in, and breathed a huge sigh of relief. Why did life always
have to introduce complications just when you thought you were getting
on top of it? Anyway, I'd faced that moment today and won through,
and here I was all packed and ready for the off. I could sleep easily
tonight, and this time tomorrow I'd be heading for the beaches of the
Greek Islands, swimming in the warmth of the...
Swimming trunks - you haven't got any swimming trunks.

Sleeping went right out of the window. I sat up and went through every
possible set of circumstances, every usual holiday activity and checked
off everything I might need to see if I possessed it and had packed it. As
luck would have it, swimming trunks were indeed the only missing item,
and that could be easily resolved in the morning long before I would have
to leave. Finally, and considerably later than planned, I did get to bed and
slept soundly, content that I was fully prepared to enjoy myself.
At Gatwick, I seriously began to wonder whether I had committed
one of the all time great foul-ups. Waiting at the departure gate to board
the plane it was obvious that I was the oldest passenger by a margin of
something approaching 30 years. To think that I could have been worried
about what I would wear had been filed under ridiculous, and I was
starting to imagine that these folk would all be heading for my apartment
building. I finally deduced that the flight was full of a combination of
kids having an A Levels are finished let's all go and get drunk in the sun holiday, and a motley collection of stag parties, hen parties and folks
who had abandoned Club 18-30 because it was too formal and didn't
allow enough drinking and sex, and me. The flight itself was everything
I had by then come to expect, and the cabin staff seemed to react as
if it was all entirely natural. On arrival in Crete I made my way to the
appointed welcome desk, and was relieved beyond belief that only three
of us went that way. The young man handed us some envelopes, explained
that as we were the only ones going to Stalida, he had organised taxis
rather than a bus. Things were looking up. An extremely scary and very
fast taxi ride later through the unlit Cretan night and I was dropped off
outside my apartment building and the taxi was gone. Two hours later
- after thanking the powers that be that I had not left my mobile phone
at home; having crossed over the road to get a signal so that I could
contact the emergency number in the envelope I had been handed at the
airport; after sitting on my suitcase on the side of a dark silent street; two
reps turned up with a key and let me into my room. To this day, and after
numerous letters, I have never received a proper apology from Thomas
Cook, and to my dying day they will never receive any further business
from me. It beggars belief as to what might have happened if the holidaymaker
had been a single girl, without a mobile phone! Unforgivable!
The morning came, and I was at last able to explore what had been
described as a 'front line apartment block with beachside bar'. My first
floor apartment actually overlooked the high street, and the beachside
bar actually belonged to another apartment block which really was front
line, and which I could use if I showed my key. Who cares, I decided, I
came here to enjoy myself, not to moan. I wasn't going to sit in my
room or hang around a bar anyway.
The good news was that I had landed smack in the middle of a
scorching heat wave, and almost every bar in town was showing the
World Cup quarter and semi-finals courtesy of various satellite TV
stations from different countries. The bad news was that this not so
long ago charming, little, off the beaten track Greek town now sported
burger bars, pizza houses, Chinese, Indian and Italian restaurants, a
Rovers Return pub complete with quiz night on Tuesdays and Thursdays,
a Queen Vic pub with its quiz nights on Mondays and Wednesdays, but
sadly only one small Greek Taverna and one Greek restaurant.
I soon found my way around the place, and learned to avoid the flying
quad bikes that were hired from two places in the town and were the
transport of choice for overloaded parties to progress from one bar to
the next. I quickly discovered the beautiful sandy beach, the quiet out
of the way bars and cafes, and a large bar right on the beach at the far
end of the high street from the main bars and clubs. This was a very
large open air bar with the most comfortable chairs in town, a discreet
Greek barman and a very laid-back DJ (without a microphone) whose
main role was to ensure an unbroken very light background of classic
jazz and blues. The tables were presided over by a Greek goddess, who
floated regally between them dispensing nectar, (straight from the
mouth of a Metaxa brandy bottle, in my case), to her late night flock.
The coffee wasn't bad there either.
This week was a breath of fresh air (and not just the sea air either).
It made me realise after a day or so that there are times when you should
just switch off, not from work or anything as mundane as that. I mean
switch off, right from the heart outwards. Forget the rules, forget the
formalities, the expectations others have of you, and just go with the flow
of whatever happens without judging. This has since become another of
my little rules, which I often try to pass on to anyone who will listen,
especially anyone struggling with a diet or weight loss. I sum it up as:

Don't forget to feed the soul too!

When we push ourselves too hard on diets, and when we absolutely
deny ourselves anything which is no longer good for us, we either give
up completely because we can't take the pressure any more, or fall to the
wayside and binge on forbidden fruits and then feel guilty for weeks
afterwards. More dieters have failed because they have forgotten to feed
their souls than for any other reason. Feeding your soul is not falling off
the wagon; it is not failing, it is not abandoning hope or a breakdown
of willpower. It is a cold, calm, deliberate acknowledgement of the fact
that many things which we now know to be bad for our health, or bad
for our diet, or bring us out in spots or whatever your worst nightmare
might actually be, are actually deeply enjoyable, and make life a little
bit easier to bear. Feeding your soul is the recognition that life will be
severely, if not terminally, diminished to the point of not being bearable,
if every single one of these little pleasures is never to be experienced
again. What is life worth without a little fun from time to time?
That week in Crete I fed my soul. / had a mixed grill for breakfast in
the Robin Hood, run by a charming couple from Nottingham, an Indian
meal, a Chinese meal, a few beers watching the football, and every night
coffees and brandies brought to me by Sophia (we had by now been
formally introduced by the barman) in the beach bar till extremely late.
It was extremely easy to do this for the week, as there was the additional
distance from normality to reinforce the freedom, and the return home
would strongly reinforce the return to the regular regime.
About half way through the week I stumbled upon another piece of
evidence about my new shape. Somehow I had fallen into a conversation,
during a match on the TV in a bar, with a young guy who was on his
own on holiday from Bradford. He worked, if I remember correctly, for
a supermarket bakery. We were discussing places we had eaten in the
town, and he had clearly not tried any of the beach restaurants, or either
of the two Greek places. He preferred to eat pizza or Indian every night as he might not like the local food. At this point I swept my cloak of
many colours of fatherhood around my shoulders with a flourish and
proceeded to give him both barrels on why he should never pass up the
opportunity to try something for the first time if it was offered, as he
might just end up liking it. Why he should never visit a place for the first
time and not try the local food and drink for precisely the same reason.
To his credit, he calmly sat there and took it all in, probably out of
courtesy as I had just bought the last round! I then wandered off down
to the other end of town, and had a coffee in a little restaurant overlooking the broad sweep of the next bay. As I sat in the warm afternoon
sun reading a book, I noticed that someone was parascending across
the bay. At least, I think that's what it's called when you are towed
behind a speedboat dangling beneath a parachute in a harness. I casually
thought to myself that I had seen this in quite a few places over the
years, and wondered what it was like, it looked like fun. Of course, I
had never even considered it. Given my weight and dimensions I would
probably not fit in the harness anyway.
Suddenly I sat bolt upright. Hadn't I just berated that poor baker's
lad from Bradford for what seemed like hours on the follies of never
trying something new? Hadn't I just pleaded with him never to turn
down the chance to try something for the first time? I finished my coffee
and headed straight down the beach to the water sports tent.
"Excuse me. I'd like to have a turn in that parachute thing, please."
The Mancunian with bleached hair, who was trying to give the impression
of still being young and failing miserably, turned out to be in
charge. He calmly told me:
"Not dressed like that, mate. You need to change into swimming gear
for that. And don't you think you're a bit old for that anyway?" Down boy! You came for a parachute ride, not a slanging match! "If you're young enough to be a beach bum, then I'm young enough
to ride that chute'"

He grinned, "Off you go and get your trunks; we'll be here for hours
yet. And don't forget your camera. The grandkids'll want photos of this!"
"Cheeky sod!"
I was on a mission now. I went straight back to change, and yes, I
grabbed the camera because I wanted photos of this one! I went off
down to the beach again, with a fair amount of cash as I thought it
might prove to be an expensive ride, and I had completely forgotten to
ask. In a few moments we were off out into the bay and I was being
strapped in for the ride of my life. I'm certain that our little exchanges

of banter had brightened his day from the normal run of kids hanging
around, as instead of the studiously observed route of the previous
flights I had witnessed we seemed to cover the full length of the bay,
and I had the pleasure of a second lap. With a casual flick of the throttles
he twice took me from the highest extension of the tow cable, with
magnificent views, swooping down to gently drag my feet through the
water before returning skyward.
I had now shed another bit of the old me. That part which had known
for too long that my size and shape denied me the chance or the ability
to do so many things through life. This part had watched the kids on the
extreme rides at Alton Towers knowing that the safety bars would not
close if I sat with them, that even if I could squeeze myself in my heart
would probably not take it, and that I had been turned away from too
many rides and bumper cars in so many fairgrounds because of my size
to risk being further embarrassed. Those days were gone. My friendly
beach bum had seen to that by simply looking at my age compared to his
normal customers, and never seeing a weight or size problem. It was time
to readjust the mental image and accept that I wasn't like that any more.
I went back to that same restaurant where I had spotted the parachute
that afternoon, and had the top of the range seafood platter for dinner,
whilst gazing out over the scene of another victory. Life really was getting
its fun side back!
The week drew on, and I discovered The Tee Shirt Factory where they
could print anything you wanted onto a T-shirt in next to no time while
you waited. They had a vast catalogue of designs, and any lettering you
could dream up. Two or three graphic designs of sayings caught my eye,
and I acquired two shirts saying When I read about the evils of drinking
I gave up... reading and At my age Tve - seen it all, done it all, heard
it all - I just can't remember it all. These were just impulse buys, but
have caused a lot of fun over the last year or two. The main reason I
went in there in the first place was to get a plain shirt with the letters
TISM across the front of the chest. I thought it would be fun to have this
for the trip to Spain with the boys, as my nickname had now officially
become The Incredible Shrinking Man.
All good things must come to an end, and with my soul having been
fed to bursting point, (and on at least one night having had slightly too
much Metaxa), it was time to board the plane home. At the airport I
was re-united with my fellow passengers from the outward trip, who
were showing all the classic symptoms of having had their perfect
holiday too. Mostly they were sitting with different people, looking very
hung-over, and covered with bright red sunburn which would probably
keep them awake at night for days back home even though they largely
slept the whole flight back.
A day later, well rested, full of contentment on the inside, and resembling
polished mahogany on the outside, I hit the gym again in a
white T-shirt (well, when you get the chance, you've got to take it). The
soul had been fed - now the body must pay the bill!

CHAPTER SEVEN

LOOSE SKIN

FRESH BACK FROM MY WEEK IN CRETE - BRONZED, BURNISHED AND WITH THE soul still purring, I deliberately had not weighed myself since returning
from holiday, as it would serve no purpose other than creating negative
feelings. I knew I would probably have put on a few pounds, but I knew
equally that I could get rid of it within a few weeks just by returning to business as usual.
As soon as I walked onto the gym floor I discovered that my fitness
instructor, with whom I often had a chat about progress, had left. It
was also time for my six week review and programme update. The main
question then was who would now take responsibility for my programme?
It fell to a guy called Mickey, who I had not actually met on any of my
previous visits. He turned out to be quite a character as he put me
through the full introductory question and answer session again so that
he could really appreciate what I wanted to achieve. Of course he insisted
on weighing me, and jumped immediately to the conclusion that I hadn't
been putting enough effort in as I hadn't got close to losing anything.
My protestations about being on holiday, backed up with all the obvious
evidence in front of his eyes, fell on completely deaf ears (even though
he had a grin when he said it), and he proceeded to introduce me to a
small group of resistance machines and something loosely based, I
thought, on a medieval torture rack. My new programme now consisted
of three to four sessions per week of:

	Burn 150 calories on the treadmill as fast as I could (the machine
worked out the calories and showed them on a screen)
	Burn 150 calories on the bike
	Burn 150 calories on the x-trainer ( a sort of cross-country skiing
machine, arms and legs all pumping away at once)
	Chest press - three sets of 16 presses (push a handle attached to some
weights away from your chest)
	Lateral pull downs three sets of 16 (pull down a bar above your head
- weights attached again)
	Leg press three sets of 16 (sit down and push a pad away from you
with your legs - and yes, there were weights attached)
	Shoulder press three sets of 16 (this time push a bar up above your head)
	Chin-ups and dips (a weird machine where you stood on a bar while
doing them, and the weights made it easier by supporting some of your
own weight)
	Finish on a mat on the floor with one of those strange roll cage things
which are designed to improve your abdominal muscles (six pack!)

Apparently the idea was that when you could manage to do all three
sets of 16 on a machine, then you made a note and increased the weight
a notch next time. It took me a few sessions to be able to find the right
machines without help, and to remember how to use each one properly.
But before long I had got myself into the habit of not being satisfied
unless I could tick off a weight progression on at least one machine
every time I went to the gym.
This new routine didn't really save any time, but it certainly reintroduced
me to muscles which had long lain dormant, if not totally
atrophied. Curiously, it was also a much more sociable routine. The
treadmills, bikes and x-trainers tended to be lined up in rows, or round the
outside of the gym and each had its own TV set where you could select
your channel and plug in your headphones - totally anti-social. On the
other hand the resistance machines were squeezed randomly into the
middle of the gym area, all fairly close together, and each requiring short
rest periods between sets which almost inevitably ended in conversations
breaking out spontaneously with whoever was sat on the adjacent
machines. To counter this, they were also right in front of the gym desk,
and Mickey would often wander over and check my workout diary, and
check the weight settings I was using. He quickly came to realise that I
was serious, and never needed to hassle me about progressing.
The high point of the month was a trip to Portsmouth for Number
Two's graduation, a completely new experience as I had never been near
such a ceremony before. I had not even come close to going to university
myself, and Number One had fallen into a dispute over her choice of
dissertation subject with her tutor at LIPA and opted to accept a
diploma rather than compromise. So a great couple of days down on the
coast were had by all concerned, and the proud Dad got ritually ripped
off and loved every minute of it. Behind the scenes and the sunglasses,
my emotions served as a powerful reminder of what I was now doing,
and why I was doing it. Moments like this were once in a lifetime, and
I had been so close to missing them it almost didn't bear thinking about.
Before I knew it the monthly check-up was here, and I realised that
I had been so busy catching up on work issues, and enjoying the new
gym routines, that I really hadn't thought much about moving the eating
programme along a bit as well. So it came as no surprise to find that I
had only lost a single pound that month. I was not too bothered, to be
honest, but my doctor was happy that I had been on a good holiday,
relaxed on all fronts, ignored the diet while I was away, and still ended
the month with a small weight loss. When he put it like that, who was
I to disagree! The other vital signs were all making progress as well, so
we both smiled and off I went.
August drifted by on a tide of complacency, if the truth be analysed
now. The diet was stable and working well, so I had long since stopped
taking the tablets as they were no longer producing any discernable
effect, although I admit that I had not yet told my doctor. The programme
at the gym was progressing nicely and the sun was shining as and when
it should. The girls were working their way through the usual succession
of boyfriends, or latest victims as I quite openly called them! I tried, as
ever, to be as non-judgemental as possible, accepting all comers in the
roles, and as ever was accused of being nice to them because I would have preferred to have had sons rather than daughters. It is totally impossible
to win this argument, so, as ever, I smiled and kept quiet.
The complacency became fixed into place with the advance notice
of an appointment with the reconstructive surgery team for the end of
September, and the August weigh-in with Dr Ken showed 15 stone 3
lb, a loss of well over 12 stone now. What was there possibly to be
concerned about? For the first time, since I literally could not remember
when, I was happy. Not only that, I was feeling fit, getting great regular
exercise and eating well. I was looking good with the tan hanging on
well and bits of the body that had been a bit slack were starting to firm
up well with the new programme. I had a holiday with the boys coming
up in October, and now the surgeon was going to remove the stomach hangover (which would also lose a pound or two more). What more
could a guy want?
In mid September Mickey announced that it was now time to review
the programme again. He knew, by now, that I had an appointment
with the surgeon, and he had also finally come to terms with just how
much weight I had lost. His decision was to devise a new schedule
designed to tone up all the various little saggy bits around my body that
were showing up through the weight loss, so that when the surgeon did my stomach, the rest would not lag behind and let me down. The point
was that it was entirely up to me; he was not going to stand over me and
shout at me, but just tell me what would work if I wanted to give it a go.
Ultimately, it was nothing to do with him whether I bothered or not.
This time, he had given it considerable thought, and used all his
expertise to put together a great set of exercises which I had to do in
the exact order he set out. Apparently each group of machines, if used
in the right order, would have a combined cumulative effect on different
muscle groups. This was all rocket science to me now, way outside of
my limited knowledge, so I nodded my head, learnt how to use the new
machines, and wandered off to the steam room to give my brain a rest.
Sometimes I worried about Mickey - if he wasn't trying to storm the
barriers of new pain levels for his charges, he was messing with our
brains by presenting little conundrums to solve, or performing card
tricks at the gym desk. To be fair, his own personal workouts were
pretty awesome, at least till he went too far one day and damaged his
back! It was about this time that I started mentally referring to him as Masochistic Mickey, although to this day I've never let him know that.
The new complacency and the new gym programme did not make
good bed-fellows, so for a while the gym did not actually see me putting
in quite the usual level of effort. I realised that I had never actually set
a target weight, and nor had the doctor. I would never have believed
that I could possibly lose as much as I had anyway, so I felt that, theoretically,
I could already claim to have met my target. I did not change
my eating habits, as I was perfectly content with what I was eating, and
didn't have any mad cravings anymore. I could walk pass a hot dog
stand, an ice cream vendor or a burger bar without a second thought.
I had reached where I wanted to be, and with the impending surgery I
would finally be able to draw a line under this whole extraordinary
story. I enjoyed the gym; I enjoyed the exercise and the banter there, so
I kept going along and working through my sessions, but there didn't
seem to be the urgent need to keep pushing things to the limits with the
weights, or hitting the calorie targets on the cardiovascular machines
quicker all the time.
September's check up revealed a loss of another few pounds, and I
was now below the 15 stone level, with the loss topping 12 1/2 stone. No
problem. What else would you expect?
At last the 29th arrived, and I arrived at Clinic G just a little early
for my visit to Mr Malata. My name was called, and in I went. After reviewing
my notes, he told me he thought that what I had achieved was
probably the best weight loss story he had ever personally seen. He had
a good look at the overhanging skin, and told me that it would be
absolutely no problem to remove this, and would be a pleasure. He had
a look at the insides of my thighs, and asked if I thought they needed
doing as well. There wasn't much in the way of loose skin there, so I
told him I didn't think so. He told me about the operation he would
do, and then sent me along the corridor to have the clinical photography
guys get some photos for the medical records.
I was feeling absolutely on top of the world now, and had a few laughs
with the photographer who also said that he had seen nothing like it
before, and had certainly photographed nothing like it before. After the
photos I had to go back to the consulting rooms and one of the nurses
measured me in various directions and checked my weight, pulse and
blood pressure. Then I went back in for another chat with the main
man. He asked me if I would have any objection to him using my photos
and notes for teaching purposes, as he was based at Addenbrookes
Hospital which is more or less the medical side of Cambridge University.
no problem, if he was prepared to put his skills to work for me, then
it was the least I could do. I was reaching quite a state of excitement by
now, as this would finally be the culmination of the whole project, I
could actually wrap it up and move on. Everything was set, and so
I asked the only remaining question.
"When will you actually do it?"
"As soon as possible."
"Is there a waiting list for this sort of operation, and how long is it?"
"Not really for this, but we do have a waiting list for the surgical
team. We'll put you on the waiting list as soon as we can."
"I'm sorry, what do you mean, as soon as you can?"
"We can only put you on the list when your body mass index (BMI)
is down to 27. It used to be 29, but the Primary Care Trust (the local
board in charge of the National Health Service in the area) has changed
the rules recently. You have to be 27 or below. Go with the nurse now
and she will work it all out for you. I'll see you again as soon as you hit
27."
Slightly bemused by this sudden turn of events, I went with the nurse
to see what weight I would have to be to hit this magic number. She shot
me down in flames by telling me I would have to lose another 2 stone.
"TWO STONE! Don't be ridiculous. I can't possibly lose another
two stone. I've already lost 13 stone; I can't possibly have that much fat
left to lose."
"Sorry, love. Them's the rules."
"I might as well forget the whole thing."
Completely deflated, I wandered back to the car and headed home.
I'd been set up beautifully, and then knocked back so hard it hurt. I
didn't know what to say or do that whole weekend, I was just numb.
I knew with an absolute certainty that I really could never even contemplate
losing another two whole stone. The whole journey had been
long and hard, and now I was stuck with this loose skin flopping about
below my waist. Why on earth did they let me think the surgery was
possible? It was a cruel, nasty, vicious and completely unnecessary act
of unpardonable wickedness. I got quite angry in the end, which didn't
do a whole lot of good but might have lightened the burden just a little.
The whole of the next week I was pretty much like a bear with a sore
head. I did actually manage to go the gym and put in my normal sessions,
but more just to keep to some sort of a routine as I searched for the
way forward. I eventually calmed myself down enough to think a little
straighter, and concentrated on getting things together for the trip to
Spain with the boys. At least I could buy myself a few more bits for the
holiday, as I knew now what size I was going to be for the foreseeable
future. I needed a few more things than I had taken to Crete, as I had
originally decided, when booking the flights months ago, that I would
actually stay on in Spain for an extra few days just to get a quiet break
all to myself before the winter set in. This had been before the spur of
the moment Crete trip, so amounted to a bit of a luxury now, but it was
bought and paid for already so never mind, just enjoy it.
The flights to Spain had co-ordinated fairly well, with my Gatwick
flight getting in first, followed an hour or so later by the Glasgow flight
hopefully with The Auld Git aboard. He had originally acquired the
nickname when his daughter was expecting her first child, the arrival
of which would turn him into a grandfather. Hence he became a grandfather-in-training,
a GIT - it had just never gone away. So I had just an
hour to kill in the arrivals hall in Malaga Airport, and get quickly
accustomed to the fabulous dry heat. I had put the setback out of my
mind, and was determined to enjoy myself. I was even wearing my TISM T-shirt, especially made for me in Crete, which I thought the boys might
like. The others were due to arrive from Edinburgh a few hours later,
so the advance party would simply find a bar to wait in.
As I stood waiting by the exit from the customs area, I spotted The
Auld Git making his way through. Although we kept in touch regularly
by emails, I realised it had been almost a year since I had last seen him
at the FRA Christmas lunch in Edinburgh. It was now October, and I
allowed myself a wry, self-satisfied smile as he walked up to me, looked
straight at me for a second, blanked me completely and headed straight
on past. Enjoying myself immensely now, I manoeuvred carefully

round 





the cafe and bar area, making sure that every minute or two he
had to look straight at me again, and detour to get past me. Eventually,
he extracted his mobile phone, and made the agreed call if we failed to
spot each other when he arrived.
As my phone rang, I stood about four feet in front of him, and
enquired why he thought it necessary to use a phone when I was stood
right in front of him? His face was an absolute picture. Even for a Scot,
straight off the flight from Glasgow, his grasp of old fashioned Anglo
Saxon was impressive. I needed to start getting used to this reaction even
my best old friends no longer recognised me.
A similar reaction occurred once the others arrived on the Edinburgh
flight, although it was slightly easier for them as they at least recognised
one of us and therefore me more by association than anything else. The
week quickly degenerated, as we decided to drop in an old member of the
gang who was now living out there permanently, just a short detour off
the motorway on our way to Marina Duquesa where the trips were based
nowadays. Suffice to say that during our supposedly brief stop it became
unwise (drinking and driving don't mix) for us to complete the trip down
the coast later on as planned, so we didn't actually make it to the apartment
till the following day. The rest of that week falls firmly behind the
cloak of the golden rule - What goes on in Spain, stays in Spain.
Seven days later I bade farewell to the guys as they caught their flights
back to Scotland, and grabbed a taxi for the short hop to the hotel I had
booked for the next six nights on the front at Torremolinos. I had
picked up a good deal on the internet, and it was a pleasant, but pricey
place, just a bit off the beaten track. It was just what I needed, a quiet
few days of solitude to ponder what the surgeon had said.
Unfortunately, or maybe, with 20:20 hindsight, fortunately, I got
exactly that. A quiet few days of solitude; a quiet few days spent wandering
aimlessly up and down the extremely long esplanade, with only
myself for company, where the highlights were getting the paper and
completing the crossword over a coffee in a different cafe each day and
trying to find restaurants for dinner that didn't object to having to give
up a precious table for just a single diner.
In the end I was desperate to get out of there and get home. The day
of my flight simply couldn't come quickly enough. I came face to face,
during those few days, with the realisation that there was still a lot of
work to bring everything to a proper conclusion. I was very far from
being a finished project, as much mentally as physically. I needed to get
home and put things in order. I needed to find a purpose, a new target,
something to aim at. At that moment I was effectively a rudderless ship,
with no destination, no cargo to deliver and without any navigation
system. If I thought I was a finished project I was totally delusional - I
was actually a blank canvas in dire need of inspiration.
As soon as the flight had come and rescued me, I immediately made an
appointment to see Dr Ken a few days earlier that month. Unsurprisingly
I had put on a few pounds while away and was back to 15 1/4 stone, but
the heart rate and blood pressure were both fine. I told him all about the
visit to the consultant, and how he was totally unreasonable in expecting
me to get below 13 stone. I still don't fully understand how he did it, but
a few minutes later I left with the absolute certainty that my next target
was 13 stone, and that I would do it. As far as I can recall, he reminded
me that I had already lost more weight than he would have ever have
believed possible, told me that I looked and obviously felt fitter than I
had probably ever been and that as far as he could tell, from the comfort
of his surgery, I probably hadn't even broken sweat over it yet and had
just treated it as an experiment in the art of the possible. He got me to
believe that I could achieve that weight loss, and sent me back out on a
mission again.
How did he do that? - The man's a genius.

CHAPTER EIGHT

AN ACTUAL TARGET

SO OCTOBER 2006 FINDS ME AT 15 1/2 STONE, WITH A TARGET OF A BODY MASS index of 27, meaning I had to get down to around 13 stone. But a
target of around something is no target, so I decided I'd better set an
actual target, something defined, something I could almost touch and
feel. That's when I remembered that magic number from somewhere
way back in my school days. The only weight that ever stuck in my
memory - 12 stone 12 pounds. It would be astounding if I could actually
get back to the weight I was when I was at school, and it wasn't that far
under the target of BMI 27, so that was it. New target acquired, I would be 12 stone 12 lbs.
That was the easy bit - now how on earth would I get there? Well I
had that fancy technical programme set up by Masochistic Mickey, so
that would be a good start, and I could take a new look at my eating
habits, and between those two it should do the trick.
But what if it isn't enough? What if I don't make the target?
Oh, shut up! The incentive of the surgery is too good to miss, and
I'd better get on with it or they'll change the rule to something more
ridiculous like 25 or 23 BMI!
So I got stuck into the new gym programme and started to learn my
way around the new strange and wonderful machines, and quickly
regained the mental need to tick off at least one progression (move up
to the next weights level) every time I ran through the programme.
This is the programme that I followed that winter:

1. Warm up on rowing machine - 1000 metres at level six (try to do
it quicker each time).

AN ACTUAL TARGET	71


Pll"

2.	Fast walk on the treadmil. 15 minutes.
3.	Chest press. 75kg. To failure. (This means you try to do 16 repetitions in one go, but to begin with you might 'fail' at less than
16. When you can do 16 in an unbroken sequence, then next time
you increase the weight.)
4.	Squat press. Set of 16.
5.	Lateral pulldown. 115kg. To failure.
6.	Step up and bicep curl. (Bench step ups, with 8kg in each hand. On each step up, raise the weight from the elbow) 16 left leg, 16
right leg.
7.	Hamstring curls. 60kg. to failure. (This is a ghastly machine where you lie on your front, hook the weight bar behind your ankles and
then bend your knees to raise the weight bar.)
8.	Exercise Bike. 15 minutes at level 17.

Then repeat exercises 3 to 8.

9.	Cross-trainer. 15 minutes at level 13.
10.	Abdominal twists. 16 to right, 16 to left (alternating).
11.	Sit-ups on a fit-ball. 16.

This one is not for the faint-hearted, and should not be attempted as
a beginner routine at all. It is actually an intensive routine that works
the body from head to foot without getting too specific in any areas.
A session lasted between 90 minutes and two hours and on average I
completed this programme every second day.

THE OTHER STEP I NEEDED TO TAKE WAS TO LOOK AT THE EATING AGAIN, and work out what improvements I could make on that front. The only
way I was going to make any real progress on this front was by trying
to learn a bit more about the subject, and so I started to wander around
the internet looking for a useful website that would contain the sort of
information I was really after. This turned out to be an odyssey of truly
epic proportions, because there is more stuff out there on this subject
than any person could possibly read in a lifetime of total dedication.
But one thing became abundantly clear in next to no time - whatever
advice was given by any really authoritative source on any aspect of the

subject, you could be sure to find a dozen other equally good sources
that told you the exact opposite! Who on earth did you trust on this
stuff? Especially true was the fact that if you found a good-looking site
that seemed to give an honest personal experience, it would always turn
out to be sponsored by some organisation or other trying to sell you
some magic potion, therapy programme, or branded range of products
of one sort or another. A very large number of sites actually required
you to join and pay a subscription fee!
Clearly I was going to get nowhere here, or waste the rest of my life
trying to find the perfect source of information, so it was going to be
a simple case of going back to my tried and tested habit of trial and
error. I would have to experiment and see what worked for me, and
what didn't. The only problem with this was that it took ages, and you
could only deal with one aspect at a time or you couldn't tell what
worked and what didn't work. It also had the distinct disadvantage of
not determining whether any of the things would work well in combination.
But let's face it, I didn't have any other option, so I decided to
stop whining and get on with it!
And stopping whining and getting on with it was clearly working, as
the November session with my doctor revealed that I was now 14 1/2
stone - a brand new record for the programme. This was all I needed
to keep me at it with a vengeance. After all, it had only been a few weeks
back that I had thought it was more or less impossible to lose any more
weight, yet here was another % of a stone gone!
Towards the end of that November the national chain of gyms, to
which mine belonged, introduced a little fun idea for the Christmas and
New Year period, which I completely ignored, initially. The Calorie
Count Challenge was a competition where the gym staff tried to sign up
as many members as possible to record the calories they burnt in their
programmes in the gym. The basic idea was to encourage members to
try to burn off the excess calories they would surely consume through
the festive food and drink binge. Each member who recorded over
3,000 calories burnt would get a free t-shirt, there would be a prize
draw, and a prize for the top lady and top gent burner in each club, and
a national league table of all the clubs across the country. The whole
thing was supposed to run from 1st December to 31st January. As I
said, initially I just ignored this as a typical promotional thing, and just
got on with my programme, but the week before it all kicked off I was
finally persuaded by one of the guys there to sign up, mainly to stop
them bothering me each time I showed up.
Now the human body is a complex and wonderful development
of evolution and probably would never have become what it is today if
it had relied on scientists and creative people to design it. But one
particular trick it has up its sleeve always fascinates me, and has been
a wonderful assistant in all my little exercise programmes. When you
put the body through a really good exercise programme (or a good long
run, as I later found out), one that is hard enough to really improve the
body's efficiency, it rewards you by producing a special little set of
chemicals called endorphins. Now I'm no scientist, and I'm not going
to even attempt to explain what this all about, but these endorphins are
the body's own special feel good drugs - a sort of personal reward for
good behaviour designed to make you literally feel great when you
exercise, and to make you feel like doing that again sometime soon.
My programme had by now reached the sort of intensity that was
regularly producing these things, and I had begun to both enjoy and feel
good about running through the full set and ticking off some progressions.
The simple fact was that I was probably going to the gym something like
four or five times a week, and even found myself popping in at the end of
the day (even on rest days) just for a relaxing steam room and Jacuzzi. It
was quite strange to be able to actually devote this sort of time exclusively
to me, and as far as I was concerned there was absolutely nothing wrong
with this at all.
The net result of this frequent flyer programme was that when the 1st
December came along, and the Calorie Count Challenge got under way,
rather than hoping to get the T-shirt in the eight week period, like most
of the members, I astonished everyone (myself included) by getting it in
the first week! Yes, that's right, I burned the requisite 3,000 calories in
the first six days, and I had done nothing out of the ordinary because
of the challenge, simply recorded my sessions on the sheet as instructed.
I think this may have made some of the gym staff sit up and take a bit
more notice of my activities. As a side effect I noticed that on most
occasions when I wandered into the gym, one or other of the team there
would be introducing me specifically to another new member. I didn't
take much notice of this at first, putting it down to the usual thing of
making new people welcome, but I quickly came to realise that I was
being drawn into conversations, and frequently asked about my weight
loss. Without realising, I had become the gym's living proof that you can lose a lot of weight if you use the gym properly and eat well. I didn't
mind, hardly really gave it a second thought - if they wanted people to
think the weight loss was down to their gym then let them. It was no
skin off my nose and didn't take up too much time. I even got to meet
some very pleasant people too!
Before I knew it, the 19th of December was beckoning, the Tuesday
before Christmas. This is, by tradition, is the day for the FRA Christmas
lunch, and I had booked my train tickets and hotel room some time
before. Hotels are not a problem in Edinburgh at that time of year, but
as ever, if you don't book your train journey months in advance it costs
an absolutely outrageous amount of money to get there. It can be a lot
cheaper to fly, but this is only an illusion as I would have had to take
a train to get to an airport (there goes most of the cost saving), and
the transport into Edinburgh from the airport there is diabolical - you
usually end up in a taxi (there goes the rest of the savings). I had long
since discovered that, if you are careful, you can work out exactly when
the timetables become available online and if you get in really quickly
you get the best possible deals. Having the FRA lunch booked with the
restaurant a year in advance made this possible, so I had been able to get
myself a first class seat both ways for a fraction of the normal cost of a
standard fare. This gave the added advantage of free wi-fi on the train
in first class, so I could work on the way up, and free coffee, biscuits and
water from the steward for the whole journey. So I had a very comfortable
trip up on the afternoon before (I never trust the railway in the morning
for this lunch - unmissable), and a quiet evening setting myself up for the
rigours of the next day!
As usual I was the first one to arrive, and although the boys who
had been to Spain in October had obviously recognised me, the guys who hadn't been able to go this year had a struggle to begin with. Let's
face it, I'd lost another stone since I'd seen them last Christmas. We
didn't realise until we went upstairs from the bar to the restaurant, but
the place had changed hands since the previous year. It was now in the
proud ownership of someone who had pretentions to master chef status
(but appeared on that day to lack the talent which would have otherwise
surely guaranteed it for him). Now I'm not going to claim that we are a
collection of the most refined palates and experienced gourmets on the
planet, but between us we have eaten in some fine establishments around
the world from time to time (usually with a company paying) and know
our way around the finer points of preparation and presentation of good
food. Suffice to say that this was the last time we graced this establishment
with our presence for the Christmas lunch.
This did not, I hasten to add, diminish the overall enjoyment of the
occasion, and the not-insignificant quantity of good Rioja and port which
seemed to disappear quite rapidly. In other words, with the exception of
the actual meal itself, it was a perfectly normal FRA lunch. Tradition then
dictates that the party moves gently along from one hostelry to another
on a fixed route, the origins of which are lost in the mists of time (and
hazy memories). Some years we don't quite manage to make the full
route, which in extreme years finishes with a late curry down near Leith
Docks. This year was one where we didn't quite make it. Perhaps age
was creeping up on us and we were getting sensible, who knows? I made
it back to the hotel in one piece, with the power of speech intact, and got
a good night before the journey back the next day.
Christmas was now upon us, and had its own difficulties this year
being the first Christmas that the girls had experienced anywhere other
than the old house. I decided to settle for the compromise of a restaurant
booking to avoid the problems associated with the girls choosing between
lunch at Mum's or lunch at Dad's, and I really wanted to avoid any
attempt at trying to recreate a family lunch. It wasn't a roaring success,
too many scars and ghosts at the table, but we soon escaped and everyone
came back to my flat for the inevitable Star Wars Monopoly and Texas
Hold-em. At least the evening was a huge success as ever!
Finally the festive season drew to a close, and the momentous 2006
gave way gracefully to 2007, which tiptoed in coyly, giving no warning
as to the changes it would bring. With the cupboards stripped of all the
extras brought in for the girls and their boyfriends for Christmas, and
the few bottles of good cheer remaining having been distributed
according to taste, I quickly settled back into the routine of the gym
programme, and trying to get a few more changes to my eating habits.
Just as I was deciding on what my next experimental change might be,
I spotted a notice up in the gym announcing that they were going to be
running a new special course called the B Plan - an eight week weight
management course to be taken by Adele and Martin two of the senior
fitness team members. Apparently it was a new thing being trialled
across the gym chain, and Adele and Martin had been on some course
to set them up for it with the first 14 members signing up being enrolled
on it for free. I thought about this for a few milliseconds and signed up!
It was free and took place one night a week commencing at the end of
the month. I had absolutely nothing to lose by doing it, and I thought
I might even get some good ideas from it.
In the meantime, while waiting for the course to start, I got on with
the gym programme. My first objective was to get rid of any extra I
might have picked up over Christmas and New Year, followed by making
a few more moves up the weight ladders on some of the machines. By
the time the monthly check with my doctor came round I was at 1414
stone. Although this was only a loss of 1/4 stone since the November check,
it did cover the FRA lunch trip, Christmas, my birthday and New Year,
so still counted as a good result both as far as the doctor was concerned,
and definitely as far as I was concerned. Let's face it, more loss is more
loss, however you look at it.
Around this time, a chance comment made by one of the fitness team
at the gym, introduced me to what has become a favourite principle of
mine. I had achieved a good level of muscle tone with the programme
I had been doing at the gym and had kept potential loose skin around
the body to a virtual minimum. I had never even thought about the
muscles being so much better than they had ever been in the past - and
I'm not talking Mr Universe stuff here, just good honest everyday muscles
where muscles ought to be. The principle was perfectly simple,
muscle weighs more than fat. Perfectly obvious, once you think about
it, but I had never even considered it in the slightest, so I could chalk this
fact up on the plus side, even though I had no idea how much it was
worth in terms of actual weight. I also found out another intriguing and
extremely positive principle - fat just sits there doing nothing of any
merit, but muscle actually burns calories by its very nature, even when
you are asleep. Now I had never, and will never, try to build muscle for
the sake of it, unlike many folks who inhabit gyms and seem to spend
more time looking in the mirrors than actually doing exercise or lifting
weights. But it has to be said that this little gem of information meant
that I was certainly not against acquiring a few along the way, just as a
sort of by-product.
Around the middle of the month they announced that the Calorie
Count Challenge was going to be concluded earlier than originally intended,
but by then my sheet had found itself a new home somewhere,
or gone on holiday, and as I had long since got my T-shirt I forgot about
it entirely. Then one day the results were put up on a big display by the
desk in the corner of the gym floor, and out of nothing more than idle
curiosity I glanced at it to see who had won. I was totally shocked to
find myself well inside the top 10 men on the list, and have wondered
where I might have come if I had actually kept on recording my sessions
for the last couple of weeks. Anyway, it was good to know, in some
small way, that I was continuing to make a serious effort, as well as
enjoying the results.
The first night of the jB Plan course, on 31st January, revealed a mixed
bag of participants, and, needless to say really, a predominance of the
fairer sex. We were measured in all sorts of directions, and in some quite
unexpected places, weighed and had our body fat percentages analysed.
Everything was noted down in a way which would allow absolutely no
excuses at the end of the course. Once we had been turned into a set
of statistics, we had to write down the targets we hoped to achieve
during the eight weeks. I wasn't the slightest bit concerned about specific
measurements of biceps, or thighs, but I was obviously going to set
myself a target on weight and with my new found knowledge I was also
interested in my body fat percentage. According to my starting statistics,
as they measured them, I weighed 14 stone 3.2 lbs, and my body fat
was 22.8%, slightly above the maximum which was regarded as normal for me of 22%. So the targets that I set for myself for the course were a 1/2 stone weight loss, and a reduction of 3.5% in body fat.
For the first week we had to keep an honest diary of everything we
ate and drank till the next session, and it's amazing how being totally
honest actually helps you to cut back. Pure psychology, but it works a
treat. We were also introduced to the concept of eating five times a day
instead of three. Not an excuse to eat five meals, but a regime of breakfast,
snack, lunch, snack, dinner, all nicely spaced out over the day. This
keeps the metabolism working away, and also leaves you slightly less
hungry at lunch and dinner. You don't end up eating more, but it helps
the body to use what you do eat more effectively.
The other aim of the course was designed to get people using the gym
equipment more effectively, and so the second session was spent in the
gym itself, being instructed on the cardiovascular kit (treadmills, rowing
machines and the like), and a number of the simpler resistance machines
(basically weights on pulleys that you pulled or pushed in various
directions). I kept a fairly low profile at this point as I was, by now,
pretty well versed in everything they covered, and both the instructors
knew it. Everyone was asked to pair up, and arrange to do a session or
two together during the week, but luckily I was excused this as there
was by now an odd number of participants due to an early drop-out.
The bottom line, really, was that the programme I was doing in the gym
would have scared the living daylights out of virtually everybody else on
the course, and there was no point trying to team up with someone in
the gym who wasn't on a similar programme.
During the first two or three weeks, apart from a lot of stuff which
was blindingly obvious, one thing did stand out. This was the introduction
to the Glycaemic Index, best known as being the basis of the GI
Diet. At this point I will freely admit that I had indeed heard of the
GI Diet, but had ignored it on the basis that I avoided all plans. I had
also always thought it was some form of American thing designed by
their Army for GIs. How dumb was that! Turned out that it was an
index developed to help people with diabetes, and indicates roughly the
speed that blood sugar levels rise after specific foods, and subsequently
fall. The faster the blood sugar rises, the quicker it falls, so it is better for
controlling blood sugar levels if you eat food that is low on the Glycaemic
Index, as it raises the levels in a more controlled way, and maintains
them for longer. The main point for dieters is that it is an indicator of
the quality of the carbohydrates in food, and although you don't have
to follow the specific GI Diet, it does give you a great indication of the
comparative effects of different foods within groups.
So now I had a real list to use to compare the effects of different
things I ate. The lower GI stuff tends to be wholegrain, less refined, and
includes most fruit and veg. The benchmark suggested to us was that a
value below 55 was better and above 55 was worse. Some of the scores
on the lists we were provided with, were quite surprising, to say the
least. Corn Flakes were 84 and Weetabix 83, yet oat porridge was 49
and All Bran 42. Similarly parsnips came in at 97, and carrots at 71, yet
green beans are 48. Tomatoes are 15, whilst pineapple is 66, but plums
are 24. To top it, orange juice was 56 versus apple juice at 41. This lesson
was intriguing, and gave me a whole new way of looking at foods in
terms of the contribution they were making to my energy levels during
the day, and how much they would contribute to potential fat. What
became clear to me was that if you ate foods that released their energy
faster than you were going to use it up, you tended to try to store it as
fat, but also felt the need for more food quicker as your blood sugar level
would start to drop quicker. So the idea was to try to eat according to the
planned activity following the meal. This course was already starting to
pay for itself - although that was not hard as it was actually free.
By now the February check up was due, and I was feeling very positive.
The exercise programme was progressing very smoothly, I was getting
great input from the weight loss course, spring was about to be sprung
on us, and I was feeling pretty good, to say the very least.

CHAPTER Nine

A CHANCE REMARK

IT HAD STARTED OUT SO NORMALLY, THAT TUESDAY MORNING IN FEBRUARY 2007, lulling me into a false sense of security. Just a plain ordinary day
with my standard wake-up routine: have breakfast and do the post. I
jumped into the car and headed off for my latest check with Dr Ken.
It would be business as usual with a weight check, heart rate, blood
pressure, a brief chat and then away to let him get on with the serious
business of treating sick people. My bit of news for him would be my
performance in the Calorie Count Challenge at the gym. I thought that
this would be something to report, just to prove I was still on the case.
Well business as usual it was, and the weight was down to a fraction
over 13 1/2 stone, almost 1 stone down from January's weigh-in. He
pronounced the right results on blood pressure and heart rate, and
he seemed suitably impressed with the gym performance, but was
obviously pre-occupied with something else, so I began to make my
excuses and leave.
"Hold on, Mike, I want to say something."
This sounded just ever so slightly ominous, definitely not what you
want to hear your doctor say, so I sat down again and pricked up my
ears with not a little trepidation.
"OK, go for it then."
He dropped the bomb.
"I think you should do a run."
This little group of seven words don't exactly inspire the same awe,
at first glance, as some other groups of seven! They don't inspire the
same reaction as the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. They don't
have the same musical quality as Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, or
the same sparkle as the Seven Sisters constellation. At that point I had
no concept of the incredible impact that this little group of seven words
would end up having on my entire lifestyle. In fact, on first encountering
those seven words, put carefully together in that order, I dismissed them
almost thoughtlessly:
"Don't be silly. I don't do running."
"No. I'm serious. I think you should do a run."
"I can't run. The skin hanging down from my stomach won't let me
jog, it flops around too much."
"I definitely think it's time for you to consider doing a run."
I was clearly struggling here. What could I say to get out of this?
Throw some consequences back at him. Good thought!
"If I end up doing a run, which I almost certainly won't, it will have
to be for charity. And as it's your idea, it will cost you BIG TIME!"
But this was a sneaky guy I was dealing with here. He gave me the
one response I really didn't want to hear.
"Fine then, if you do a run, I do the sponsorship. That's a good bet.
Now off you go, we're done here."
I wandered out of the surgery, back to my car, thinking what sort of
run does he mean? Must be some local fun run or something, but even
so, I can't run with the overhang, so it's completely irrelevant. The bottom
line was that I didn't want to do a run, and he doesn't want to pay for it
I thought, so I decided to ignore it, and hope it would go away. Anyway
it was time to get back into town to work. Once I'd parked the car I
decided to bring forward my coffee break, so popped round the corner
to pick up my Daily Telegraph and into my local Italian cafe for a cappuccino.
As I stirred in my sweeteners, there, sitting innocently on the
front page, trying to pretend to mind its own business is an advert. Well,
a promotional thing about registering online for a Daily Telegraph readers'
ballot. I usually pass these things by without a second thought, but
something drew my eye onwards. This ballot was for the first 2000
places in the Great North Run 2007.
It's a conspiracy! Clearly the forces of fate have ganged up and
hatched a foul and dastardly plot to get me. Hey ho - que sera, sera!
The mind immediately started to wander - it was Doris Day, wasn't
it, who sang that?
One quick crossword later, (the Cryptic is still undefeated by my sad
little efforts) and I'm back at my desk entering the online ballot with the
confidence that goes hand-in-hand with the knowledge that if it's really
a conspiracy led by fate then it is certain I will get a place. Once they
confirm, I'll find out what it's all about, how long it is, when it takes place
and all that good stuff. Some days later an email pops up explaining
that I have been unlucky in the Daily Telegraph pre-ballot, but they
have forwarded my name, along with all other unsuccessful names, into
the main ballot. I had absolutely no idea whatsoever how these things
worked, but assumed fate would get me a place from the main ballot.
There was no need to worry.
Time passed by, and somehow I managed to just keep doing the same
stuff at the gym. There was no need to worry about this running stuff
yet, not until I knew what was really going on. It's a strange sort of
mental limbo, two mutually opposite thought processes cancelling each
other out. On the one hand a total acceptance that fate has decided I
will do this Great North Run thing, which on reflection I think I might
have seen on the TV on occasion. On the other hand, it is a complete
denial of any need to start preparation, as I haven't actually got an entry
yet. Not only that, but here we are in late February, and this run thing
isn't until the end of September anyhow.
Finally the ballot takes place, and the email comes through telling
me that I haven't got a place.
What do you mean - I haven't got a place? It's FATE. I am SUPPOSED
to be given a place!
This can't be happening; this is NOT what was ordained. Don't these
people understand?
Eventually I read on through the email, to discover that 'you can still
participate in the Great North Run 2007'. All I have to do is look at the
list of charities that have places, and contact them to ask to run on their
behalf. Now this makes sense, especially as the bet with Dr Ken was
for me to do a run, and him to sponsor me for charity. At this point, I
realise that I don't actually have, nor ever have had, a charity in mind.
Yes, of course I've made donations to charities over the years, sponsored
people doing things, bought flags, and worn my poppy with pride, but
this is different. This is going to be serious fundraising, probably.
So I start to look through the list of worthy causes to see if any of
them strike any sort of chord. I had no idea at all of the charities that got
themselves involved in this sort of thing, and certainly not the foggiest
that this was actually a really immense source of revenue for them. All
the usual suspects were there, from Cancer and Kidney Research
through to Oxfam, Guide Dogs, RNLI and of course I mustn't forget
err.. .Alzheimer's (sorry.. .couldn't resist it!).
But then one popped up and hit me between the eyes - The Prostate
Cancer Charity. Never heard of them before, but I didn't need to look
any further. By way of an explanation, over the past few years I had
witnessed the deaths of a number of close acquaintances to prostate
cancer. In fact one of my very good friends from the Fuengirola Residents
Association, The Poseur (who had acquired his nickname from a very
occasional habit of sporting particularly designer bits and pieces on our
trips), was at this very moment undergoing treatment for it, having been
diagnosed the previous autumn. I immediately went to have a look at
their website, and was taken aback by the extent of their work, and the
services they offered both to sufferers and to the field of research into
potential cures. This was truly the charity for me; the cause I would be
prepared to support on behalf of so many people I knew and cared about.
I called them up, they emailed me the paperwork, and in next to
no time I had a confirmed place to run in The Great North Run 2007,
together with a guarantee to raise at least 400 pounds in return for the entry.
That's that then, I thought. I AM going to do a run.
At this point it also occurred to me that I should find out a little
about this run. Just what had I committed myself to? I started to check
through the Run's website for information, and very quickly realised
that it was a HALF MARATHON.
"Oh shit!!"
THIRTEEN POINT ONE MILES OF RUNNING.
I'm certain that this was NOT what the doctor had ordered. He had
meant a nice little 5k run, something like the 'Race for Life', and here
I had gone blundering thoughtlessly into the pure nightmare of a HALF
MARATHON. Several deep breaths later, I had begun to realise that
actually, with six months to get used to the idea, this was going to be a
great way to do a run. I bet myself that Dr Ken would be amazed at the
idea, as would virtually everyone I knew, and that this could actually
turn out to be a bit of laugh.
So when I arrived at the gym that same night I calmly informed
Masochistic Mickey that I was going to do the Great North Run and
that my place is confirmed.
"But you don't do running, Mike." is his response.
"I do now." I retort.
When is it, where is it, how long is it - the questions just flowed out.
On 30th September, Newcastle, half marathon come the rehearsed replies.
"If you had told me that six months ago, I'd have fallen over laughing",
says Mickey, "but I know better with you now. Let's sort out a
programme."
It's March, so we cobble together a simple plan for the six months to
the race, and I head off to the treadmill to see what this running lark
feels like. Meanwhile another of the gym staff, Ben, who has a little
running experience, comes over to advise me to go to a local running
shop of whose existence I had previously been blissfully unaware, to
get myself some proper running shoes. I explain that I recently acquired
some nice trainers, but he is totally insistent, and backed up by Mickey,
so I make a mental note to do as I'm told.
Normally on the treadmill I power walk with a high incline setting
as a good cardiovascular workout, but tonight Mickey advises me
to drop the incline to a very low level, and increase the speed to a jog.
Immediately the main problem manifests itself in a quite painful way.
This is clearly not going to work without some serious intervention.
I now explain the problem with a simple description delivered with
a smile,
"It is the gentleman's version of the Dolly Parton effect, if you get my
meaning!"
In the old seaside postcard joke, the extremely well-endowed lady
tries jogging and ends up with two black eyes. In my case, the extremely
large overhang of, by now useless, excess skin immediately flops up and
down as soon as I try to start jogging, creating a catastrophically painful
collision with my testicles on every descent. This is clearly not going to
Work without some method of holding it firmly in place. I turned down
the speed to a walk again, and left running to another day.
The next email to arrive is from The Great North Run people, confirming
my place, and offering all sorts of good advice for the novice
runner. I am now well into soak up and use all information mode, but one
particular tip leaves me wondering - Start a training blog on Realbuzz. Now I'd heard of these blogs, but had never ventured to actually look
at any. They were some sort of diary, weren't they, that anyone could
look at on the internet. So I went onto the realbuzz.com website, and spent a while looking at some of the blogs in the great runs section. It
seemed that there were a lot of people doing these things, and any time
they asked for advice or help, there were always replies from other blog
people to help out or answer the questions. Maybe, just maybe, this
warranted some thought. I went back for another look, and started to
pick up on the types of nicknames people used, the fact that they had overviews as a sort of simple introduction to themselves, and profiles to characterise themselves for anyone interested. If I was going to do as
instructed and take yet another plunge into the unknown, I would
clearly have to decide on my profile, my nickname, and what on earth
to write about myself.
Dr Ken's "I think you should do a run" was starting to snowball,
and clearly it was turning into a whole new project with boundaries
that were expanding all the time.
In the end, I finally decided to take the plunge. But first I would have
to decide on a nickname to blog under - my blogname. Then my mind
shot back to that FRA Christmas lunch up in Edinburgh, and Para
Handy's decision that I should now be known as The Incredible Shrink
ing Man. Perfect! So The Incredible Shrinking Man blog was created,
and the sign off TISM was used for the very first time.

MY FIRST BLOG'S OVERVIEW

Hi, my friends have started to call me The Incredible Shrinking Man, because,
over the last two years, I have managed to reduce myself from 27.5 stone
to 13.5 stone (I am officially less than half the man I was). I had never set
foot inside a gym, but have used my local Bannatyne's for the last 10
months, and much to my surprise I actually enjoy it.
Now, at 53, and never having done a run before, I am going to do the Great
North Run for Prostate Cancer. This is a direct result of my new philosophy
of trying never to say No to something I haven't tried before. Life is way too
short for missed opportunities.
In case anyone wonders, I have not used any of the diet plans - my
secret is a completely new found willpower - (there are no reasons not to
- only excuses).
I have never attempted a blog of any kind, but as there were no reasons
not to - here I go...!! I have no idea what this going to turn into, but the
only way to find out is to do it. All comments will be most welcome - I have
the feeling that I am going to need all the encouragement I can get.

This project was rapidly taking on a life of its own, but I still hadn't
even run a step, got running shoes, or started a training plan. It was
high time I got serious about this and found out if I could actually do
it at all, before things went any further. So I went shopping, something
which I normally avoid like the plague. I will never ever understand
the concept of Retail Therapy, clearly a feminine speciality beyond my
simple thought processes. As far as I was concerned, the only time these
two words deserved to be in close proximity to each other was when
explaining that I needed therapy after a retail experience. Nevertheless,
I girded my loins, metaphorically speaking, and hit the city centre on a
mission to find something in one of the sports shops to hold everything
in place for running. Eventually, after hours of browsing, trying on and
rejecting just about everything that might have worked, I finally found
exactly what I was looking for. They were black, some sort of neoprene,
rather like a cut down version of a diver's wet suit. About 5mm thick and
encasing everything from my waist to my knees without compromise.
Technically, they were called compression shortsl Without this find, I
would most certainly not have been able to run, so I can forgive them
anything. But on a long hot summer run, they took on the characteristics
of a blast furnace, and eventual removal was always accompanied by a
small steam cloud forming in the locker room at the gym. So I cleared
out the small supply they had, added a couple of likely looking running
vests, and went on my way rejoicing.
Next was the trip to Advance Performance - the running shop on an
out-of-town retail & industrial park. This was a complete eye opener
in so many ways, and brought to an abrupt close the days of buying
trainers because they looked good, and seemed comfortable sitting in
the shop. The simple opening remark:
"I need to buy some running shoes" was the trigger for a re-enactment
of the Spanish Inquisition.
"What sort of running?"
Oh come on, I thought, how many types of running are there?
"The one foot in front of the other quicker than usual, sort of running!"
"Road, off-road, trail, sprinting, track running, long distance running?"
"Err... I am going to do the Great North Run in September."
"Great. What running do you do at the moment? Have you brought
your current running shoes with you?"
"I don't do any running at the moment, and so I don't have any current
running shoes."
Then it was a sit down in the corner, and a few questions about injuries
at any stage of life, followed by a check of the shoes I was wearing, and my
foot measurements. All these were noted down on a card, accompanied by
name, address and anything else that sprung to their mind.
Finally, a pair of running shoes was brought out for me to try on and
check the fit. These seemed perfectly good to me; they fitted well, and
didn't look too bad, so I asked how much they were.
"You probably won't want these. They are just for an initial assessment."
Now
they had lost me completely.
Dave, the running shoe man, (it had seemed appropriate to be introduced
if we were going to spend some together, as I now suspected)
explained the process we would go through to find the right shoe. It
involved running on a treadmill in the shop, with my feet being recorded
on video. Then looking at the playback in slow motion to see how my feet
performed throughout a contact with the road. This would be followed
by trying a different carefully selected shoe, until we eventually saw a
picture where my feet were touching down, rolling forward, and leaving
the ground, with my Achilles tendon, up the back of my ankle, remaining
close to vertical throughout. I had no idea that the trainers you see
on an ordinary sports shop display are so carefully designed to make
your feet work correctly, and that without this knowledge, the chances
of getting a trainer which is precisely wrong for your foot, as opposed
to precisely right, remain startlingly high. Some make your foot roll outwards
and some inwards. The aim is to make your foot work so that the
Achilles tendon in the back of the ankle remains precisely vertical
throughout the running gait.
Finally, once the correct type of support had been identified on the
treadmill video, a choice of three shoes was offered, all of which did
the same support thing. Now I was expected to try each pair on, and go
for a run around the car park outside the shop until I was sure which
pair felt the most comfortable to run in. I eventually settled on a pair of
Brooks Glycerin 5s, and about an hour or so after dropping in, I made
my exit with my shiny new running shoes. By now I have come to love
this process, and, of course, to know it by its real name - a gait analysis.
(Dave, in the meantime, has become a friend, and my running shoe guru.)
I'm now on a roll! I've got a race entry, a training blog, my compression
shorts, some white socks and fancy running vests, my running
shoes, and a masterplan from Masochistic Mickey.
Do I need anything else? I asked myself.
Yes, came the response, You need to do some running!

CHAPTER TEN

DO I KNOW YOU?

DURING THAT FEBRUARY AND MARCH, WHILE THE WHOLE QUESTION OF
doing a run was becoming an entry to the Great North Run, the B Plan course was continuing apace. I had to come to terms with strange
things, like the fact that FAT is an essential part of a healthy diet. Not
going to get technical here, but unsaturated fat is more or less good,
saturated fat is more or less bad, but the hydrogenated stuff is the real
killer. The food manufacturers make hydrogenated fats by blasting liquid
oils with hydrogen to turn them into solid fats to provide longer shelf lives
for baked products and give a more satisfying sensation in the mouth.
These things cause no end of nastiness to cell function, and cholesterol
levels, so we were shown some food labels to help us identify them. We
also looked at the energy density of foods, which is the basic calorie to
weight ratio, and the amazing range of numbers calories in different
manufacturers versions of what you would otherwise assume were exactly
the same products. Our homework that week was to go around the
shops we used, and actually read the food labels to see the distribution
of these fats in some of our normal shopping. This was a real eye-opener
in many ways, but I was pretty happy to see that I had more or less
come to the right conclusions on most things over the last year or two.
The main rule I took from this first part of the course, and which I still
use now, is a very simple one, and easy to spot very quickly on almost
everything in supermarkets when shopping.

Maximum 150 kcals per 100 grams.

In week 4 of the course, at the end of February, we were hit with a
halfway weight check, and I have to say that I was simply staggered by
the fact that some of the people on the course had actually put on a
pound or two. The second half of the course was not quite so interesting,
and concentrated on a whole bunch of things which frankly ought to have
been second nature to everyone there. I suppose for the younger folk it
is a sad reflection that these things were not the automatic facts that
were drummed into my generation. Fresh fruit is good for you and fresh
vegetables simply cooked are better than processed. These are things we
took for granted from an early age, but it appears that for many nowadays
the prospect of cooking vegetables from raw can be quite daunting. The
final message of the course was fairly straightforward, and has long been
another of my mantras, one that I pass on to anyone and everyone that
ever mentions wanting to lose weight. At times I even embellish it a little
- in an attempt to give it a little more impact on the unwary.

If you put in more fuel than you burn, then you put on weight.
If you put in the exact fuel that you burn, your weight stays steady.
If you put in less fuel than you burn, you lose weight.

Now I know that it is a little more complicated than that, but as a
basic principle it is perfect. The beauty is that you have a free choice
of changing any element whenever you want, as long as the equation
remains the same. If you can't reduce fuel input, then increase the burn,
or accelerate downwards, like I had been doing, by both reducing fuel
input AND increasing the burn. The embellishment, for those struggling
to grasp the concept, is that:

The only people I can think of who are fed involuntarily are coma patients,
and prisoners on hunger strike. Just about everyone else uses their own
hands to put all their food into their mouth, and no one forces them.

The final act of the course was to check everyone and see who had hit
their targets. Now mine had been to lose 1/ stone in weight, and 3.5%
of body fat, and I managed to lose 1 stone 1 lb, and lose 4% of body fat,
so I marked that down as a very distinct success. More important to me,
however, was the fact that at the end of the course they calculated my
BMI as 27.3, which meant I was now extremely close to my target of
27. This would be the trigger for the surgical team to whip into action,
not that the people on the course knew anything about that. I wasn't
going to talk about that publicly until I knew it was a definite fact, and
I've known the National Health Service for long enough not to count
any chickens in their farmyard.
Meanwhile my gym programme had been progressing well during
the winter, but it was approaching time for one of the regular reviews.
It is more or less essential to change your routine in the gym every two
or three months, or you get into a rut. It is simply not possible to work
on all muscle groups in a gym programme, so you have to rotate around
to keep a balance or you end up over developing some areas and neglecting
others. It also helps to prevent you getting bored with the same old
routine for months on end. Now this review happened to coincide with
my telling Masochistic Mickey that I was going to do the Great North
Run, and once he had got over the shock he went to work on a specific
schedule that would get me there in Newcastle, at the end of September,
more or less ready to do the thing. I knew nothing about running or
training for running, let alone running half marathons, so I was content
in the knowledge that the guys at the gym were experts in this sort of
thing, so I would do whatever they told me to do. To be utterly fair to
them, I followed their programme, and all was well, but in retrospect
they were definitely not running coaches, and no one should think that
anything that follows in this section is a really good way to train for
running such distances. It will certainly work for a one-off attempt, but
proper, well balanced running training it is certainly not. But for now,
ignorance was bliss, and I got down to it with gusto.

The new programme was absolute simplicity. We were at mid-March,
and the Great North Run was at the end of September, so on the first week
I had to get to 3 miles, the following week 4 miles. Then in April I had to
go up to 5 miles, May 6 miles, June 7, July 8, August 9, early September
10, and this would be enough to get me round the full 13.1 miles on the
day. The idea was to do 2 runs per week, one in the gym on the treadmill
on a Wednesday, and one outside somewhere on a Sunday, running both
sessions at a fairly even pace. The idea was that as the runs outside
increased in length they would build my mental endurance, as well as help
the physical stamina side which would be enhanced by some weights
and CV sessions in the gym for toning and upper body strength.
So on the 19th March, kitted out with my wonderful compression
shorts, I went for a run on the treadmill in the gym, and managed 3
miles without too much bother. Guess it goes to show that all the gym
work I had been putting in had really had a pretty good effect on my
fitness levels. I followed this up with a run outside, actually up the
tarmac path beside the river and then up along the rowing lake and
back, total 4 miles, on the 25th March. My running had finally started
properly, and it felt a bit better than I had honestly expected. But after
a 4 mile run, the thought of doing that run three times in a row without
stopping, then adding on another mile and a bit for the fun of it, was
perfectly daunting. What on earth had I been thinking? OK, it was way
too late to back out, but for goodness sake, did people really do this for fun, for sport. Did they really join clubs and go out running together as
a hobby}
As usual, I stuck to the plan, more or less, and racked up a total of
10 miles in March! (Yes, that's right, I only did one more 3 mile run on
the treadmill - but it sounds so much better as a total of10 miles!)
During the first week of April I did two runs outside; 4 miles and 4.5
miles. Then it was time to see my doctor again, and I had a few things
to discuss this month. However, not surprisingly, he took the wind out
of my sails again.
"The weight's OK at 13 stone" he said.
"What do you mean, OK? That means I've lost over 14 1/2 stone, I'm
less than HALF what I was when I started! That's not just OK! That's bloody marvellousV
"Yes. I know. And if you carry on like this you'll be down to a BMI
of 27 next month and we can send you back to the surgeon. Now how's
the running?"
Always grounded was Dr Ken, my rock through all of this. But then
he got me worried when he took my blood pressure and pulse, and
announced that he was going to have to send me for tests.
"Whoa there. What tests?"
"I have to send you for an ECG, check your heart properly. It's the
rule when I record a heart rate like I just got on that check."
This had me worried now, however much he reassured me that this
was standard procedure. We'd been doing this for a couple of years
now, and he'd never sent me for tests before. And HEART tests as well
- never a good sign in your fifties. He explained at great length that the
exercise and weight loss had improved my heart strength enormously,
and that I now had a really strong, but very slow heart rate, normally
seen in the likes of top athletes. But the rules meant that anytime anyone
was seen with a heart rate that low, they had to cover themselves by
getting a full ECG to make absolutely certain. He was sure that there
would be no problem, but he couldn't write that number down in my
notes without sending me for the check-up. So the following Monday
I went for my ECG, wires were attached everywhere and then I was
hooked up to the machine which duly whirred away for a while and
spouted reams of paper. The lady operator had a long look at the traces,
then another long look, and refused to tell me anything as it was up
to the doctor to read them and tell me. Huge relief all round when he
pronounced that everything was in better than perfect working order
and that I had no right really to have a heart trace that good. End of
worries (there was never a dull moment though, when I got together
with Dr Ken!).
Not long after this little episode I stumbled across another new phenomenon
one night at the gym. I had finished my workout upstairs in
the main gym, and had gone down for my usual little session in the
steam room and Jacuzzi as a reward for a good workout. I was doing
a couple of lengths of the pool before popping into the steam room
when I noticed that an old friend from the Rotary Club was swimming.
I hadn't seen him there before, didn't even know he was a member, so
was quite surprised to see him. In fact I probably hadn't seen him at all
for probably 18 months or more. It was Tony, the guy who organised
the annual 10k road race for the club, and who had been something of
a runner in the past himself.
"Hi Tony." says I, all innocently. He ignored me. "Hi Tony", says I,
slightly more insistently.
"I'm sorry. I didn't realise you were talking to me. Do I know you?"
Now this is a guy I had dinner with every week for years. He had a
very good little printing works, and had done all my business printing
for a couple of companies that I had been running for a while. And here
he was, claiming not to know who on earth I was? When I explained,
in words of one syllable who I was, he initially refused to believe me, but
eventually realised that he did, in fact, recognise my voice, if not the
body it came from!
This was the first time, apart from the fun with the guys in Scotland,
that I had really encountered the simple fact that I was now unrecognisable
even to my local old friends and acquaintances, and it took a bit
of getting used to. We eventually ended up in the coffee bar for a longer
chat, and I was able to tell him that I was actually training to do The
Great North Run. This again took him a few minutes to assimilate, as
he had certainly never envisaged having to think of me doing a run like
that. But he was quick off the mark, and in no time at all had persuaded
me to run in the Deepings 10k race on 20th May, as,
"It would be at the perfect point in your training, for the half
marathon, and you will need to have some race experience."
Eventually I agreed, but only after he had spiced it up with a slightly
naughty little scheme. He would slip my entry through the computer
system, which he controlled anyway, without telling anyone at the Rotary
Club. On the day of the race I should just turn up, line up, and go, and we
could safely assume that no one else would recognise me. Then, during
the race, he would casually tell all the rest of the guys so that they would
know by the time I finished and could look out for me crossing the finish
line. He would give me an easy to spot number, to help them all pick me
out - in the end I had the running number 700. This definitely sounded like
a bit of fun, and I was suckered into entering my first ever race!
It was about this time that I got an email from Para Handy telling me
to look at a strange website that he had found. He wanted me to go on
to it, and put in my stats from before I started losing weight and also
my new stats now. Intrigued, I looked up the grim sounding link
www.deathclock.com and found The Death Clock a weird website
where you enter some simple facts about yourself, like body mass index
and age, and it supposedly gives you your expected date of death. I was
hooked immediately, so I began by putting in my before details, and
then my new ones. The stark truth was that whilst previously it reckoned
that I would have fallen very short of picking up my pension indeed, the new me apparently would last TWENTY FIVE YEARS LONGER! I
know perfectly well that this site is probably based on life expectancy
statistics used by the insurance companies, and that it is really just a bit
of fun, but there is a strong element of truth behind it in an all things
considered kind of way.
I now encourage anyone who is looking for extra motivation on their
own weight loss journey to have a look. I usually advise them to put in
their target weight and see the difference it will make. The potential
outcome has a wonderful way of concentrating the mind, but it is not
one for the superstitious or faint hearted.
By now I had also got used to posting entries on my blog on Realbuzz,
and had quickly realised that there was a very interactive community of
bloggers there. Any time you had any questions about any aspect of
running, there were always plenty of folk willing and able to come up
with all the right answers. I have always been the sort of guy who likes
to understand as much as possible about anything I get myself into, so
I was soaking up information like a sponge all the time. It was also
apparent that my somewhat unusual background to running, through
the weight loss and my slightly irreverent sense of humour, meant that
I was getting a number of regular visitors and comments on my blog,
and was getting to know a good number of people on the site. It was an
easy habit to get into, posting a blog entry and checking to see what
other regulars had been getting up to on most evenings. This community
spirit side of the site became obvious when I mentioned that I was going
to do this race, and immediately one of the other bloggers from fairly
nearby signed up to do the race with me. At the same time, a number
of the others were entering a 10k race to be held in June - the City of
Manchester 10k, based at the new City of Manchester Stadium. Now
Number One lives in Manchester, and I hadn't been over there for a while,
so I decided to enter that race as well, as it would give me an excuse to
see her, and also to meet finally with a number of people that I was talking to on an almost daily basis. So I entered online, and then stepped
back and realised that I was no longer just doing a run, but I was now
actually entered in three races! Only problem was that I still hadn't run
any further than 4 1/2 miles yet, and I was now supposed to do two races
of 6.2 miles in a few weeks. Had I lost some marbles, somewhere along
the way, without realising?
Actually, alongside entering races, my right knee had been hurting a
little at the end of that second run in the first week of April, and while
I was unsure of what caused it I didn't want to aggravate anything, so
cut back for a while to just doing my normal gym programme. I didn't
run at all the second week, but finally had a run on the treadmill in the
third week to see if everything was still in working order. I was pleased
that there was no recurrence of any discomfort, and managed a steady
3 miles without any problems. This was followed by a couple more runs
over the next few days, and then as the end of the month loomed it
dawned on me that the Deepings race was only three weeks away. The
race was 10k, or 6.2 miles, and the furthest I had run was 4.5 miles, and
that was the run when my knee felt funny. It was time to at least make
a serious attempt at running the race distance, or I could be making a real
fool of myself on the day. Looking back I have no idea how I managed
to do such a distance on a treadmill, but that is indeed what I did. In fact
I ran 7.4 miles on that infernal machine, and now knew for certain that
I could at least run the race distance with a bit to spare in the tank. It
was not very fast, and it was not very pretty, but it was at least done
now! April's total became 25 miles - quite a step up from March.
During the first couple of weeks of May I managed to get a run in
every other day, ranging from 2 to 7 miles, some in the gym on the
treadmill, some outside along the river bank and out towards the lakes
in the country park. The running, backed up with the more intensive
gym programme, was clearly turning some of the remaining fat into
muscles, in places where I had no real idea that I should have muscles.
Now as muscle weighs more than fat, this was not the clearest way to
a short term weight loss - but I reasoned that I was not after a short term
weight loss programme, so as long as the toning I was getting was
making sure I didn't have too much loose skin around the body showing
up as bingo wings or a floppy neck then it was doing all I could ask for.
May's check with the doctor revealed a couple more pounds were gone,
and he was now happy to refer me back to the reconstructive surgery
team as I would probably have lost the last little bit by the time I got an
appointment. When I got home I noted down my latest weight on the
spreadsheet I had drawn up so that I could see how I was progressing,
and something made me play around with some calculations. I had
actually lost over 200 pounds, and I was more surprised than anyone
else that I had actually been able to achieve that amazing number. Mind
you, although I had worked hard enough to ensure that I did not have
folds of loose skin in places where they would look unsightly to normal
public scrutiny, I did have the most advanced huge flap of loose skin
hanging down from my stomach, and the inside edges of my thighs were
by now looking pretty grim too.
I went for one more run on the Wednesday before the race, and before
I knew it I was all kitted out in my running gear, parked up, and walking
into the Deeping Rugby Club which they used as Race Headquarters
each year. This was going to be the real test, in more ways than one!
First and foremost, it would be a test of how on earth I would get on in
an actual running race. Me, in a running race, voluntarily, for goodness
sake, who would ever have thought it? Secondly, it would be a test of
whether any of the guys would actually recognise me, which would just
be a bit of fun. Thirdly, it would be a test of how they reacted when they
found out, and in a weird way this was actually extremely important
to me, as it would be a really good indication of how almost anyone I
had known over the years would probably react. I had to find out, and
not least I had to see how I reacted to their reaction, it was a sort of defining moment hiding behind playing a fun trick on some good guys.
As I walked into the club house I could see that two of the club stalwarts
were manning the late registrations desk, Mike and Derek. I knew
perfectly well that I had no reason to speak to them as I was long since
registered, and had my number pinned on my vest already, but I couldn't
resist the chance.
"Excuse me Gents, I've already got my number and stuff, but do I
have to sign in or anything?"
"No. You're fine. We don't need to check you in."
Hurdle one cleared with ease, absolutely no recognition in the slightest.
Now to be fair to the guys, I was dressed in running gear, and on reflection
I was brushing my hair slightly differently, but no recognition in the
slightest! Not even a second glance. At that point I spotted Tony doing
his race director thing in the corner, and wandered over and said "Hi"
in passing. He smiled broadly, and quietly said that he would tell them
all as soon as all the runners had left the field on the race.
Heading back outside I passed any number of the guys getting set
up for their various roles, and managed to offer a "Hi" or a "Good
Morning" to every one of them I spotted, and all with the same result
- that is no result. At this point I met up with Mel, a blogger from the
Realbuzz site who was also training for the Great North Run and had
decided to come and run this race when she had read about it on my
blog. Number Three and her boyfriend also showed up at this point.
None of the others were able to get there for the race, so she was on Keep an eye on Dad and phone to tell us which hospital they've taken
him to duty for the others. All of a sudden it was approaching race time,
so I did my last few warm up stretches, and walked across to the far side
of the field with all the other runners ready to line up. By now I was
taking note of what the other 200 or so runners looked like, and it was
clear that there were some pretty serious runners around, and very large
contingents from what were clearly local running clubs judging by their
various running colours. Actually the best clues were the names of the
running clubs on the vests in big letters, but please cut me some slack;
it was my first time taking note of such things! At this point discretion
was very clearly called for, so trying to look cool and as if this was a
normal Sunday morning pursuit, I slipped towards the back of the line
up so as not to get in anyone's way. At this point I also said "Good
Luck" to Mel, who was looking like a Whippet straining at the leash,
and it was clearly the last time I would see her before the end of the
race, and only then if she hung around to wait for me. Tony then took
out his megaphone and gave everyone their last instructions, and the
countdown began.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

OLD FRIENDS & A NEW FACE

NEXT THING I HEARD A HOOTER BEING SOUNDED, AND THE RACE HAD started. Up at the front of the pack, they took off like greased lightning,
but I quickly realised that that there were a good few more at home at
the back, and intent on keeping to a much more civilised and sedate
pace, so I wasn't going to be running alone. The route began by taking
us through the edges of the main residential area for about a mile or so,
where there were a good few folk around clapping and encouraging the
runners. At each junction there was a yellow-bibbed marshal making
sure that everyone was OK and going in the right direction, and I recognised
practically all of them from the Rotary Club. The runners around
me have by now thinned out a good deal, so I was able to call out a
greeting to each Marshall by name, as I passed. In every case there was
a mild query obvious on their face, as they failed to recognise someone
who clearly knew them by name, and it took my mind off the running
for short stretches.
Soon we cleared the housing area, and were now out on some back
lanes for the rest of the course. This was real fenland, flat as a pancake for
as far as the eye can see, and I remembered to thank the gods that they had
seen fit to keep the weather fine and calm. This could clearly be a pretty
evil course if the weather was to turn nasty, as there was no shelter of any
kind whatsoever. The runners were really thinning out now, but I could see
the whole of the rest of the route across the fields, and it wasn't so funny
to see just how far ahead the leading runners already were.
A couple of miles into the race, was the water station, strategically
positioned so that it served both directions at just the right stages of the
race. Some of the usual suspects were serving up plastic cups of water
to the runners, so it was another chance for some confusing name
dropping. Mind you, trying to drink cold water from a plastic cup
whilst running is virtually guaranteed to bring you to a choking halt, so
discretion dictates a walk break to make sure the drink goes down safely
in the right direction. A little further on and the route went off on a
very long loop of a couple of miles, before coming back on itself and
returning along the same route back to the rugby club. I was relieved to
get to the loop before any of the leaders were coming the other way,
saving a small degree of potential embarrassment, and at the turn I
spotted Tony's son acting as marshal there. He was the only other coconspirator,
and was kind enough to give me some really heartfelt
encouragement to keep me heading on.
After playing cat and mouse with some of the other back-markers
for a couple of miles, most of whom, like me, had by now resorted to
what is known as a run-walk strategy (run 5 or 10 minutes, walk one
minute) I finally turn onto the last long straight lane towards the finish,
but by now I'm feeling seriously knackered and just about ready to walk
the last 1,000 yards. At this point, Tom, another friend I'd known for
years, and who had done a fair bit of jogging in his time, appeared
alongside me on his bike. I remembered that I had mentioned to him a
couple of weeks back that I would be doing the race, and he had come
out looking for me especially to support me on the run. He kept me
going, chatting away, all down that long stretch, and really helped me
a lot just when I needed it.
Finally I reached the turn into the rugby field, and the final couple of
hundred yards across the grass to the finish line. What a wonderful sight
a finish line makes at the end of a race, I had clearly never appreciated the
finer points of their beauty before. Crossing that line was accompanied
by a smattering of cheers from the few supporters still waiting around, the
majority having found their way by now into the bar of the rugby club
for something to eat and a hot drink. My daughter was clearly hugely
relieved to see me back safe and well and with a smile on my face, and
the looks of astonishment on the faces of the finish line officials, who had
by now been told to look out for me finishing, was a picture.
Officially I had now finished my first race, the Deepings 10k, in a time
of 66 minutes 38 seconds, and was placed 189th out of 201 finishers,
so wasn't last either. Not bad from only 2 months of running training,
in my mid fifties, to go out on a Sunday morning and do a race just
over 6 miles long.
Once I had got myself a couple of cups of water, and collected my
finishers' commemorative mug, we headed for the bar as well to get
warmed up and also to have some proper conversations now with the
Rotary Club guys who had all been told by Tony, but were reluctant to
believe it. Probably needless to say, they were completely astonished!
Not only did they have the complete shock of seeing my new and
improved shape, which they found extremely hard to believe, but they
also had to get used to the fact that I had just run their 10k race, probably
the last person on the planet that they would ever have believed
would run it. Congratulations flew thick and fast, and I certainly didn't
have to pay for any of the food the ladies were serving up, or any drinks.
The biggest question of the day was clearly:
"How?"
How had I managed to lose the weight; how had I not got wrinkles
of loose skin on my face, my neck, my arms etc. I was still in my running
vest, so it was perfectly plain that I had managed to get reasonably well
toned given the amount of weight lost, and to be honest, it was probably
the best sort of clothes to be wearing as they could really see the new
me (if still just a little bit on the sweaty side).
While I was thoroughly enjoying the attention and praise, Tony came
over and told me that he wanted to have a chat properly, but that he had
to sort out the final results and arrange for the prize presentations so
that the winners could collect their spoils and get off home. So he asked
if I'd mind hanging on and he would see me and buy me a drink as soon
as they got it over and done with. I was in no rush to go anywhere, so
I told him it would be fine, and I would hang on. Mel and her boyfriend,
and Number Three and her boyfriend had Sunday lunches to go to, so
they said their farewells and left, and I stayed on chatting while we
waited for the presentations. To be honest, I'd never been to anything
like this before, even when I had helped out a few years before. I had
always done my bit and then disappeared rather than hang around with
a load of fit people. So I was quite interested to see who the best runners
were, and which running clubs they came from. It was not too long
before they had sorted out the results, and had set up a table with a
large number of plaques for the winning males and females, the age
group winners, the winning male and female teams and I don't know
what else.
Tony opened the proceedings with the Club President ready to start
giving out the prizes. At this point I finally realised just how stitched up
I had been, as his first announcement was about me doing the race. He
explained to everyone about my weight loss, that this was my first ever
race and they had a special plaque ready to give to me, amidst much
flashing of camera bulbs and applause. This was so totally unexpected
it took me quite unawares, and I was really struck by the warmth of the
reaction from the other runners. Luckily I didn't have to say anything,
but this gesture from the Club meant a huge amount to me. I had started
the day wondering about how people would react, how they would look
at me now, wondering if it would change any attitudes. The answer was
very clear and bold now, and positive in every way. I had nothing to fear
in the slightest, if anything I could even possibly detect a hint of respect
for my achievement, and it was certainly making me feel good about
myself in every way. The icing on the cake was that they told me that
I couldn't have the plaque to keep yet, as they were going to have it
engraved with my name and my time for the race - a fantastic gesture,
and what a wonderful souvenir of my first ever race.
I finally managed to extricate myself and head out, as I was still in
my running gear and was starting to become both unsightly and not a
little malodorous - I needed a shower! I had realised that my trip home
would take me past my gym club, so I had come prepared to stop off
there for a shower, and also for a long slow session in the steam room
and the Jacuzzi. I had certainly earned it, and it was a real treat after the
morning's exertions. So much so, that I made a mental note to try to
organise it so that I did this after any of my longer training runs. It also
gave me the opportunity to have a comfortable lie down and reflect on
the day. It had been so far out of the ordinary; I had enjoyed myself so
much in many ways; I had been able to allay my fears about old friends'
reactions to the new me, and I had taken the first proper step towards
doing the Great North Run. It had been A GOOD DAY in every respect.

CHAPTER TWELVE

THE R-EALBUZZ GANG

MAY 2007, AS IF IT HADN'T QUITE FINISHED WITH ME YET, SERVED UP ONE last pleasant surprise before it left. I received a letter informing me that
I had an appointment to see the consultant surgeon on 13th July. I was
definitely impressed with their speed this time, not only the speed with
which they had accepted the referral again and made an appointment,
but that the date was so soon too.
I also made myself another appointment before the month was out.
When I had got back to my car after the Deepings 10k there were a
number of flyers popped under my windscreen wipers, and on every
other car in the car park. Suspecting the usual load of rubbish about car
boot sales and special offers at new hairdressing salons, I was surprised to
find that they were all adverts for races organised by other local running
clubs through the summer. To be honest, I had never realised that there
was so much of this stuff going on around the area, and certainly I'd
never realised the number of running clubs that appeared to be thriving
right under my nose. Looking at the dates, distances and locations, I
quickly worked out that most of them would not fit my schedule at all,
but there was one 10k race, again quite close by, that looked good for
the 1st July, the Thurlby 10k, so I popped off an entry without a second
thought. I have no idea what on earth I was thinking about, as no other
race was going to have the same fun and friendly atmosphere as that
Rotary Club one, which was unique. I suppose in some way I was just
thinking that a couple more shorter races would help me get properly
prepared for the Great North Run, which was what it was all about.
However, I did start to get concerned when it began to appear that I
had made a serious miscalculation on this one.
Around the South Lincolnshire and North Cambridgeshire area is
some of the flattest country ever fashioned by either God or nature, and
I just made the natural assumption that as Thurlby was local, and I had
driven past it a few times on the A15 and not noticed anything unusual,
that it would naturally be another pretty flat course. Not long afterwards
I bumped into Tom, the friend who had encouraged me to the finish at
the Deeping 10k, and when I mentioned that I was also going to do the
Thurlby 10k he looked surprised and asked:
"So you are going to take on Cardiac Hill are you?"
Whoops! This was not in the masterplan. It wasn't supposed to include
running up anything that could possibly be described as Cardiac Hill. Homework was required immediately, and was obviously long overdue
on this one! I took a drive out to Thurlby, with the course map downloaded
from the internet, and introduced myself to Strawberry Hill,
which took up a significant chunk of the first third of the course, winding
its way up from the village to the site of the radio mast. From that day
onwards I have (almost) never entered a race without checking the course
profile in detail before even considering entering. It was a daunting
prospect to someone of my limited running training, but it also made me
go straight back to the Great North Run website and take a long hard
look at the course profile there for the first time properly. It was not
flat either, not by a long way. There are no really steep bits at all, but
there are some long gentle inclines that go on and on, most famously (or
should I say infamously) the notorious John Reid Road. My conclusion
was that if, in fact, the Great North Run was not flat then it was probably
a good idea to find out what running uphill was like sooner rather
than later. Lesson learned.
June brought with it the realisation that I had to make sure that I
was definitely below a body mass index of 27 by the time I saw the
surgeon on the 13th July, as I didn't want any more delays, or excuses
there. I had originally had no idea that surgery of this nature would be
possible on the National Health Service, so had not really been expecting
it at all. But once we had got this far with the surgical team, I could no
longer envisage not having the surgery. To fail on some technicality now
would be disastrous, as in the back of my mind I had already virtually
had it. This gave a new edge and focus to the eating habits during June,
although it would be fair to say that I didn't have to consciously make any
efforts when cooking or shopping any more, it had become the normal
routine to live by the new rules I had set myself. Not only could I actually
walk past a burger bar in the street without giving it a second thought,
but I even realised that I could buy something from one of these places
for one of my girls if they wanted, and not buy something for myself.
I was sticking as well as ever to my gym and running training, but
this extra exercise did need fuelling properly, so I began to look at the
proper nutrition for the body to be able to do this much work. Not only
was it new territory for my eating plans, it was a strange new world
for my physical self as well, getting used to doing serious exercise and
eating properly for it. As usual there was more information available
than any one person could possibly read, and enough different plans
and opposing ideas to try a different one every day of the year. It turned
out that the low Glycaemic Index foods were perfectly suited to running
as they released energy slowly. The only other main rule was to slightly
increase the protein intake to help to maintain and repair muscles, so a
little more meat and fish was added into the eating plan - particularly
chicken and tuna as I especially like them, and I also allowed a little
cheese back into the plan too (although the emphasis was on a little due
to the fat content as well).
With the food side of things better organised for the amount of running
I was now doing, I got on with the running! My simple little plan required
me to be up to 7 miles in June, so I suppose typically, I ran 7 miles on
the first of June. Now when I say I ran 7 miles, I don't want anyone to
get the wrong impression here. This was not a full-blooded impression
of an athlete, but more what I had by now realised was a thoroughly
legitimate strategy referred to in distance running circles as a run-walk method. So it was very largely running, but with the odd power walk thrown in now and again to give my body a chance to keep up with my
brain. The end result was an average pace of just over 11 minutes a
mile, so a bit on the slow side, but totally satisfactory none the less. I followed this up with a 6 mile run on the 3rd, which felt really lousy, but
recovered to do an 8 mile run on the 5th. I mixed in a couple of good
gym sessions over the next week, and a couple of shorter runs taking
advantage of the long evenings. The route I was using was along the
side of the river, and into Ferry Meadows, our local country park about
2 miles away which had a tremendous selection of different paths around
the lakes there, so it was always a pleasure to run in such peaceful and
pleasant surroundings.
By now, I should have realised that this was all going far too
smoothly. I was ahead of schedule on my training plan, and looking
forward to the Gity of Manchester 10k on the 24th. I had booked a
room in a hotel recommended by the running club organising the race,
as Number One was working some pretty strange hours and I wanted
to get a good night's sleep before the race. My brother and his family
lived in Cheadle, on the southern edge of Manchester, and my mother
lived a few hundred yards from them, but I wanted to keep away from
them on this particular weekend. My nephew was getting married in
September, and it was going to be a big family get-together. I had not
actually seen any of them for a year or more, so apart from talking on
the phone and mentioning I had lost a bit of weight, I had decided to
maximise the impact just before the Great North Run, when the whole
family would be together for the first time in ages. I was intending to
wander into the hotel where we were all staying for the festivities, and
basically see how long they took before they recognised me. I couldn't
afford to spoil the surprise by dropping in on some of them now, so I
made sure they had no idea I was going to be there that weekend. My
nephew himself knew, as I had recently helped him to move. He was in
the RAF, and was moving from RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire to
RAF Marham in Norfolk, and hadn't passed his driving test yet, so I
offered to do the honours as it was a lot easier for me, being near
Marham, than for his Dad who was in Manchester. When I picked him
and all his gear up, I had sworn him to secrecy - relatively easily bearing
in mind his state of shock - and he had kept his word impeccably.
So all was set, and the trip to Manchester for my second race was fast
approaching, when I went out for a run on the 15th June. I was cruising
along comfortably about 6 miles into the run, when I suddenly got a
sharp pain in my ankle, at the back around the Achilles tendon. I simply
couldn't run on it any more, it was far too painful, and it hurt a fair bit
just to walk on it. My only problem was getting home. How would I get
home - I was out on deserted pathways on the edge of the park, with
no money on me, not that that would have made any difference as I was
a fair way away from the nearest road or bus route. I had no option but
to walk the 2 1/2 miles home on a dodgy ankle. It was not much fun, but
I made it back OK. I remembered seeing a physiotherapist working at
the gym, in fact I think he had his clinic set up in one of the rooms there,
so I called the gym to get his number, and made an appointment to see
him urgently. He quickly decided that it was Achilles Tendonitis - a strain
in the tendon at the back of the ankle (in English). He hooked me up to
various bits of equipment which apparently did strange and wonderful
things (appropriate for people with Achilles Tendonitis), in the right
places. Then he promptly announced that if I behaved myself, did as I
was told, and came back to see him in a couple of days, that I would
probably be all right in time for the race. Massive relief ensued, as I had
feared the worst for a while there, and really didn't know what I would
have done if he had told me I couldn't do the Great North Run after all.
At the end of that traumatic week, the Saturday was a theatre night.
Number Four is a very talented actress and singer, and that's not just my
highly biased opinion but the opinion of a number of local drama societies,
and the main youth theatre group in the city. This group was putting on
a performance of a clever piece of work called Our Day Out at the mam theatre in the city. We all had an excellent evening's entertainment, and
I got the excuse to spend a Saturday evening resting my ankle without
having to explain it all to anyone.
The next week shot by in a blur of physiotherapy appointments,
evenings in the steam room and Jacuzzi at the gym, rather than in the gym itself, and wondering whether I would be able to race at the weekend
(or if my ankle would cope with driving all the way there first). Finally,
on the Friday, Paul, the physio, told me that I would be fine to run on
the Sunday, but to make sure that I rested the ankle till the race. This
was a huge relief, as I had been looking forward to this race for weeks well
to be fair not necessarily looking forward to the race, but to meeting
up with so many of the people I had virtually met on the blogging site,
and who had been so supportive in their comments and encouragement.
So on the Saturday I drove the 160 odd miles over to Manchester,
and booked into the hotel - once I had finally found it! Shortly after
arriving I made contact with Number One on the phone, and she came
over to the hotel. I don't know Manchester very well at all, so she drove
us into the centre and we found a great little Italian restaurant for a
delightful meal and a great catch-up chat. By now I had also come to know
that pasta on the night before a race is almost obligatory for runners, as
it gives you a high quality carbohydrate boost to increase your energy
levels for the race. Although this is not so important for shorter races
like the 10k that weekend, it is still a good idea. When preparing for
longer races, like half marathons and full marathons, most training plans
include what is known as carb-loading in the final few days before the
run. This is to boost to the maximum energy stored by the body, which
cannot normally store enough energy to fuel itself for a marathon. Running
26 miles will burn anything up to 4000 calories - which is more
than the body can store (a bit like having a fuel tank in your car which
will let you drive 400 miles, then trying to do 600 miles of driving), so carb-loading is like creating a short term auxiliary fuel tank for another
100 miles of driving. When the energy store runs out, that's when
marathon runners hit the wall - they literally have the will to continue,
but the body is no longer able to function as the muscles have no fuel
left. So the more you boost the auxiliary energy tank the better - and
on the run you need to take extra energy on board to fill that gap at the
end, usually by taking special energy drinks.
Anyway, we went for a pasta meal even though it was only a 10k
race - why tempt fate? We also both needed to head our separate ways
quite early, she because of her work shifts, and me because I needed a
good night's sleep ready for an early start in the morning. It was a real
treat to spend an evening with her, as we didn't often get the chance for
a one-to-one chat nowadays. But all good things must come to an end,
so she dropped me back at the hotel, and I managed to avoid the lure
of the bar and got my head down.
Race day saw me up bright and early for a quick breakfast, change
into my running gear, and off in the car to try to find the race venue. It
proved relatively simple, as it was at Sportcity, which included the City
of Manchester Stadium - built for the 2002 Commonwealth Games and
now home to the Manchester City football team, and the very much
smaller athletics track. What really made it easy to spot was the quite
remarkable giant sculpture, the tallest in Britain, known as the B of the
Bang which dominated the road junction on the corner of the site. I soon
discovered that the name came from a quote by Linford Christie, the
Olympic Sprinter, who said that he always started his races on the B of
the Bang from the starting gun. Safely arrived, I parked in the enormous
car park and joined the throng of runners and supporters making their
way across to the athletics track where the race would start. This was
a very different affair to the little run in the Deepings, as there were
well over 1,000 runners participating, and the local radio station was
covering the event live. I had numerous photographs of other bloggers
burned into my memory, and it was remarkably easy to spot the first
few, which led to all the others as they had already congregated together.
The period up to the race itself was just a mad session of introductions,
hugs, photos and excited chatter, broken only by quick toilet breaks and
not so quick stretches and warm-ups as we prepared for the off. Leaving
the various supporters and family members who had accompanied them
in the stands, we all made our way to the track, wished each and everyone
good luck, and merged into the crowd of runners. This was seriously
different to anything I had ever attempted before, and was far from
being a couple of hundred runners out on Sunday for a run round the
village in aid of the local Rotary Club. I was not going to be singled out
or given special plaques here, just merge into the background and hope
that I didn't make too much of a fool of myself. Luckily, there was so
much going on, and so many people talking to or at you, I clean forgot
to worry about my dodgy ankle. I managed to insert myself about
halfway back in the field of runners, and in a very short time the gun
went and we were off.
The route was out of the athletics track, round the outside of the
main stadium and the sculpture thing, then down the main road to the
gasworks. Turn left and through the housing estate, ending back at the
track, and on for a second lap. This lap was a bit shorter than the first,
taking a different route through the local neighbourhood, and then the
third and final lap was shorter still, missing the housing area and coming
straight back through the car park, up the main approach to the big
stadium, then veering off to finish on the athletics track. There was quite
a large turnout of supporters at some parts of the course, and I was
struck by how dramatically the route changed as you ran round. One
moment you were running past a magnificent modern super-stadium,
then past a world famous and very iconic sculpture, only to find yourself
a few minutes later running through some pretty basic back streets scarred
by a degree of clearly hard times. It appeared to me as if the organisers
had found a way of showing us a microcosm of the extreme faces of the
incredible mix which was the magnificent city of Manchester.
Eventually I approached the finish, and when I finally ran into the
athletics track for the last couple of hundred metres it was a whole new
experience to have a small crowd of bloggers cheering me home (needless
to say I think they had all got back well before me, or at least the majority
of them). The next, and surprising, new experience was to be ushered
along after the finish, to keep out of the way of other runners finishing
BEHIND me, and then to be handed a bag of goodies and a bottle of water
by a pleasant young Army Cadet Corps lad. The piece-de-resistance was
being asked my size and handed a very smart race finishers T-shirt,
before being politely moved on to the meet-and-greet area, where I was
re-united with the Realbuzz Gang. Lots of photos were snapped at random, and cameras were handed around till there were no more angles,
or groupings left to preserve for posterity. Performances were compared
and contrasted, and I was struck by another simple but totally endearing
reality about these running folk. No one cared at all if anyone had
beaten them or were beaten by them, and race position comparisons were
ignored. The only thing that mattered to every one of them was how
they had done against their own record, and their own expectations. If
someone had achieved a PB (Personal Best time for the distance) then that
was a definite reason for celebration. In fact it outranked the performance
of someone who might have run very much faster, but had been a bit
slower than their usual time. On reflection, I realised that technically I
had achieved a PB myself, as I had just clocked a time of 63 minutes and
44 seconds, a massive 2 minutes 54 seconds faster than my time at the
Deepings 10k a month earlier, so that received much praise too. My
position was 971 out of 1,114, so not last by quite a handsome margin.
In the end we all had to drag ourselves away as time progressed, and
I had to get back to the hotel, grab a shower and a change into some
proper clothes before check out time, which I actually managed. The
drive back was pleasant and uneventful, which is in itself an event. It is
almost unheard of for me to have a clear and unfettered run back across
the Pennines, and down to the Fens. Normally the dreaded M62 and Al
conspire between them to create some sort of motoring chaos as soon
as they realise I am in the vicinity, but they were in utterly benign mood
that day, and provided me with another PB for the drive home. It had
been a thoroughly successful and extremely enjoyable weekend in every
respect, and it was already pretty clear that I had begun to gather a
completely unexpected and delightful new circle of friends through this
running and blogging routine. Looking back a year or two later, the
folk I met at the City of Manchester 10k that weekend have remained
good friends, constantly corresponding through the blogs, and meeting
up randomly from time to time. Wendy, Russell, Paul, Martin, Laura,
Andy and Jamie turned from being virtual people to real people, and
from being virtual friends to real friends in the span of a single morning,
and to a significant degree made another major contribution to what I
had started to refer to mentally as Project TISM.


CHAPTER THIRTEEN

HALF THE MAN I USED TO BE
THE VERY NEXT DAY AFTER THE MANCHESTER RACE I WAS BOOKED IN FOR my usual visit to the doctor, and he assured me that all was fine ahead
of the impending visit to see the surgeon. When I got back afterwards
and did the maths to convert his kilos into real weights, I realised that
he had finally confirmed that my weight was officially 12 stone 11.8
pounds. I had actually beaten my target of 12 stone 12 pounds - that
figure I had a vague recollection of being at one stage when I was at
school. I had never really thought it would be possible, had thought
maybe I would get a bit close to it, but here I was - ACTUALLY AT MY
TARGET WEIGHT. I was staggered, and unbelievably delighted with
myself, I had actually done it!
To say I was pleased with myself is perhaps one of the biggest understatements
I could possibly make. I was ECSTATIC! I really didn't
get much sensible work done that day - I simply couldn't concentrate.
It had taken me 2 1/2 years from way back in January 2005 when I found
out I weighed 27 stone 8 pounds (386 pounds) to get to 12 st 12 lbs
(180 pounds). I had lost 14 st 10 lbs (206 pounds), and when I was
playing the numbers through my head the old Beatles song 'Yesterday'
kept popping up - you know the line,
"Suddenly, I'm not half the man I used to be... "
It was absolutely true, I actually weighed LESS THAN HALF of what
I used to weigh. How mad was that? I really DID deserve the nickname
The Incredible Shrinking Man. After all, I had now shrunk to less than
half my size. I got quite carried away with checking numbers - I even got
the tape measure out to do some checking, just so that I would know!
I had lost 7 inches from my neck.
I had lost 23 inches from my waist. (If I held the skin flap out of the
way!)
I had gone down a shoe size - now who would have ever thought
that would happen?
I checked through the remnants of my old wardrobe, and my hats
were too big for me now, and slipped right down over my eyes. Even my
gloves were loose and uncomfortable. In fact I realised that I only had
two things that still fitted me from my old wardrobe - my ties and my
belts. OK you might think that's cheating a bit - I had to make new
holes in the belts and cut a couple of feet off the ends - but nothing else
fitted. It was almost symbolic really, like shedding the old appearance
once and for all. I even realised, in this orgy of self-awareness and self
congratulation, that I was brushing my hair differently now and had
allowed myself a small sort of goatee beard thing on my chin (I had
always had a moustache, so it wasn't that big a deal). There was definitely
some sort of psychological stuff going on to reinforce this whole new
image thing in more ways than I had really focussed on, but it didn't feel
like a bad thing at all. On the contrary, the new package felt damned
good from the inside, and if anybody else really preferred the old look
then they had better keep quiet and learn to live with it. This new me was here to stay!
I had a couple of really great runs during the week, while the euphoria
stayed with me and lightened everything I did. I wasn't doing anything
too drastic this week as I had a heavy weekend coming up, including
having to face Cardiac Hill in the Thurlby 10k Race that Sunday. I'll
never really know what on earth had possessed me to enter two 10k
races on consecutive Sundays - it's not as if I was used to doing this sort
of thing. Firstly I had to get through the Saturday task of driving over to
Nottingham to load up the car and move Number Three from her digs
over there back towards home. She had been working in Nottingham
since deciding, after a full year of training at Queens Medical Centre in
Nottingham University, that nursing was really not what she wanted
to do for the rest of her life. Now she was finally moving back and had
decided to move in with her boyfriend who had recently been provided
with a very nice big bungalow attached to his work. So I had been
elected to provide the transport, yet again. I had got used to this over
the years, with various moves to and from universities, and was now an
expert at loading vast amounts of rubbish (aka But I need that, Dad) into the car. That move went perfectly smoothly, and by Saturday
evening all was quiet again and an early night was achieved.
Sunday dawned brightly and in no time I was off for the relatively
short drive to Thurlby, about 15 miles north of Peterborough on the A15.
This time I was meeting up with Sophie, a blogger who was studying
modern languages at Durham University, and her boyfriend. Her folks
lived not too far away, and the two of them had decided to come over
to do the run when I had mentioned it in my blog. This was much more
like the Deepings 10k, a local village race, principally comprised of
members of the local running clubs, and a few privateers like Sophie,
and I. My first surprise of the day came when I spotted Dr Ken in the
small crowd milling around before the start. It turned out that he hadn't
come to run, and certainly hadn't come to see me run, as he was as
surprised to see me as I was to see him. He had actually come to watch
and support one of his offspring in the 3k fun run, but it did provide the
opportunity to discover that he had done some running himself in his
younger days, right up to running the London Marathon. Maybe this
finally explained why he had suggested that I do a run!
When the time arrived, all the runners trooped across to the far side
of the playing fields and onto a residential road, where we were quickly
lined up and sent on our way. The course wound its way through the
houses for nearly a mile, before turning onto the road out of the village
and up what Tom had called Cardiac Hill but which I now knew to be
more correctly referred to us Strawberry Hill. Basically it headed out of
the village in a more or less straightish line uphill for about a mile until
it arrived at the foot of the radio mast. I had not previously realised
such hills existed in this area until my research visit, having believed it
to have been where the original architect of the universe had abandoned
his Steam Iron when he realised that hills and mountains actually looked
good. This damned hill just kept disappearing upwards, along with
Sophie, her boyfriend, and most of the other runners. Luckily there was
a fair smattering of more sedate individuals so that I certainly didn't
end up feeling lonely as I finally crested the top to what were pretty
stunning views, to be honest.
From there we turned left, and the route basically formed a large square
through some pretty little hamlets and farms dotted about otherwise
extremely rural lanes. The contrast to running through the highs and
lows of inner city Manchester the previous week could not have been more
marked. Scenically, they were at the two opposite ends of the spectrum,
but the Manchester route had not been without its charms, and had been significantly enhanced by the tremendous support of the residents
all the way round. Here, with the tail end of the field strung out along
the country lanes, most of the time the only observers were dumbstruck
wildlife and the odd cow. Nevertheless it was a thoroughly enjoyable
run, and on the basis that what goes up, must come down (the race
finished back at the playing fields where it had started), once we had
passed the radio mast the rest of the route was primarily gently downhill.
The final mile back into the village and round towards the finish area
was buoyed up by an increasing numbers of spectators providing
encouragement from their front gardens. The last few hundred yards
were almost crowded, and it was good to finish to a hearty and well
meant round of applause from the previous finishers. This is another
delightful aspect of these smaller local races. Virtually everyone stays
around the finish area until the last runners are home, and everyone is
given the same welcome and congratulations on finishing from the first
to the last finisher. There is no elitism as a general rule, just a broad
camaraderie that encompasses everyone. My time was a little quicker
than at the Deepings 10k at 66 minutes 16 seconds, which was a good
performance given that damned hill. For the record, I finished 143 out
of 154 finishers, so once again I wasn't last! The reward here was my
first race medal, given to everyone who finished rather than a T-shirt or
a mug. I really liked having that hung round my neck and being able to
wear it while we had a chat and a cup of coffee; I decided not to chance
the sausages or burgers that were being enthusiastically barbecued by
the local scout troop.
A couple of pictures later (with medals), Sophie and Chris had to hit
the road back to Northamptonshire, and so I hit the road back, which
luckily, again, went right past the gym where I stopped off for a melt in
the steam room, and a relax in the Jacuzzi before heading home. It was
while I was bubbling gently in the spa that it occurred to me that my
next race really was The Great North Run, and that it was only 3
months away. I also realised that it would mean, effectively, doing the
run I had just done at Thurlby, then doing it again for a second lap,
then doing another mile just to round it off. Not only was it feeling
more real, but the prospect was becoming more daunting by the minute
too. It certainly gave a new edge to the training runs from that point.
As the timescales got shorter and shorter towards the big run, it was
time to get a little more serious about the sponsorship side of things. I
had got my place in the Great North Run by being given a Bond Place by The Prostate Cancer Charity as I wanted to run for them.
Most of the larger charities have these bond places for the big, really
popular runs that are oversubscribed, and they are a strange partnership
between race organisers, charities and the runners. I had not known
anything about these until getting mine, but had immediately cottoned
on to what it was all about. Most races around the world are simply enter and go races, but there a good many now where more people
want to run than the race organisers can accommodate. The few runners
who can get the qualifying times get automatic entry to most races, but
the rest have to apply through a random ballot, which is usually hugely
oversubscribed. It has now become usual for race organisers to sell a
large number of entries to the race to the charities, at a huge premium
to normal entry cost, in some cases as much as ten or more times the
normal fee. This creates substantial extra revenue for race organisers,
and allows charities to effectively ask runners to bid for entries. This has
now become regularised so that charities set tariffs for their places for
different races, according to the type of race and likely demand for
places from runners who are not lucky in the general ballot. To obtain
the place, runners have to sign a bond to the charity for the amount of
the tariff, so that if they fail to raise the required amount they make up
the shortfall to the charity themselves.
My bond tariff for the Great North Run was 400 pounds that year. For races
like the London Marathon the tariff is usually something around 1500 pounds
to 2000, pounds depending on the charity. So I was on the hook for 400, pounds
which was not too daunting really. I was introduced by The Prostate
Cancer Charity to a marvellous website called www.justgiving.com which allowed anyone to easily set up a personal page for sponsors to
make payments online, direct to your chosen charity, in your name. This
saved me the bother of extracting cash from people, and also meant I
could send out an email to everyone I knew with a link to the web page,
and be able to raise sponsorship from donors I might not otherwise see
face to face. So I set up my page, set my target at the required 400, pounds and
sent off a batch of emails to all and sundry. Now bearing in mind that
a lot of these people would have not have seen me for a year or two, and
probably had no idea that I had been on Project TISM, I made sure I put
a before and after photo on the webpage. This made me pretty certain
that the shock factor would probably mean some pretty good donations,
at least, once people had recovered their breath! As predicted, it had
the desired effect, and in the first few days I had to quickly edit my target
upwards as I didn't want anyone thinking they didn't need to donate
any more as I had hit my target. Within the first couple of weeks of it
going live I had to raise it again to 1,000 pounds to keep ahead of the game
and I could already stop worrying as I had exceeded the bond tariff of 400 pounds pence(Before the race took place I actually had to raise it to 2,000 pounds pence
All this, plus the training, kept me occupied until the appointment
with Mr Malata, the Consultant Reconstructive Surgeon. As the day
approached it suddenly dawned on me that the appointment was actually
on Friday the 13th July, and immediately I set about persuading myself
that I was not in the least bit superstitious. This was just a pure coincidence,
and Friday 13th was just an urban myth, an old wives tale sort
of thing. This time I was not going to be unlucky again, but we were
going to do the business without a problem.
When I was finally ushered in, his first reaction was delight that I had
clearly gone away and done as I was bidden. He got the nurse to check
my weight, and confirmed that the BMI target had been duly beaten,
and we could go ahead and get this done. At this point I mentioned that,
although at the previous meeting I had said that my thighs were not a
problem, with the extra weight loss and the running they were now
getting significant loose rolls of skin down the insides of the thighs. He
took a look and said that they were indeed worth doing in his opinion,
and he would be delighted to do them, although it was not something the
local NHS Primary Care Trust would normally fund. He did say he would
talk to my doctor and discuss putting me up as a special case for their
consideration. We then went on to discuss the detail of the operation,
and he said that he had never seen such an extreme case, and it would
be good to do this for me. He looked at his file, and said that he would
need me in for the operation in about 8 weeks.
Disaster! I hastily explained that I was, in fact, running the Great
North Run for the Prostate Cancer Charity on 30th September, and
could we possibly arrange to do it in such a way as it didn't interfere
with this important part of The Project. He was brilliant, and even asked
if I was planning for a little break after the run to recover properly. When
I explained that I was actually supposed to be going down to Spain with
the boys for our annual outing a week or two after the run, he said
that he would be delighted to perform the operation as soon as I got
home from Spain. RESULT. Simple as that! I was to have a Fleur-de-Lys
Paniculectomy, more or less whenever it suited me. Apparently he had
originally been intending to do a simpler operation, just slicing me
across the stomach, but I had now lost so much weight, and there was
more loose skin than he had seen before, so he was going to do the first
slice and then add another vertical slice up to my breast bone. At this
point I ducked out of the conversation as it was all getting a little bit too
graphic and I was intending to leave the worrying till the night before the
operation when it was too late to back out. He finished by congratulating
me on what he described as an extraordinary achievement, and
assured me that he would write straight away to my doctor about the
thighs, and that I should go and see him soon. Making the appointment
was the first job as soon as I got back to the flat, as it could sometimes
take a fortnight if I was fussy and actually wanted to see my own doctor.
The next couple of weeks were fairly quiet on most fronts, and I got
some good runs in around Ferry Meadows. One of my early acquisitions
on the running equipment front had been a Garmin Forerunner 305 basically
a fancy piece of kit which was a satellite system on your wrist,
with the addition of a heart rate monitor band which you strapped
round your chest. This gave me a read out on my wrist of time, speed,
distance and heart rate, and was extremely useful for my training. I no
longer had to plan where I should run to get the right distance, but
could just run where I fancied on the spur of the moment, and be able
to see the distance in metres as I went, and could check my speed at any
time. After each run, I could plug it into the computer and get a map of
where I had run, and also check the statistics for the run, and compare
it to previous runs to see if I was making any improvements.
When I had mentioned on my blog that I had now acquired a Garmin,
I was immediately advised that it was a bloggers tradition to have a nickname
for it. I now realise that this is because it is a totally invaluable part
of running training, as it monitors you on the run, gives you accurate
time and distance, keeps you on your pace, and tells how you are
improving. I thought long and hard about a nickname over the next few
runs. In the end my sense of history, and perhaps some strange hidden
sense of the future, prompted me to call it Dippi. Now I realise that this
sounds very shallow and frivolous at first glance, which also adds a bit
to the fun. I had begun to think of this piece of kit as the heart of my
running training, and remembered that the very first marathon was run,
according to Greek legend by a soldier called Phidippides. Dippi is
therefore a simple extract of the heart of PhiDIPPIdes!
On one run, when I had decided to drive out to a particular car park
and go for a shortish run round one of the lakes, rather than run the
extra 2 miles each way to get out there in the first place, I switched on
the Garmin in the car and was waiting for it to pick up the satellites,
when I noticed that it was showing my resting heart rate as 39 beats per
minute. Now I know that with the weight loss, and all the cardiovascular
exercise I was doing, I now had a relatively low heart rate, but this was
quite seriously low, so I started the record button just to get it on the
print out before I started the run. Once I got back I checked the stats,
and printed off the heart rate chart so that I could show the doctor
when I saw him next.
The training plan I was working to said that I should be up to 8 miles
in July, but, as I had already done at least one run of 8 miles in June, I
hit 9 miles a couple of times, and then just before I saw the doctor again
I did my first run of 10 miles. At this point I was now two full months
ahead of schedule, and according to all the advice on the Great Runs
website I was now at the point where I could successfully do the Great
North Run. Strangely, when training for a half marathon or a marathon,
apparently it is not necessary to train right up to the full distance,
because the crowds of supporters and the other runners, and the
atmosphere, will carry you the extra few miles on the day. By know
I had also decided that I would definitely NOT run the full distance
before the race, just so that the actual race itself would really be the
very first time I ran a half marathon.
So, when I saw Dr Ken on the 26th I was in a pretty good mood.
Training was going well, and ahead of schedule; the surgeon was going
ahead with the operation at last; I had hit my target weight. We discussed
the operation, and also the potential for doing the thighs. He repeated
what the surgeon had said about it not normally being something that
would be done, but he was perfectly happy to write to the Primary Care
Trust and ask if they would fund it in my case. I then told him about the
heart rate, and showed him the chart I had printed off. I should have
realised what this would mean, without thinking about it, but it hadn't
occurred to me. I was immediately told to book another ECG to have
my heart checked over again. Apart from that everything else was fine.
Then he started to assess the current position. He told me that, although
he enjoyed seeing me most months, I had long since stopped taking any
prescriptions and that I clearly (subject to the ECG) had absolutely
nothing wrong with me at all. Therefore, once I had seen him with the
results of the ECG, he really didn't need to see me regularly any more.
Fair enough, I thought.
August started with a totally weird experience; a rugby international
at Twickenham IN AUGUST] They were having some special pre-world
cup friendly internationals, and because of the time of year tickets had
been unusually easy to get hold of - Twickers wasn't even completely
full. Going to the old place to watch England on a glorious summer
Saturday afternoon was almost surreal, certainly seeing England beat
Wales 62 points to 5 was totally surreal! The day was great fun all
round, as I had got hold of enough tickets to be able to take Number
Three's boyfriend along. All my girls have been there a time or two singing
'Swing Low, Sweet Chariot' in a crowd of 80,000 at Twickenham
is one of those things that has to be ticked off on life's shopping list. He
was a firm rugby fan and played at university, but had never been there,
so we put that right as soon as we could. He was also introduced to the
delights of the steak baguettes produced by the South African barbecue
which is always set up in someone's front garden about 300 yards from
the stadium on the right as you walk up from the station. This is an
absolutely integral part of the day - one on the way to the ground, and
another on the way back.
Now I know that you will be thinking 'How does a barbecued steak
in a white baguette fit the diet plan?', and you would normally be right
to question it - and even more right to question the second one on the
way back, and probably the beers in the ground too if I had mentioned
them! This can all be safely covered by reference to the special mantra I mentioned earlier during the Crete trip:

Feed the body correctly - but don't forget to feed the soul'
now and again.

Although certain things might not fit the perfect diet plan, your
quality of life goes down too much to bear without them. Every now
and again you have to make sure you have a treat, if for no other
reason than that it makes you feel good. Call it whatever you like, but
essentially it is what I call soul food, whatever it is. So every now and
again, when tickets could be had, this was a day out which simply HAD
to bow to our long family traditions, and it always feels good.
The following Saturday was probably even more expensive, but
unique and very special. Number Three's 21st birthday was only a few
days away, and this was the night when we could all be together for a
meal out. As was always the case, she had a free choice of where she
wanted to have the meal (dangerous, I know, but what the heck? They're
only 21 once!). Unsurprisingly she chose the place where over the years
we had celebrated most of these types of event - the floating Chinese
Restaurant on the river in the middle of the City. We'd probably been
going there off and on for something like 15 years, and had never had
a poor meal, and I know the girls all love the place. The whole family
were there, and of course her boyfriend, and I had even been persuaded
to invite the boyfriend's parents too - a great couple that we had
bumped into a few times over the years through school and always got
along with well. We had a great night, and I even managed to get a
photo or two of all four girls dressed for a night out - a distinct rarity
now with them starting to scatter around the country.
It had been a hectic few weeks, with so much going on, and the
autumn was starting to hold the promise of bringing The Project to a
finish. With the run being done, and the surgery now booked, it looked
as if I might finally be able to draw a line under things and declare The
Project successfully completed. How little did I know?
On the Sunday I went for a great 10 1/2 mile run on a very hot sunny
morning. Normally I would have waited till late afternoon when it was
starting to cool off a bit, but I had realised that on the day of the race I
wouldn't have that choice. So now I was trying to go for a longer run at
11:00 on Sunday morning each week, just to get used to doing it so it
wouldn't hold any nasty surprises on the big day. On the Monday I
packed my bags and my laptop computer, and headed for the airport
last thing in the evening to be ready for a very early flight on Tuesday
morning. Even though I would be going there with the boys in October,
after the Great North Run, I was off to Spain (well it's a lovely country)
for 11 days for a summer holiday and another two new experiences I
would never have contemplated before.



CHAPTER FOURTEEN

IN THE MEDIA

JUST AS I WAS GETTING READY TO HEAD OFF FOR THE HOLIDAY, I RECEIVED a letter which was a guarantee of leaving in exceptionally high spirits.
The Primary Care Trust had considered my doctor's request for the
thigh operation, backed up by the surgeon, and had immediately agreed
to fund it. This was fantastic news, and I knew I was extremely lucky
to be given this opportunity. I immediately sent the Trust an email with
my thanks and appreciation.
Now I had been talking to The Prostate Cancer Charity about fund
raising tips to help me get as much sponsorship money as possible for
doing The Great North Run, and they were very keen on trying to get
bits into your local paper wherever possible. We had some long chats
about what the story might be, and their PR people had got involved as
they decided that they rather liked my story so far, and thought it might
get some good media interest. We hadn't done anything yet, as they
thought it should only be tried nearer to the actual run when it was
more topical, but they anticipated talking to some media seriously at the
beginning of September. I had also begun to notice that I was getting a
lot of questions on the blog now from people wanting to know how I
had been losing the weight, and what my diet was, and all sorts of bits
and pieces. It seemed that quite a lot of people were now taking an
interest in my ramblings on the blog, and I had a feeling that this might
increase if the PR people managed to get any articles printed, and that
meant possibly lots more questions. So I had concluded that it would
probably be a good idea to prepare a set of answers to most of the usual
questions, that I could then wheel out when required. Then I finally
decided to make them available to anyone 
who wanted to see them, and that meant putting them on a little
website. So I also now had to find a bit of time, and some peace and quiet,
to get this done in time for anything that might happen with the press
before the run, and that's why I took my laptop with me on holiday.
I was going down to Southern Spain and staying on Para Handy's
new boat in a lovely little marina between Estepona and Gibraltar, and
had already checked that there was a Wi-Fi service in the port. When he
had upgraded his little speedboat to a serious six berth cruiser and the
offer to stay on the boat was first made, I had decided that I would take
the chance to do the three day intensive course run by a company down
there and try to get my Day Skippers licence which is a legal requirement
for anyone wanting to use a boat in Spanish waters. I had sailed racing
dinghies to quite a high standard up until I left school, and graduated
to offshore racing yachts at one stage. So I already had an excellent
knowledge of boats, and safety on the water, although engines remained
a mystery to me. It had been an awfully long time since I was on a boat,
but once these things are ingrained in you they never completely go
away. The boat I was staying on was a beauty, American designed and
therefore roomy inside. It slept four easily and comfortably, (or six very
close friends), with shower, toilet, galley and all mod cons, so was as good
as a really big caravan. The interesting bit was the two corvette engines
which drove her fast enough to water ski behind! So the holiday plan
was a ten day break, staying on the boat, and doing the licence course
over the first three days. Chilling out and doing the website on my laptop,
and doing nothing much else for the rest of the stay, completed what
had the appearance of an excellent plan. It was also a relatively cheap
way of getting a great holiday somewhere very warm, in high season!
The course itself was very intense, one-to-one on the boat, everything
from knots to navigation charts, machinery to man overboard drill. We
even had to go on a night navigation exercise down the coast very late
one night, which got quite exciting at the point when one of the engines
failed about 3 miles offshore. It turned out not to be anything too
serious, and was quickly put right in the light of day, but made for an
interesting couple of hours limping back to home port in the dark. It
was great to be able to do this course in the shadow of the Rock of
Gibraltar, and with the promise of the company of dolphins at any time
- although I never saw one at all. I'm of the opinion that the dolphins
off that part of the coast of Spain are closely related to a certain Scottish
legendary water dweller! However I would have to say that the main
thing I learned during those few days was that I still infinitely prefer a
sail to an engine on a boat. A power boat attacks the waves, and
bounces around on them, but a sailing boat cuts through the water and
waves, and works with the sea at all times making a much smoother
ride. The other significant difference was, having to call into the fuel
station on the way out of the harbour, and spend a fortune to fill the fuel
tanks so that you could watch the dials go back down before your very
eyes if you really opened the throttles. The wind that powers a sailing
craft is free; usually plentiful; you don't need to stop and collect some
before leaving harbour; and if it gets a bit strong at times then you
wouldn't be out in a power boat then either. Never mind, this was great
fun, and I was grateful for the chance to use it both as a base, and for
touring up and down the coast once I had my licence safely acquired.
With the course out of the way I set about learning how to design and
create a website, fill it with interesting content, and make it live - which
was a very new experience indeed. I'd hate to try to work out how many
goes I had at it, but by the end of the holiday I had something which
worked, and which seemed to do a nice simple job. It would at least be
possible to mention it to people now, and hopefully save me the time of
having to answer every question separately. More importantly, I could
put the address for it on anything that went out to the media from The
Prostate Cancer Charity. In between times I actually went out for a
couple of runs between 3 and 4 miles long along the promenades that
flanked the coast on either side of the port. I did not particularly like
running in the full heat of high summer down there, and the few people
that did appear to run regularly always did so at first light before the sun
really got up steam. However, I was more used, on summer holidays, to
seeing first light BEFORE I went to bed, rather than it being when I got
up for a run, so I packed my running shoes away and forgot about them
for the rest of the stay.
The other thing I realised when I got there was that once I had
hooked up my laptop to build the website, I could also write up my
blog. So this gave me the opportunity to try adding photos from my
little digital camera too. Having grown up in an era when you got to
see your holiday photos a week after you got home, provided the local
camera shop developed them properly, it never ceases to amaze me that
you can look at your photos on the camera screen instantly, and then
put them into your computer and onto the internet so that anyone can
see them anywhere. The thought that I could actually show the folks
back home my holiday snaps, before I got home, would have been totally
beyond comprehension 25 years ago. What was even more amazing was
that here I was, sitting on a boat in a Spanish harbour, using a laptop
computer to build a website, keep my blog up to date, and put some
photos online. It appeared that you CAN teach an old dog new tricks
after all - even an old sea dog
Suntanned, relaxed, a qualified skipper and the proud owner of the
wonderful new website www.tism.co.uk I finally headed back to Malaga Airport and the scrum they call Easyjet Check-in. A few hours
later, sitting back at home, it was already becoming just a memory as
the reality of five weeks till the big run started to hit home.
At this point I was brought face to face with a whole new reality
surrounding what I was doing. When I was talking to the PR people at
The Prostate Cancer Charity, I had sent off another email. At the time
I was using my local Bannatyne's Gym, and had been a member there
for over a year. The owner of this chain of gyms, Duncan Bannatyne of Dragon's Den fame on the TV, had been making some strong statements
all over the media about office obesity and how people could lose weight
if they exercised a bit more (in his gyms, I presume). I looked him up on
the internet, found an email address and sent him off a quick precis of
what I had done using his gym. I was, to all intents and purposes, living
proof of what he was talking about, and wondered if he wanted to use
me for a bit more publicity in return for some sponsorship. I hadn't expected
to hear anything, but apparently his office had picked it up, sent
it off to the chief executive of the gyms, who had passed it down the line
and set up a meeting with me and the local manager. So when I got back
I had to go in for this meeting, and see what could be sorted out.
The offer was quite clear and unequivocal. They wanted their public
relations company to have use of my story, and to work with the charity
too on anything they wanted to put out. They wanted to use my story
for local and national publicity for the gyms, as they thought it was a
terrific achievement, and especially wanted to do some things around the
Great North Run. They especially wanted to arrange a photo session in
the gym for some publicity work.
"OK, if I agree to all that, what are you offering me towards my
sponsorship?" I asked, quite reasonably I thought.
The response was three things. First of all:
"Free membership of the gym for one month for you to raffle at work."
"I work alone, at home. The other guys I work with are miles away.
This is no use to me."
Second thing: "Some bits from our shop to raffle at work."
"Which part of my previous response did you not understand?"
Third thing: "Buy yourself a running vest in town, and bring in the
receipt and we will pay for it - provided we can have our name printed
on the shirt to show up in all photos of you."
At this point I explained that I already had businessmen, and businesses,
who had sponsored me for some very generous amounts, and I was not
really wanting to explain to them that I had not put their names on my
shirt when their generosity was so much greater. I also explained to
them that I would, in fact, be running in the especially designed Prostate
Cancer Charity running vest that they kindly gave to all their runners
to help identify them on the race.
They were unwilling to discuss their extremely generous offer any
further, and would not even entertain the idea of making even a small
donation to The Prostate Cancer Charity, but would like to know when
it would be possible to arrange for some photos to be taken in the gym.

I politely declined their overwhelming generosity, made my excuses
and left. As soon as I could get on to my computer at home I diligently
went through all my old blogs and carefully edited out all references to
Bannatyne's gyms. Then I went through the website with a fine-toothed
comb and edited out any references in there. I had resolved that they
would never get any credit whatsoever for anything I had done, and
since then I have made it a pre-condition of any writing or interviews
that their name is not mentioned in any way with anything to do with me.
I also resolved that when my annual membership came up for renewal
I would be looking for another gym - and I did!
This episode did, however, start to make me realise that people might
be interested in the story of what I had done. This was a very strange feeling, as it had been a very private and personal journey so far, and,
apart from some friends being amazed, it had never occurred to me that
there could be that sort of interest. Yes, I had received a lot of questions
through the blog, and got to know a lot of new people through it. And
I had thought it worth starting up the little website in case a local paper
or two ran an article about people from the area doing the Great North
Run. But here was the possibility that a big company wanted to get their
public relations people using the story. This was almost instantly backed
up by the PR team at the charity telling me that they wanted some photos
of me because they had received some interest in the story, not that I
knew what that really meant.
This all went on the back-burner for a while, as there were more
important things going on. Every year the main theatre in Peterborough,
the Key Theatre, puts on a summer musical for a week with a cast of the
best local young talent. It is a highly popular show each year, and sells
out the 450 seats practically every night. This year, Number Four had
one of the lead roles in Into the Woods - a show I hadn't seen before,
which is a clever weaving together of all the classic pantomime fairy
tales such as Cinderella, Red Riding Hood and Jack and the Beanstalk. So for the last week in August everything was dominated, as it rightly
should be, by the show. I finally got to see it on the last night, with all
the family, and was as proud as ever as she lit up the stage in her usual
style. She had been involved with local drama and musicals for years,
and this was the second time she had performed a major role in the
summer show and she didn't disappoint. Mind you, it was fun meeting
up with so many of the local theatre folk we had run into now and
again over the years and watching their faces as they slowly realised
who I was, and how different I was. But I tried to keep a low profile on
this occasion, there could only be one star in the family that night, and
it certainly shouldn't be me.
All of a sudden it was now September, and the Great North Run was this month. It had seemed such a long way off when the doctor had said
"You should do a run" but now I could count the days, and would very
soon be counting the hours. I kept to the training schedule as much as
I could, and even managed to get in an extra run or two even though I
knew perfectly well that it was too late to make any significant improvements
now. I had trained according to Masochistic Mickey's master
plan, and I was ready. In fact I started to watch out for myself more
than ever, as there was no way I wanted to get injured now. The latest
email bulletin from The Great Run people had reassured everyone that
if you could run 10 miles reasonably comfortably by now, then you
would be absolutely fine on the day. It also, by the way, asked if anyone
running the race had any interesting stories to tell, as they were always
looking for stories for the website, and their newsletters. So I thought that
I would send off an email, just in case they didn't have many and needed
something badly enough to use a simple guy loses some weight story.
About this time, the Prostate Cancer Charity people also sent out a
press release to their normal contacts, and, it seems, spoke to a few of
the local media around my area too. The result astonished me, but to
be honest it was also a lot of fun, and shyness had never been one of my
strong points anyway. For the next three weeks I was in almost daily
contact with Nikki, my main contact at the charity, as she reported
conversations, and set up things for me to do. The first coverage was a
full page article in the Daily Star Sunday, on the 9th September, and it
even mentioned my website address. I knew that this article was coming
out, because The Star had arranged to send out a photographer to get
some photos of me in my running gear for the article. I had made sure
that I was wearing my Prostate Cancer Charity running vest for the
photos. They also put in the article that, in the six months since I had
started that simple little blog, as advised by the Great Run people, there
had been 117,000 visits by people looking at my blog. What they didn't
know is that I had only finally let the website go live to the world two
days before the article, so that they could see it, and check it was there
before mentioning it. By the 13th, mainly because they mentioned it in
the article, the website had received nearly 700 visitors, and I began to
worry about what I had said on there now that I was faced with the
stark reality that 700 people had been reading my ramblings on there.
Nikki was delighted, as were her colleagues at the charity, as apparently
they had never been able to get a mention of the charity in that
particular national paper before, and now they had a mention in the
article, and their name and logo big and bold on the photo of me. It
appeared that I was becoming quite popular at the charity headquarters,
and as a result of the article they began to get more interest in the story.
Unfortunately, I also encountered another side of the commercial
interest in my story. I had put a facility on my website for people to
leave comments if they wished, and some had been kind enough to leave
some very complimentary messages. In case anyone was asking any
questions, I had taken to the habit of checking the site on a daily basis
as I didn't particularly want to upset anyone by appearing to ignore them.
A couple of days after the Daily Star article appeared, some messages
were left on the website for me from some press agencies offering to pay
me for my story provided that I signed a contract with them allowing
them exclusive rights, and leaving phone numbers to call them. These
were right there, in full public view, on my website. I was furious, and
immediately removed them of course. This made me check the site even
more often for a while, because this sort of thing was totally out of
order as far as I was concerned. Did they not realise that I was doing all
this because of running for The Prostate Cancer Charity, and that any
publicity should benefit them, not me?
While this was all going on, I had to pop to the surgery for the ECG
the doctor had suggested, as a result of the heart monitor results I had
shown him. Secretly, I think he wanted one last check that everything
was as good as he thought before the actual race. So I lay there as usual
hooked up to wires attached (with funny little sticky pads) to every part
of my anatomy. Also as usual, the nurse declined to comment on the
results, saying that it was not up to her to interpret it, but the doctor.
Finally I saw the doctor a couple of days later to hear that there was
absolutely nothing wrong with the results, all was fine. So I was cleared
to get on and do the race without any worries at all.
During the last 2 weeks before the run I had some photos taken for
an article in the local daily paper, the Peterborough Evening Telegraph, and they wrote a really good supportive article too. I also found myself
in the studios of both the local BBC Radio station, and Hereward Radio
- the local independent radio station, doing interviews about the weight
loss and the run coming up. The commercial station just recorded a lot
of stuff in a back room there, and then fitted extracts around the music
and news bulletins. On the other hand, the BBC Radio interview was
done live on air, and I was inside the studio chatting live to the presenter.
If you ever feel low on adrenaline, just try doing a live, unrehearsed
interview with the extra knowledge that a good proportion of your
friends and family are listening in.
My email about my story to the Great Run people in response to
their appeal for stories also got a reply, which ended up with a piece being
written for their next email newsletter which went out to all runners
and supporters. It was a very nice, complimentary piece, with a couple
of photos. It also contained a link to the BBC local website for the North
East where they had set up a page in their Great North Run section all
about me! This was all getting quite fun now, and it was certainly bringing
people to look at the website, and there were a lot of new visitors
to my blog as a result of the email newsletter. But I was still managing
to get my training in most days, and it was all overlaid with the
strongest motivation of all now to make sure I finished the run well.
The papers and radio stations all wanted me to contact them after the
run with my result, so that they could do follow up articles, and the
fear of having it splashed over the papers and radio that I had failed to
finish was the worst nightmare possible right now.
In the end the final week dawned, and I started to taper my training.
The accepted wisdom in the running world is that during the final week
before a major run you tail off your training runs down to the bare minimum,
to preserve as much energy for the big day as possible. Also for
the last couple of days you are supposed to carb load ready for the run,
although I think this should really only apply to the longer races like
half marathons and full marathons. This is all about making sure that
you eat really energy intense foods immediately prior to a really big run.
The favourite of nearly all runners is pasta, and it is an absolute must
the night before a race as an extra insurance policy against hitting the
wall. Even elite runners carb load and take energy drinks and energy
gels during marathons, because this is a factor for everyone.
So there I was on the Thursday, eased right down on the training,
going through all my kit and stuff I would need for Newcastle, as I had
decided to go up on the Friday. The plan was that I could have all day
on the Saturday to relax and watch the various events put on for the
occasion along the quayside - they have some short runs on the Saturday
for the junior age groups, the mini Great North Runs, and they also
have some elite athlete short races too like The Great North Mile. I also
wanted to spend a fair bit of time at the Expo to which all runners were
invited, and where many of the bloggers from the Realbuzz website had
arranged to meet up on the Saturday afternoon. By now my race pack
had arrived, with my number to pin on my vest, and telling me that I
was to start in Zone J as indicated by my original estimated time of 2 1/2 to 3 hours. What this actually meant in real terms was that I was starting
very near the back, as I expected and anticipated, and the pack warned
me that it would probably take about 40 minutes from the starting gun
for me just to get to the start line with the crowds of runners in front.
For those who have never got close to a race like this, I should mention
that in my race pack was also my chip. This is a natty little device used
in all of the larger races nowadays, which you lace onto one of your
running shoes. It sends out a tiny signal with your unique running
number which is picked up by sensor mats on the road at the start and
finish, and it is this that determines your personal time for the race,
rather than suddenly finding that you are already 40 minutes slower
than the other guys as you cross the start line. This technology is an
absolute must when you are trying to organise a race with 50,000
entrants. Funnily enough they now also put extra sensors down along
the route here and there at key distances, and if a runner misses being counted by the system at any point then they are disqualified. Anyway,
all this stuff had to be packed, or I wouldn't even be able to enter the
starting zone.
But Thursday had the biggest surprise of all waiting up its sleeve to
catch me completely unawares. During the morning I had a phone call
from a young lady who told me she was from the BBC, and asked me
if I was aware that the BBC were broadcasting live from Newcastle on
Sunday, covering the whole of the Great North Run. They would start
broadcasting live on BBC1 at about 9:30, and run right through to 1:30
with coverage of all elements of the race.
All the really big world class events like this are always split up into
three starts. First to go is the wheelchair race as these athletes really do
travel at phenomenal speeds and mixing them up with runners would
be a recipe for disaster. The second start a few minutes later is for the
Elite Women's Race, which includes all women runners who have
achieved the special qualifying time for the distance. They are sent off
separately so that they can have a proper race, watched closely by the
TV cameras, without becoming swamped by the men's race. About half
an hour later the Elite Men line up at the start, with everyone else, male
and female, who hasn't achieved the qualifying times for the Elite races
penned up behind them in ranks according to expected speed. The
exotic costume runners in their Rhino Heads, Sumo Wrestlers and any
other strange and wonderful outfits are usually required to start at the
back. This third start is known as the Men and Masses Start.
I confirmed that I did indeed know all of this as it had all been in the
latest email newsletter from the organisers, but politely enquired why on
earth she was phoning everyone to tell them when we all knew already.
"I'm not phoning everyone, Mike, I'm just phoning you. We would
like you to appear on Grandstand before the start of the race for a live
interview about your weight loss and your run, if you will agree."
Dammit - another of those moments when you know perfectly well
what you want to say, but the words simply don't come out, and you
are left feeling like an idiot, and knowing that she is probably thinking Why would we want to interview someone with a speech impediment
on live TV? I could lose my job here!
After what seemed to me like an age, I managed to regain the power
of coherent speech, and she seemed not to notice the incredibly long
silence before I was able to agree. She asked me where I was staying,
and I gave her the address of the hotel I had booked, and she said there
would be some instructions left at the hotel for me, with details of where
to go and when to be there by. She also told me that she would provide me
with a pass to get into the front zone, where they would be conducting
the interviews. On further enquiry this meant I would have to go right
to the front of the start area, next to Paula Radcliffe and the Ethiopian
runners, and stand around with all the celebrity runners until I was
interviewed. Obviously two important questions sprang straight to
mind, so I just came right out and asked her,
"Can I warn my friends and family to look out for me on the TV?"
"Of course you can. Tell them you should be on live, at about 9:48."

"Brilliant. But will I then be sent back to Zone J, where I belong,
ready for the start?"
"No way! You can stay up there, watch the wheelchairs, and the
women's elite start, and then you can start with all the celebrities right
at the front!"
"Oh, thanks." I lamely replied.
This now meant that the rest of the day was spent phoning all and
sundry, putting a note on the website, posting a special blog, and
generally losing the plot completely. The folks at The Prostate Cancer
Charity were completely blown away by this turn of events, as it meant
that their name, emblazoned boldly across the front of my running vest,
was going to be out there on the telly for all to see. And all they ever
wanted was more awareness of Prostate Cancer, and raising the profile
of the charity which very rarely got prime BBC TV mentions. By now
it was almost impossible to concentrate, but I finally managed to get
all my kit laid out and checked, and do the rest of my packing. I filled
in the back of my running number and got that safely packed too. On
the back of the bib numbers for these big races there are a series of key
medical, identity and contact questions, so that if a runner collapses
during the race the first aid team can identify them, be forewarned of
any key conditions, allergies or sensitivities which might influence any
treatment, and have a phone number of your supporters at the race,
and at home. Clever stuff really, and something I never realised till I got
that race pack.
Sleep that night was hard to come by, as my blood stream appeared
to be in the process of being replaced with pure adrenaline. Eventually
I got to sleep, but my dreams were dominated by what I later found to
be normal issues for anyone taking on this sort of challenge. You have
the I've woken up too late and missed the transport to the start dream,
and the standing waiting for the gun to go off and realising that you
have lost your chip dream, and any number of variations on the theme
of unthinkable disasters that will stop you running, get you disqualified
or ensure your name does not appear as an official finisher. Somehow I
did manage to get some rest, and arrived at the morning feeling good and
ready to go. After a last couple of phone calls, and putting the finishing
touches to my packing, I was locking up and walking to the station.
The journey to Newcastle was fairly smooth and quiet, and I spent most of it in a reflective mood. Here I was, just a couple of weeks short
of three years from the car accident. Then I was 28 stone, and not fit
enough to be trusted to even drive a car properly. Now here I was, 35
months later, 15 stone lighter, heading for Newcastle to run the Greatest
Half Marathon in the World, chatting on the radio, having papers write
about me, and shortly to be interviewed live on BBC presumably as
some sort of example of people who can do this race if they put their
mind to it. I smiled all the way to Newcastle, as I realised that, after
perhaps a very long wait, life really was getting to be rather fun again
in a most unexpected way.




CHAPTER FIFTEEN


THE GREAT NORTH RUN

there's some strange chanting going on ahead, can't make it out - like nothing I've ever heard before, yet deep down it has a familiar sort
of ring to it. As we head towards the Tyne Bridge, with the other lanes
of the motorway overhead creating a long dark tunnel, it starts again.
"Oggy Oggy Oggy", and a thousand voices, including my own I realise,
respond at full strength "OF Oi OE\ The 'oggies' under the motorway
flyover are one of the great 'runners only' moments of long distance
running. No spectators can get down there, and it is as integral to the
runners' experience of this unique race as any other single aspect of the
day. The hairs really are standing up on the nape of my neck, and I feel
excitement coursing through me as I pound the crowded road up
towards the great icon of both the North East, and of RUNNING The
Tyne Bridge!!
There, as planned, on the left hand pavement by the start of the 'arch \
screaming with excitement and almost the same degree of incredulity as
currently envelopes my own soul, are my girls, watching me in The Great
North Run. Absolutely no one who knew me would EVER have believed
it. Here I was, running the Greatest Half Marathon in the World!
I arrived in Newcastle in high spirits, and got a taxi to take me to the
hotel, which turned out to be a fair way out of the centre, on the
Gateshead side of the River Tyne. This meant crossing the famous old
Tyne Bridge, which I knew was going to be part of the route of the run,
and I got shivers up my spine as we approached it and I saw the massive
banners draped across the bridge advertising The Great North Run.
When I got to the hotel and checked in, the young lady receptionist
handed over a small package which she explained had been delivered
for me only a few minutes before I got there. I couldn't resist ripping it
open right there at the desk, and there it was - the all important pass,
on a long strap, permitting me to access the Start Area. It also contained
instructions to be at the start area for 9:00am, with details of who to
report to, and their mobile phone number. Even if they decided not to do
the interview in the end, at least I had my pass now and could get into
the Celebrity Runners Area.
At some time that night, I'm sure I probably did get some sleep, but
it was touch and go for a while. Once I had found the breakfast room
on Saturday morning, negotiated the buffet, and checked with the staff
there that they would indeed be providing a special early breakfast on
Sunday for all the runners staying there, I headed off into Newcastle on
the bus. Way too keyed up for anything sensible now, I decided to have
a look around the city centre before heading in the general direction of
the river. I had a vague idea of where the Expo was supposed to be set
up on the south side of the river, and that there were also the events on
the Quayside, so I knew I would find it somehow. There had also been
a lot of chat between the folks on the blogs arranging a general meet-up
at the Expo during the afternoon, and I was really looking forward to
turning some more virtual friends into real people. In the race pack
everyone had received an entry pass to the Expo, and a ticket for a free
bowl of pasta at the Pasta Party, so these were in my pocket, along with
my camera, and my Start Area pass which I wasn't letting out of my
sight now. In fact I caught myself checking it a couple of times, just to
make sure I wasn't dreaming.
Eventually I found the approach to the Tyne Bridge, adorned with its
giant banners for the race, and I walked across it full of anticipation
about running across it the very next day. As I crossed, I realised that the
Mini Great North Run was actually taking place on the quayside way
down below the bridge, so I stopped to watch, and got a few pictures
from a bird's eye view. Then it was time to find the Expo, and join the
massive queue to get in. In all honesty it was a pretty poor affair, with
very little in the way of interesting stands, considering the size of the
potential audience of 50,000 runners and all their entourages. It was
way past lunchtime by now, so I went straight through to the Pasta
Party. The portions were really not very much, but I suppose that was
only to be expected as they were free, after all. Luckily everyone had
been given two tickets so that they could bring their partner or friend
or whoever they wished, so by the time I had used my second ticket I
had enjoyed a good lunch. One of the stands was giving away fruit, so
desert was well catered for as well.
Strangely, as I really couldn't figure out the connection, the RFU had
set up a large caravan in the outside area, and were showing some live
international rugby matches, so I joined the small crowd to watch while
I waited for the others to arrive. The rest of the afternoon passed all
too quickly, as there really wasn't enough time to have a decent chat
with everyone who turned up and introduced themselves around the
group. The first person I met was Vicki, a Newcastle lass who I hadn't
even thought would be there, but we instantly recognised each other
from our photos on the blogs and it was a great way to get the afternoon
going. From then on it was a flurry of mobile phone messages helping
folks to home in on the gathering, followed by a couple of hours of
adrenaline fuelled chatter about nothing much as we were by that time
all getting just a little bit excited. But we were staying in a huge variety
of places, as Newcastle itself cannot cope with the sheer numbers of
people, so it was not long before we were heading off in all directions
for a meal and an early night.
Back at the hotel I wandered into the bar with the intention of getting
a light meal, and turning in very early. The transport to the race start
at the Town Moor, which was part of the package I had booked through
the race organisers, was leaving at around 7:30 in the morning, but it
was not from the hotel but from somewhere about 20 minutes walk
away. Apparently they would have a fleet of coaches at a central point
catering for everyone staying in three or four hotels in that area, but that
meant leaving the hotel by 7:00am, after having breakfast and getting
kitted up for the race. However, once I got into the bar I was quickly
swept up into a conversation with a few others there with similar plans
for the evening, and I ended up eating with a guy about my own age
who had done this race before, and many others along the way. He had
come all the way up from the South Coast and was on his own as well,
so I passed a great evening soaking up lots of tips about how to make
sure I enjoyed myself.
The last thing I did was to make a couple of phone calls to York and
Edinburgh, just to check the arrangements for the race. I might have
been on my own on the Friday and Saturday, but I certainly wasn't
going to be on the Sunday. My four daughters had all decided that they
wanted to be there to see me run, as it was something that they had
never ever thought would happen, and they wanted to support me. They
couldn't get trains early enough on the Sunday morning from home
to be in Newcastle for the start, so they had come up to York on the
Saturday evening so that they could get an early train from there. They
would have come up and stayed in Newcastle, but quite frankly the
Great North Run weekend is a bonanza for Newcastle's hoteliers and
guest houses and they throw the rate books out of the window and charge
a fortune for rooms. In fact most central hotels will not take single
night bookings, insisting you have to book for two nights at something
like two to three times the normal room rates per night. Number Four,
however, was in the process of deciding which universities to apply to,
and Edinburgh University, which was on her short list, had organised
their Open Day that Saturday. So she had been up in Edinburgh for a
couple of days, having a look around, and staying with her godfather,
Para Handy. The plan was that she would come straight down from
Edinburgh on the Sunday morning, in the company of Para Handy, the
Poseur and Auld Thai Tam who were all coming down for the race (Tam
is another member of the ERA. His nickname stems from his finding out
that his workmates call him Auld Tam, added to his regularly recounting
tales of a long and interesting trip to Thailand a while back). What they
had actually told me was that they were coming down with a large glass
jar so that they could scrape my remains off the road - but what the
heck, that's what friends are for, isn't it?
My final act before attempting sleep was to lay out everything ready
for the morning, as I knew I would not necessarily be thinking totally
clearly when I got up. It never ceases to amaze me how much stuff you
have to lay out just to go for a run, but it always pays to be absolutely
certain, as most of it is essential for a smooth race and good memories.
So on the other bed, (a twin room for single occupancy does have its
compensations), I laid out the following:
Running shoes
Running socks
Timing chip
Velcro strap for timing chip
Underpants
Compression shorts
Two waist band pouches (one for camera and one for mobile phone)
Prostate Cancer Charity running vest
Bib number
Four safety pins (for attaching bib number to vest)
Wrist sweatband
Head sweatband
Heart rate monitor on chest band
Garmin (stop watch thing)
Rucksack with clothes to throw on after race
Energy drink
Powdered recovery shake in bottle ready to make up
Two bananas
Baggage tag with race number on (attached to rucksack)
Start Area Pass
Race Instructions (this race provides a little credit card sized fold
out set, with start area, route and finish area maps which you can
slip in a pocket)
And last, but by no means least, a bin liner and a roll-on stick
of Body glide

The bin liner is an essential piece of kit for big races where you are
going to be hanging around for a while before the start, and bearing in
mind we had to leave the hotel at 7:00am and the race start was at
10:40am, there was going to be a lot of hanging around. You can wear
a decent jacket up to the point where you hand your bag over to the baggage marshals, but from then on you can still have a long time to
wait. The bin liner is therefore the ultimate throw-away wind and rain
proof layer - just pop it over your head with holes pushed through
for head, (and optionally for arms), and then when the gun goes just rip
it off and throw it away. The alternative is to wear something you want
to give to charity, and discard it at the start, as the race organisers
collect it all and give it to local charities.
The Bodyglide is another matter entirely, and is mostly a requirement
for men. Vaseline is an alternative, but I don't find it as effective over
very long runs. It is to prevent, or minimise, jogger's nipple, arguably
one of the most painful injuries that a runner can get. There is nothing
worse than a hot sweaty running top constantly rubbing against your
nipples every stride you take for mile after mile. It is not uncommon by
any means to see runners finishing with large red stains on their vests
from bleeding nipples - but generally a runner only does that once! So
a specially-formulated, and long lasting, body lubricant grease is utterly
essential for application before every run. Ladies tend not to suffer in
this way, as sports bras tend to overcome the problem - or so I've been
told! I had discovered jogger's nipple on one of my earlier long training
runs, and although it's not necessarily too painful while you are running,
it is sheer agony when the hot water hits in the showers afterwards.
Convinced that everything was now in order, I went to bed, having
booked an early morning call, and set every alarm I could find and programme,
as necessary. Somehow I actually managed to sleep like a log,
right through till the alarms went off and the early morning call came
through right on time.
At last, after months of preparation, the big day was here. It actually was Sunday 30th September 2007 - the day of The Great North Run.
I shot out of bed, had a very quick shave, and threw on a pair of
jogging bottoms and a T-shirt and headed down for breakfast. Under
normal circumstances hotel stays represented the only chance I ever got
for a proper Full English (Cardiac) Breakfast, but that was definitely
NOT a good idea on this occasion as heartburn or a heavy stomach did
not fit well with running. I stuck to my pre-race routine of a small bowl
of All-Bran, and some wholemeal toast, with orange juice and coffee.
There were a lot of people wandering in for the early breakfast, but the
room was quite subdued as everyone sat there contemplating what they
had to do that day. I finished up, grabbed a banana from the fruit bowl,
and headed off to my room to get my running kit on.
A few minutes later I was heading downstairs, and joining the trickle
of people heading down the road towards the coach pick-up point.

which turned out to be a lot further away than I had realised. I must
admit to thinking that it might turn into a long, tough drag back to the
hotel later on, but then I realised that after the race it wouldn't really
matter. Once I got to the pick-up, I was directed onto the next coach in
line, and in a couple of minutes we were on our way, with the coach
more or less shrouded in reflective silence. As we approached the dropoff
point at Town Moor the scale of the event began to become clearer.
Up to that point it had just been a case of the biggest half marathon in
the world, about 40,000 actual starters on the day (there are always a
lot of no-shows due to injury or illness of either runners or members of
their family), and other random facts. It was only when you started to
see the queues of coaches waiting to disgorge their contents, and the
long snake of runners writhing across the moor towards the motorway,
that you started to get a feel for what that many people actually looked
like. The next stage was negotiating the huge queues for the massed
ranks of portaloos, and then on towards the bridge over the motorway
as the baggage buses were on the other side, on a street that ran parallel
to the motorway which itself formed the first section of the course. My
plan was now very simple, pop over to drop off my bag, then get down
onto the motorway and find the Start Area, which looked as though it
would be the first pen you would come to. I knew I would be fine, as I
still had almost an hour before I had to be there, and I could see the start
line from where I was standing on the bridge.
Now the sheer scale of this thing really did hit home, as I walked up to
the baggage buses. The instruction was to pass along the line of double
decker buses being used for the purpose till you came to the next bus not
yet full. Here you would show the baggage marshal that your bag tag
was the same as your bib number, and they would stamp the number
of the bus on the corner of your bib number, so that you could then get
it back at the end of the race. Technically a simple proposition, but the
buses didn't seem to start till about half a mile up the road, and countless
numbers of them were already full, making me walk further and
further away from the start line, through a huge throng of people, and
queues for the many blocks of portaloos spaced out along the side of the
road. By the time I finally got to the next open bus, dumped my bag,
and got my stamp, I realised that 1 was actually going to be pressed for
time to get back to the bridge, down onto the motorway, and find the
right entrance through the huge fences along both sides that had been
erected to keep the crowds of supporters at bay. It was quite a good warmup
as I tried to power walk through crowds, not staying quite as calm
and collected as I had intended. But I made it with literally only seconds
to spare, and the magic pass did its job of getting me past the security
and into the relative peace, quiet and comparatively wide open spaces
of the Celebrity Pen on the left hand side of the central reservation. The meet and greet lady performed her allotted task, and told me where to
stand and wait as 9:48 approached, but until then I could wander
around the area and chat to whoever I liked. I asked her the one remaining
question in my mind,
"Who is actually interviewing me?" I asked, expecting that it would
probably be one of their local team from Newcastle who I had never
seen before.
"Hold on, let me check my running order" she said as she ran her finger
down her clipboard.
"Right, Mike, you'll be interviewed by Jonathan Edwards."
"What - THE Jonathan Edwards?" I ask in star-struck amazement.
"Yes, we've only got one of him."
I think I just stood there in stunned silence while she dashed off in
search of a crisis. I really did not know what to think, or do, at that
moment. This was an Olympic Superstar, a sporting icon of the highest
order, someone I had watched perform on the TV in awed respect for
his world class talent. He had won an Olympic Gold Medal in 2000,
and held the Olympic, World, European and Commonwealth Games
titles all at the same time, and still held the world record for the Triple
Jump. And this was the man who was going to be interviewing ME?
This crazy day was just getting better and better!
Now there was just the small matter of how to fill the next half an hour.
Basically I was stood in the middle of a motorway in Newcastle, dressed
only in shorts and a flimsy running vest (well I couldn't be interviewed in
a bin liner could I?), at half past nine on a Sunday morning, surrounded
by celebrities and elite athletes. So the answer was simple. I wandered
around the pen seeing who I could spot, and finding out which ones
would speak to me and which ones wouldn't. Now I'm not an autograph
collector by nature, and there's something strangely levelling about the
fact that they too are stood there in the middle of the motorway, in
flimsy running kit, not a minder or publicist in sight, with their bits freezing and as scared as any other runner about what they are about to
undertake. I suppose the worst bit about it was that I found it extremely
difficult to recognise anyone, partly because no one was used to seeing
them like this, and partly because I never watch soaps, talent shows,
reality shows, or read the tabloids. However I certainly did recognise Sir
Chris Chattaway from across the pen, and had a few moments gossip
with James Cracknell (it was clearly a good day for meeting Olympians)
and Ben Fogle who were on a serious challenge to be the fastest celebrity.
Before I knew it, I was being lined up for my interview, with almost
military precision, and it was obvious that the schedule they were working
to meant that the only conversation I was going to get with Jonathan
Edwards would be the live on camera one, as he was being moved
around by a producer most unglamorously, with a cameraman in hot
pursuit through the throng that was now building up. I was to be the
second of two interviews done back to back in this corner of the pen,
and in a flash we were live and the preceding interview was finishing
already. The only things going through my mind were to look at him,
rather than the camera, and REMEMBER TO SAY SOMETHING
ABOUT PROSTATE CANCER - it was the charity that had given me
the spot in the race, and this could be a good payback over and above the sponsorship money. Back home someone had set up the video
recorder, so I could see it for myself in the context of the programme,
but this also gave me the chance to make a transcript of the whole thing,
which went exactly like this:

JE "Mike, let me come to you. You've lost even more in even less time."
ME "Yes, 2 1/2 years ago I weighed 27 1/2 stone. I'm now down to 12 1/2"
JE "And what was the impetus for that?"
ME "I had a car accident, and thought that if I'm going to get another
chance at this, then I'd better get it right."
JE "And who are you running for today?"
ME "I'm running for the Prostate Cancer Charity. When you consider
that the same number of people running this race will actually
contract prostate cancer this year I thought it's something I should
do something about. I'd like to not have that happen next year."

JE "Well Good Luck Mike - and you look great!"

And with that he was gone, along with all the pressure, and the nervous
excitement. The producer lady threw a "Nice interview, well done"
over her shoulder as she swept away through the crowd, and I was free
to get on with my day. It doesn't sound much put down in cold text
like that, but it was fun, I had actually spoken with the man himself,
and he had seemed like one of the good guys. More importantly, I had
remembered to say what I had wanted to, which was an excellent performance
under pressure as it is so easy to think you have far more time
than you really do, and not get round to your own points in time. Most
importantly, I found out later, The Prostate Cancer Charity people were
delighted, as they had never got that sort of exposure at an event like
this ever before, and had not expected that I would use the time to talk
about them, rather than about me. I was also quite shocked later on
that morning to find that people in the Newcastle area had actually
really taken notice, as I heard two or three shouts running down
through Jarrow congratulating me on the weight loss - utterly amazing,
the power of TV!
Once I had gathered my thoughts, and had a gossip about the weight
loss to a few TV soap stars who had been standing in close listening to
the interview (and making sure they were seen on TV too), I realised
that while I was leaning on the crash barrier doing some stretches, there
were people on the other side doing exactly the same thing. The key fact here was that while the celebrities were in the front pen on the leti
of the central reservation, on the right was the elite start area. The few
serious wheelchair racers were lining up for their early start ahead of
everyone else just after 10:00, and behind them, just opposite me, were
the Elite Women preparing for their start at 10:15. The lady doing her
stretches about 10 feet away from me was none other than the incredible Paula Radcliffe herself, and as I whipped my camera out to save the
moment for posterity she gave me a wonderful smile which I actualy
managed to capture. It made me realise properly, for the first time, the
privilege that long distance running hands out to all who run these
races. It is difficult to think of a single other sport of any nature, on any
continent, where I would be welcomed to compete alongside, at the
same time, in the same race, with World champions, Olympic champions,
National champions, and where my name would appear on the same
results sheet.
All the runners were by now assembled in the pens stretching way
back up the motorway, and huge screens had been erected on the overhead
gantries to keep the masses entertained. As soon as I had watched
the wheelchair race start, and then the introductions of the top lady
runners, and the start of their race, it was time for the mass warm-up. High up on a small stage set up above the runners waiting in the pen
behind us was one of TV's keep fit gurus who would lead everyone
through it. With his image being broadcast on huge screens above the
runners into the distance back up the motorway the sight of 35,000 odd
people being choreographed through their exercises and stretches was
one to behold. Those numbers of people take up a lot of space, and
with a gap between each of the pens from A to M they literally stretched
out of sight. At the start gun each pen would be released one at a time,
and the folks at the back, with the slowest predicted times could take
three quarters of an hour just to get to the start line once the gun went.
It was now that it finally dawned on the good folk in the celebrity pen
that a few yards back behind our pen was Pen A, populated entirely by
the fastest runners outside the elite athletes, and that when the gun was
fired we were going to be inundated by a wall of fast runners eager to
get on with it a lot faster than we wanted to. At that point I opted for
discretion and worked my way quietly but purposefully through the (I
wonder what the proper name for a flock of celebrities is - maybe a pose of celebrities?) crowd to the far left hand side of the pen, ready to
hug the edge of the road and hopefully avoid the worst of the onslaught.
Sir Bobby Robson, himself a legend in most parts, but particularly
in Newcastle, mounted the rostrum on the central reservation, fired the
starting gun, and all hell broke loose as the Elite Male Athletes on the
right hand side took off like bats out of hell, and one particular nutter
from our side tried to outrun them before collapsing in a heap after
about 500 yards. In seconds a tide of runners had engulfed me, and I just
stuck to the barriers along the left of the road and soon found myself high-fiving the kids in the crowd of spectators lining the road.
The next 2 hours, 24 minutes and 11 seconds were a unique experience.
The oggies in the motorway underpass; seeing my girls standing on
the left of the Tyne Bridge (they had called to tell me they had arrived
safely and where they were waiting to see me); the banter among the runners
for the first few miles; the sudden quietness amongst the runners
when we hit the long slow incline of the infamous John Reid Road; the
Wall of Sound where one of the sponsors had set up huge speakers every
few yards for half a mile to blast out favourite motivational songs; the unbelievably
inspiring support of the locals who lined the route from start
to finish, shouting your name read from your running vest, offering jelly
babies and slices of fruit; the man standing on top of a bus shelter with a
garden hose to cool you down just when it was getting too hot; the smell
of the sea as you drop down the slope onto South Shields seafront with
just a mile to go; the massed banks of supporters carrying you the final
mile on their very own Wall of Sound; the sign 800 to go, then when you
thought it would be 400 it was still 600 to go; determination to run your
best for that last stretch all the way to the finish; 200 to go and the final
turn right, in towards the finish arch - REMEMBER TO SMILE FOR
THE CAMERA - and crossing the finish Line.
Timing chip off, collect water and down half the bottle in one, collect
MEDAL and T-Shirt. Stop and watch the Red Arrows doing their
incredible display for US RUNNERS! Fight your way through the huge
crowds to the tents of the Charity Village, and find The Prostate Cancer
Charity Tent for an orgy of hugging and back-slapping with my four
girls and the boys from Edinburgh. They really had brought a jar, but
didn't seem too disappointed that they hadn't got to use it! The charity
folk had laid on all the right drinks and refreshments for their runners,
and it was great to meet up with some of the other runners on the
Prostate Team and share the experiences of that incredible 13.1 miles.
As I stood outside the tent, with The Great North Run medal round
my neck, a silver foil blanket round my shoulders, and having photos
taken with my girls, it hadn't quite sunk in yet just how much that day
had changed my life.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

NIL BY MOUTH

I ROUNDED THE DAY OFF WITH A QUICK MEET UP WITH SOME OF THE OTHER
bloggers running, and then headed for the coach back to my hotel for
a shower and change. I had originally booked to stay over that night as
I genuinely didn't know whether I would be up for a two hour train
ride after the run, and had opted for the discretion of a good night's
sleep over the valour of immediately attempting the long journey home.
My support crew had gone straight back into Newcastle from South
Shields in search of a suitable hostelry, and within a couple of hours I
had hooked up again with them and set about properly re-hydratmg
(well that was my excuse and I was sticking to it!). We saw the girls off
on their train back down south, and then managed to find an excellent
Chinese restaurant where I felt perfectly fine forgetting my diet rules
just this once. We then headed back to the station so that I could see
the boys off on their trip back to Edinburgh. Their trip down had been
by coach, as there was engineering work on the railway line, and we
soon found that the trains were still not running and again there was a
replacement coach service. The only problem was that the coach was
now full, so the train company arranged to put them in a taxi, all the
way back. Glad that my taxi ride would be considerably shorter, I was
soon back at the hotel and finally got to bed. I set the alarm last thing
before turning in, as I had to do a live interview over the phone with
Hereward Radio back home at 7:00 in the morning, letting everyone
know how I had got on.
I was actually wide awake when they phoned, and I had a really good
interview with the morning show host Kev Lawrence. He was brilliant
in one respect; he actually asked me if I had hit my sponsorship target,
and gave me the chance to say that I was still a few hundred pounds
short of my target. I failed to mention that I had kept putting up my
target every time the total had approached it, and although my original
target was 400, pounds it was now officially 2000 pounds Just after 9:00am I had
a phone call from my local internet service providers, who had heard the
interview, with a guarantee to make up the sponsorship to my target if
it was still short at the end of the week. This is still the one and only
time that any publicity has actually resulted in real sponsorship money
- so well done and huge thanks to Cyberware!
Once that fun had died down, and I had managed a leisurely breakfast
in the hotel dining room watching a few other very stiff-legged individuals
negotiating their way around the tables, I was off to the station for
the train home. It was packed solid, and I had a huge smile to myself
to see that I was very, very far from being the only person on the train
actually still wearing their medal around their neck for the journey
home. The atmosphere on the train positively crackled with the almost
deafening roar of unspoken respect between the runners, and I saw a
number of people quietly fishing for their medals and slipping them on
with a smile! Mind you, two hours of cramped conditions were not the
perfect antidote for the legs the morning after, and my short walk home
from the station was anything but smooth.
The surgeon had kindly scheduled the operation on my stomach skin
for the 24th October, to give me time for a good break after the run to
make sure I was fit for the table, so I now set about making the best of
that break. In my usual inimitable style, I had managed to arrange a
business meeting in Oxford on the Tuesday morning, so after one night
off on Monday I had to face a day of driving cross country and back,
without the benefit of motorways. I had a day with nothing special to
do on the Wednesday, and on the Thursday I had an appointment to see
Dr Ken and I made certain I had my medal with me when I went to the
surgery. I think the object of that meeting was more for him to check
everything was fine after the run, and before the operation, but I had
nothing to worry about. He did try to get me to understand that the
operation was quite a serious thing, but I was not listening to any talk
of that nature - all I could see was the end product, and all they were
doing was removing some loose skin, so as far as I was concerned it

would all be a breeze and quite simple. It was not as though they were
going to cut into muscle or anything like that, so there was no real point
in worrying.
On the Friday, five days after the run, I was on a plane heading to
Spain for the annual Boys Week. To be honest, the week didn't really start
till the next Wednesday, but I had decided that I deserved a little extra,
and as we were going to be staying at Duquesa, close to the Marina, I had
organised to stay on the boat again for the few days before the rest of
the boys arrived. I had a great few days just chilling out and recharging
the batteries in the sun, and on the Wednesday I drove back up to the
airport to drop off my little hire car and meet them in Arrivals at Malaga.
At least this time they recognised me, as they were now quite familiar
with the new look. By now we were sadly reduced to the position where
we had no apartments in Spain between the entire bunch. Slacko had
passed on a few short years ago, and The Hermit, who we had dropped
in to see the previous year and persuaded to join us for the rest of that
trip, had shrugged off his mortal coil a couple of months later. They are
both sadly missed, and every time we meet up now the first drink is
always to Absent Friends. The last apartment had now been sold, in
order to acquire a place in Florida, so we were reduced to renting this
year. However, when we finally arrived at the luxury, six bedroom
apartment that we had hired through somebody one of the boys knew,
we discovered that it was actually three medium-sized double beds!
Now I know that we are all very good friends, and had been for years,
but there is a line that has to be drawn in the sand in any relationship,
and this was in grave danger of crossing that line. I immediately solved the
problem as far as I was concerned, by deciding that as I had not yet packed
my kit from the boat, I would continue to stay on it for the duration. I
was completely comfortable there, and it was only a few yards from the
local hostelries around the harbour, whereas the apartment was a good
10 minutes stagger. Auld Thai Tam also cottoned on to that key piece
of information, and decided that he would join me on the boat (which
easily slept four anyway), so the other three shared out the bedrooms
and we headed for a bar.
We had a very relaxed time that week, took a few trips out in the
boat, and generally did very little but wander around the place trying
out new little local places, as we found them. The main topic of the
week turned out to be deciding on the final nature of the order that they
were going to place with my surgeon for a variety of leather goods just
to make sure that the skin he was going to remove did not go to waste.
In the end the consensus seemed to be for matching wallets for all the
boys, although my personal misgivings seemed to carry very little weight
in the discussions. As it happens, the surgeon wanted me to agree to let
them have it for research purposes, and that appeared to be a much
more satisfactory outcome for all concerned, but I'm not certain
whether the boys ever forgave me. After another terrific week, rounded
off with a beautiful day in bright sunshine on a sea as flat as millpond,
when we took a pile of bread and cheese and a few bottles of wine and
cruised up the coast past Marbella, it was time to go home.
In the few quiet moments I had during the holiday it had occurred to
me that once the operation was done with I would need to think about
some new goals. Everything had been about The Great North Run all
that summer, and had given me a focus, but now there was no focus, no
goal and no target. I had actually done something I had never ever
thought possible; I had run a Half Marathon and lived to tell the tale.
This, however, was over, and I would need something else. When I got
back home, I was faced with a long tally of emails, and lots of them
from the blog site. This was another thing I had not factored into the
original equation of doing a run - the blog and the publicity and all the
new friends. What was I going to do about that side of the project if I
didn't do any more running? However, it was already becoming quite
clear to me that I would keep up some sort of running, even if it was just
for general fitness, as it was actually quite a fun pastime if you weren't
pushing the training too hard. In fact, that feeling when I crossed the
finish line at South Shields, and collected my medal, was like no other
feeling I can ever remember having. The sense of personal achievement
was overwhelming, not in a smug way, but in a quiet, life-affirming
sense of inner strength and new found capability.
Then something inside my head latched on to the fact that I had done
a half marathon, and asked the question that raised the bar:
"Since when is doing things by half good enough?"
This thought had settled into a corner of my mind, and was quietly
festering away infecting all sorts of thought processes. It suddenly burst
out of its corner with all guns blazing. In amongst the emails waiting
for me to work my way through, was one from the Great Runs people
offering me a guaranteed entry in the Edinburgh Marathon as a finisher
at Newcastle. Yes, you guessed it, less than three weeks after doing
my one and only, never to be repeated long charity run, I went ahead
and paid for my entry into the Edinburgh Marathon taking place the
following year on 25th May 2008. It was all done so quickly I hardly
stopped to catch my breath and question the enormity of what I had just
done. What on earth was I doing entering a marathon - it was only
about six months or so away, and I was about to start that six months
by having a big operation.
Now the operation was suddenly looming very large, and on the
Tuesday I packed my bits and pieces according to the paperwork, and
got the train down to Cambridge on the way to Addenbrookes Hospital.
I had thought all along that the operation would be done in Peterborough,
where all the clinics I had been to were held, but apparently the top team
were based down there, and so that was where I would be sliced and
diced. Mind you, when I arrived at Ward 15 I was thoroughly impressed,
as it was in the new Addenbrookes Treatment Centre, a whole new wing
not as yet officially opened by a visiting dignitary. The hospital here is
the teaching hospital of Cambridge University, so a significant portion
of this new wing was a research facility, but everything in the place was
shiny and new, and the highest of high-tech.
For the rest of that evening I was subjected to a variety of tests to
check that I was fit for the surgery the next day, and the first problem
very quickly arose. They used these wonderful electronic gizmos for
checking your heart rate and blood pressure, and although my BP was
as fine as ever, my low heart rate immediately set off the automatic
alarm on the kit. This took them by surprise, and led to various checks
with my patient records, but it inevitably meant that I was immediately
put down for an ECG before I could be allowed near a surgeon. I don't
think I had my heart rate checked all the time I was in there without
them having to turn off the beeper on the machine, but at least they
soon got used to it and stopped worrying. I also had to go and have a
medical photographer take some interesting shots of the skin they were
going to remove, and as usual by now they were kind enough to say that
they had never had to take photographs of anything quite like it before!
The day of the operation finally arrived. This meant nil by mouth
from midnight. That's all very well, but it was no fun watching the other
guys in the bay tuck into whatever was on offer. Then the surgeon came
round to introduce himself to what he was taking on, have a good look,
and draw all over me with a felt pen. Suddenly it was real, very bloody
real, and the sizes of the lines he was drawing were literally breathtaking.
He was a short guy, of African descent I think, but with a name quite
difficult to pronounce so everyone called him Deevor. He had the most
engaging smile and friendly way about him, which was just as well as he
explained that he had never seen an operation of this type on quite this
scale before - not a remark particularly designed to instil confidence!
Basically he drew a fleur-de-lys on me, with one leaf from my breast
bone down virtually to my crutch, and the other two leaves going to each
side along my waist, and right out to the extreme sides of my hips. It was
HUGE! On a casual enquiry, he explained what he was going to do:
"Cut you open along these lines, remove everything between them
and then pull the edges together and sew them up."
Holy shit, the guy was actually grinning! I tried to cling onto every
word, as this was suddenly desperately serious - no longer some wonderful
thing that was going to take the skin problem away, but this lovely
guy was going to go for it with gusto, and a big sharp knife. He then told
me that it was a fairly serious operation, and that I would be out on the
table for probably over FOUR HOURS, making it dangerous and a
little bit dodgy as once he had cut the middle bits out, there was no going
back, and whatever happened they would just have to plough on.
"Oh, and we need you to sign this consent form, please, before we
can proceed."
For one tiny moment... but I signed, he smiled again, and was gone
with his piece of paper. I was left lying there, contemplating what he
had said, and the lines on my stomach (and virtually everywhere else too).
I also spent a little while doing something I had never really done before
- contemplating my navel. It wasn't anything special, but I couldn't work
out why I'd never done it before, as some would have us believe that it
can be a mystic experience. I just lay there and contemplated it for old
times sake really, and so that I could at least have a lingering memory
of what it looked like, because by that night it would have ceased to
exist, and therefore this was the last time in my life that I would ever be
able to contemplate it. It seemed only right and proper to actually do it
that one time, just so I could genuinely say that once upon time I could,
and so I did.
And that was more or less how the rest of the time passed by that day,
vague inconsequential ramblings passing the time, having a bit of banter
with the nurses who looked in from time to time, and wondering when
they were coming for me. I chose not to dwell on the operation, as by now
I had been made starkly aware of the reality of it being major surgery, and
the easiest way to cope with that was to ignore it completely. C'est la
vie, que sera, sera! That's life, what will be, will be. Let's get this show
on the road and then I can move on and get some new running shorts
- funny what the mind comes up with to throw you of the scent when
you're on the brink of something stressful.
Suddenly a porter arrived, and gave me two minutes to go to the loo.
Dressed now in a surgical gown, flat out on the bed which had been
unplugged from its own mechanical life support system, I was wheeled
out of the ward to a chorus of good wishes from the nurses on duty. The
porter, one of the nurses who had to accompany us and me on my bed
filled the lift. It, and my spirits, sank a couple of floors, and then we
headed along a long, quiet, white corridor towards the theatres. I'll never forget the experience of wheeling quietly along that long, bright white
corridor which instantly conjured up the images recounted by people
who have had out of body or near-death experiences. That was really not
the type of thought I wanted at that moment for heaven's sake.
Once into the theatre area, I was handed over in some little ante
room full of pumps and gauges and shelves full of packets of stuff.
Someone introduced themselves as my anaesthetist, and started sticking
needles into me and in next to no time I'm... back in the ward, trussed
up like a Xmas Turkey with tubes with bags on the end emerging from
deep inside dressings. Curtains round the bed; hushed voices; offers of
water to sip through a straw. I'm offered some sort of button on a chord
thing, which apparently if I press would make the pain diminish a bit.
BP and heart rate checked every ten seconds, or at least it felt like it.
"just let me sleep."
The next morning was still a bit hazy, but the highlight, if I can call
it that, was the surgeon's round. It all got a bit crowded as I got the impression
that my case had created a bit of a stir amongst the apprentice
knife brigade (well, it is a teaching hospital). When I could get a word
in edgeways I managed to enquire how much skin Deevor had actually
removed, and was informed that he had taken off 3 kilos of skin. He
was of the opinion at this stage that it had all gone rather well, even
though it had taken him about five hours in the end. Unfortunately he
was completely unable to tell me how many stitches I had received. This,
of course, is one of the main pieces of information a patient requires
after an operation, as it the one thing that will convey to your mates
how big a deal it was, and how brave you were. Sadly he waved it away
with a casual:
"Oh, a few hundred I should think - it's not worth trying to count
them all, and most of them are below the surface anyway."
A FEW HUNDRED? How am I ever going to get away with a line
like that? I'd have settled for 50 or 60, an impressive but believable figure
which would raise eyebrows satisfactorily. But who was going to believe a few hundred - it was just too big! Then one of the other guys wanted
a look at something amongst the dressings, and needed me to move
slightly so that he could get at it. As my pillows and head were raised
at the time, I just did a plank and raised myself in a straight line with
just my shoulders on the raised head of the bed, and my heels lower
down the bed. It's a great core strength exercise in the gym. Apparently
I shouldn't have been able to do that in my condition, but as it was
about the ONLY thing I could do I was more than happy to oblige.
Mind you, it caused raised eyebrows all round! Then they checked on
my medication, at which point someone had a bit of a go at the sister
in charge about the fact that my on demand morphine pump wasn't
working. They argued the toss for a bit about whether this thing was
actually working or not, until I finally twigged what they were going on
about - the button on a cord thing. When I joined in, they explained that
it was obviously not working as the level had not dropped in the dispenser
tube thing above my bed. It was supposed to give me a controlled level of
morphine every time I pressed the button when the pain got too much,
but as the level hadn't gone down, it was clearly not working.
"But I haven't pressed the button, so it's obviously not gone down.
It's probably perfectly all right." said I, leaping to the nurse's defence.
This caused a degree of scepticism.
"Why didn't someone explain it better to Mr Hare? He should have
known how it works".
"I did know. I just didn't need any more pain relief. It seemed OK to
me as long as I stayed fairly still, and someone gave me a tablet during
the night sometime".
It was probably a simple case of where there's no sense there's no
feeling, but I was never in any real pain as long as I stayed fairly still.
But eventually I would have to move, for clinical reasons as much as for
the obvious bodily ones. But what a rigmarole it was. Apart from the
dressings basically covering just about everything from my neck to my
thighs, I also had two drains. I didn't know a lot about these other than
that they were tubes emerging from just above the top of my thighs on
each side with little plastic bags on the end which collected a trickle of
something with a distinctly unpleasant look about it in a deep shade of
red. These little plastic bags lived in some flowery shoulder bags normally
tied to the edge of the bed, but which had to be slung over the shoulder
if I was to go anywhere. It took an average of about 10 minutes to cover
the 5 yards to the loo and back, punctuated by sharp intakes of breath
at certain key moments. Enough said!!
By the Friday afternoon, almost 48 hour after the operation, I was
moving about a little more freely and even managed to sit out in my
chair for my meals. This probably wasn't a good idea, as it clearly gave
them just the excuse they were looking for, and ended with me being sent
home at the weekend. The good news was a phone call from Number
Four to tell me she was back safely from her school exchange visit to
Delaware in the USA. She was currently Head Girl at her school, and
so she had been required to give a talk at one of the school assemblies
while she was there, and it had all worked out very well. She had also
managed to visit Broadway during their little stop over in New York,
and although they had not been able to fit in a show, just being there
had been enough for the performer in her. Now while I was stunned at
being turned out of the hospital quite so quickly, I was also delighted as
it meant that I would actually be home on the Sunday for Number
Four's 18th birthday. She had decided against having a party as soon as
the opportunity for the trip to the US had come up, and had asked me
to pay for the trip instead. I have long since learned not to argue about
such things with the girls, so that was what she got. But now, against
all expectation, I would at least be home with her for the actual day.
On Saturday morning it was confirmed that I would be discharged,
and I was to arrange for someone to pick me up later on. They showed
me how to change the dressings on my wounds, which I was now able
to discover were actually a total of about 37 inches of stitches (on the
surface), and gave me a supply of a variety of dressings, painkillers and
antibiotics. The worst bit of all was the all-in-one Tubigrip corset - a
sort of all round elastic support bandage which I had to wear to hold it
all together until the stitches healed properly. One small spot on the
stitches on my left side was still leaking something that looked quite
nasty, but they said that it should dry up soon and all would be well.
The last act before getting the paperwork done was removing the
drains. As far as I could tell, they were just there to drain out the bottom
of the wounds, and probably didn't go in very far. So when the nurse
undid the stitch holding the first one in place, and told me to take a deep
breath and she would pull it out, I wasn't ready for what happened. The
damn thing clearly went right to the top of the wound near my chest, and
had obviously made itself quite at home over the three days. In fact it
was distinctly unhappy about leaving - OH MY GOD that hurt... all the
way down across the stomach and finally out by my thigh. It was agony
for a minute or two. She repeated it with the drain on the other side,
equally embedded, equally as far up the wounds, equally painful. I swear
that was the most painful part of the whole show.
Once I'd packed, been handed my discharge paperwork, collected my
bags of pills, potions and enormous dressings, and made my contribution
with gratitude to the Ward Fund, I was pushed fraudulently to the front
door in my wheelchair. I was perfectly capable of walking, but rules are
rules. Finally I'm waved off to get on with it. Extremely glad to see the
back of the place, however shiny and new and comfortable it was still
a hospital, and no one can really say they enjoy being there. I was sooo
glad to be home, although the three flights of stairs to the flat were a
living nightmare for a very long few minutes. Decent food, decent telly,
comfortable chairs and my own bed: everything I could possibly need
to aid a speedy recovery. The rest of Saturday was a slow recovery from
the drains trauma, but by Sunday I was feeling very much more relaxed,
in myself. Although, it has to be said, I virtually needed a computer to
work out how to take my pills. I had some that had to be with food, and
some on an empty stomach and others at least one hour before food, which would have been easy if it wasn't for the fact that some were four
times a day, and some were three times a day. It was a juggling act with
an alarm clock to make it all fit in properly. It was not the most exciting
of birthdays for Number Four, and I was in no condition to take her out
for a meal, but she had a totally captive audience for her tales of her
school trip to America, and the bonus was that I was home, which we
had not really expected.
For the next couple of days I basically took it really easy, but the leaky spot in my dressings meant that I was having to change that bit
on a daily basis, even though it was best to leave the dressings alone as
much as possible. By the Monday I actually ventured out for a coffee,
but it was still a little bit awkward getting back up the stairs, especially
with the corset thing still restricting movement to an extent. On the
Tuesday the leaking was getting a little dodgy, and I was starting to see
the time coming when I would run out of dressings, if I kept going
through them at this rate. I decided to wander gingerly round to the
local NHS Drop-in Centre and get them to give me a decent opinion. In
retrospect, this was not as good an idea as it first seemed, as this sort
of thing was way outside their comfort zone, but they did their best.
They took a swab of the ooze, and patched up the dressings for me with
the advice to come back if it continued.
On the Wednesday it had got a little worse, and by now the corset was
developing a nasty stain too from the leak, and this was going to present
a whole new problem. So I visited the drop-in centre a second time, and
this time they got straight on the phone to the ward at Addenbrookes for
an opinion from the duty doctor. This resulted in the request that I pop
down so that they could take a look and dress it properly once again,
so I grabbed some cash and meandered slowly to the station to get the
next train down to Cambridge. On arrival at 15 I was laid out on a
handy bed for the once-over, and immediately informed that I was not
going home that night.
uBut I haven't got any kit with me" I feebly protested, to absolutely
no avail.
"Get someone to pop some down for you."
"Yeah, sure! The only daughter with a car lives 15 miles further away
than my place, and she works till 8 o'clock at night! She's probably 60
miles away!"
"Well sort something out tomorrow, you're going nowhere with that
infection."
Oh great! So the wound was infected. They enquired as to when it
had started to behave like that, and I pointedly responded that it had,
in fact, been exactly like that BEFORE I had been discharged! Anyway,
I was written up for broad spectrum antibiotics, meaning that they
hadn't a clue what the infection was till they got the lab results, so they
were going to hit me with everything to cover all bases in the meantime.
So there I was, stuck back in hospital, 40 odd miles away from home
with just what I had been stood up in when I was sent there. One phone
call and a request to pass the word around was enough to get everyone
worked up at home, so I spent the evening trying to reassure the girls
that everything was really OK and that it was just routine. Obviously
it wasn't, but I didn't want the girls throwing a wobbly at that distance.
Number Three duly arrived later on the next day with a few bits and
pieces from home to keep me going, and I spent the next couple of days
popping pills and lying around with a fair degree of frustration while a
succession of nurses came by and changed the dressings on a regular
basis. The one real bonus was that I didn't have to wear the corset while
I was in a hospital bed.
Within a couple of days the decision was taken finally to put me on
to the good stuff - intravenous antibiotics. Obviously this was a fair
indication that progress was NOT being made as desired, and it had
the undesirable side effect of hooking me up to a bag stand on wheels.
This development severely restricted my mobility, and brought an abrupt
end to my little trips to the circle of shops and coffee bars in the centre of
the hospital where I could get a paper and a decent coffee each morning.
I also started to form the impression that things were not quite going to
the plan that the doctor had ordered, prompted by the increasing number
of checks, and the repetition of swabs being taken for analysis.
I was also becoming heartily sick of the food in there. It might have
been a fabulous new facility, with all the latest high-tech gizmos going,
but the food was utterly diabolical. By now, of course, I had developed
an acute sense of what was good food, and what was bad. I had also been
able to check out carefully what the NHS was keen to tell everyone was
good food and what was bad. My problem was, that whilst the NHS publicity machine was stridently telling everyone what was good for
them, the hospital was merrily serving up an unadulterated diet of all the
bad stuff to their inmates. Could I get a high fibre breakfast with low
sugar content? NO! Could I get a wholemeal sandwich at lunchtime?
NO! I actually ended up with my own packet of breakfast cereal in my
locker, and resorted to salads for main meals - no fun in November.
By now I was getting more than a little hacked off at the tack of
either progress or information as to what the problem was. On the plus
side, the other guys in the bay had finally got the information out of me
about my weight loss project, and had been on the internet and looked
at the website. I was now on excellent first name terms with the nursing
staff on the ward, and they had also been looking at the website, and
checked back through my notes, so I was now being introduced to visitors
as The Incredible Shrinking Man! By the weekend I noticed that the top
guys on the team were now dropping by to check me over, which I did not
take as a good sign, so I thought it was about time I started demanding
some answers. The ones I got were not what I had hoped for, as it
turned out that they had not been able to identify whatever the bug
was, as by the time the ooze got to the surface the antibiotics had killed
it off rendering the swabs useless. However it was still beavering away
inside, whatever it was. They also started talking about necrosis, which
turned out to be some sort of breakdown of the tissues where they were
supposed to binding back together. It was then that the penny finally
dropped about just how serious this operation had really been, and that
the process was very far from being completed.
But now the powers that be decided that slightly more drastic action
was required, and they would relieve the wound around the leak. That
sounded like perfectly good sense to me, but I was distinctly unprepared
for what happened next. As soon as the treatment room off the side
of the ward was free, I was wheeled in there and placed myself carefully
on the treatment table while the young duty doctor performed his
ritual ablutions.
uThis might hurt a bit."
The translation from Doctorese to plain English goes roughly like this:
"Prepare to meet thy doom! Try not to wake up the patients having
their afternoon sleep with your childish screaming! The pain will probably
ease off after three days!"
What he actually did was to lie me down, and brutally hack through
the stitches holding me together at that point. He relieved about four
inches of the wound, without ANY anaesthetic or warning at all, and
then just let the wound peel open at that point. He swabbed it down,
and pronounced that it had been a good job! How on earth I kept my
mouth shut I have no idea, but it had been absolutely excruciating
agony for a minute or two, and now I was left with a stretch of open
wound. I was duly returned to my bay to wait for the cold sweat to dry.
Shortly after, the charge nurse on duty that afternoon, a great guy
called Steve, wandered by for a chat, and enquired as to whether the
anaesthetic was wearing off yet. I queried that fairly frankly, and on
checking the notes he remarked:
uOh, he didn't use any!" accompanied by his eyebrows giving an
excellent impression of an express lift in up mode. To his eternal credit
he immediately departed to make me a good strong mug of coffee.
However, even with bits hanging out of big new gaping holes, and
antibiotics pumping into my veins like Chardonnay at a Wags Ball, no
discernable improvement transpired, so they started to discuss alternative
approaches. By the Wednesday, a week after I had been summarily readmitted,
and by which time I was ready to explode with the frustration
and going rapidly stir-crazy, they opted for the drastic approach. They
made the decision to take me back into theatre, open up the whole wound again and give it a right good scouring out with carbolic and
wire wool (or the clinical version of that approach). Then they would
introduce some magic new piece of equipment they had which would be
left inside the wound when they closed it up again, attached to some
sort of electronic pump on the outside. There was no way of knowing
how long this would all have to be in place, but it was now their best shot at sorting this out. I was scheduled for the next morning, and returned to
the nil by mouth list. Oh joy - no more hospital food for a day!
The next morning I was gowned and prepped for theatre, and a large
suitcase was placed on the bed beside me with instructions to guard this
with my life. It was the aforementioned magic new piece of equipment, and was worth more than its weight in gold. Off we duly went, on the
same route through lifts, the blinding white near death corridor, and
into the theatre complex. Same old same old - tubes and needles and
things before instant oblivion, but I was just about past caring before I
passed out anyway.
Coming round slowly on the ward later on was a lot more comfortable
than I expected, and I was surprised to find that I had a very nice neat
dressing in place and not a single tube sticking out anywhere, not even
one of those subversively nasty drains in a cute little shoulder bag. There
was no sign of anything resembling a magic new bit of equipment hooked up anywhere either. Steve had no idea what was going on, but
told me that Deevor would be round when he finished his theatre list to
tell me the outcome. I had a drink and a bite to eat, and before long he
showed up with his trademark grin in full flower. He had opened up the
wound completely, washed it all out, and found that the antibiotics had
obviously done the trick and everything was now settled down and as it
should have been originally. The decision had been made that nothing
further was required, so the equipment had not been installed and he
had just sewed me back up neatly and tidily and that should be an end to
it. He was delighted with the final outcome, so I decided that I should be
as well. The funniest part was when they realised that their wonderful
new piece of kit had not only not been attached, but had not been returned
with me either, and a search party was immediately despatched to scour
the area to find it before it disappeared into some NHS black hole.
I was to be kept in another day, just to make sure there was no reaction
to the latest surgery, and by the Friday night they were satisfied that I
was in order, so arrangements were made to discharge me again on the
Saturday. So I finally got out of there by the Saturday afternoon, with
fairly explicit instructions from the nurses, in the nicest possible way,
not to come back again. I was feeling a lot better by now than when I
had come home the first time, and had formed the definite opinion that
although they had probably been way too keen to discharge me the first
time, this time I really was going to be fine. I was still trussed up in that
damnable corset, and was under strict instructions that I had to wear it
for at least six weeks, and I had a bag of spare dressings and a collection
of five different pills to take. My discharge letter said that the reason for
admission had been emergency other source and the diagnosis was suitably
vague as post-abdominoplasty wound infection or fat necrosis. I would
have to attend the dressings clinic the next week, and come back to see
the surgical team in a fortnight, but that was me out of there finally on
the 10th November.
It was probably just as well that I had gone into the whole surgery thing
with my eyes effectively tightly closed. If I had ever really understood just
what major surgery it was, and the possible outcomes, I might never
have gone ahead with it. Instead I had chosen to focus entirely on the
fact that they would simply remove the skin overhang, and I would
toddle back out a new man, without ever thinking what that actually
entailed. In the end I had actually toddled back out a new man, but
until the dressings and corset were off I wouldn't really appreciate it
properly. However the surgery had left more than my torso scarred.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

'INSPIRATIONAL AMBASSADOR'

THERE IS A STRANGE LAW IN SCIENTIFIC CIRCLES - THE LAW OF UNINTENDED Consequences. It basically means that whenever you do something new
or different, it will somehow cause something to happen which you
were completely and utterly unaware would be a consequence. In the
case of my surgery, there was indeed a complication resulting from the
operation. In my blog I referred to it as ITS - Insecure Trouser Syndrome.
I found myself for a while, in a very strange position, as I couldn't use
a belt or drawstring, on my trousers because of the long line of stitches
stretching right across my waist from hip to hip. There was no way of
actually buying anything elasticated, as I still had absolutely no idea
whatsoever of what my waist measurement would actually be, until I
had the dressings finally removed. So for a while I was reduced to some
strange solutions, the most novel being in the end deciding to use safety
pins to attach some light jogging bottoms to the corset thingy.
I hated that Tubigrip elastic thing with a vengeance, and experimented
with a Velcro waist support about a foot deep, which I had originally
bought when trying to find a way of holding the loose skin under control
for running. It turned out to be the perfect solution, but not really deep
enough, so I quickly acquired another three, so that I could use two at a
time, one above the other to cover the wound completely, and have a set
to wear while one was in the wash. Totally practical, extremely comfortable,
and luxuriously adjustable unlike the elastic rubbish one from
the hospital. In fact when I attended the dressing clinic a week later the
sister in charge said that she had never seen anything like it, and would
be recommending it to anyone who needed something like the corset
thing as it was the best thing for the job she had ever seen.
Another week later and I was back at the hospital for my post
operation check with the boss Mr Malata, who decided that everything
was now very much in order and going according to plan. In fact his
actual words were "Spectacularly successful surgery" and "brilliant
progress and recovery". I was allowed to do without the corset at night,
but still had to wear it during the day for a few more weeks, and I was
allowed to drive again. I explained that I needed to know when I could
get back into training, as I had a marathon to do in May in Edinburgh,
and his first reaction was to refer me for psychological evaluation, but
then he said he thought it was typical of me, and wished me luck. He
agreed that I could try some light work sessions on a treadmill, but that
I	should be very careful and feel my way back gently, listening for any
sign of complaint from my body. The appointment was at 15:30, and
by 17:30 I was on the treadmill at the gym, (in my corset), for a gentle
2	mile trial run.
Plans at this point got extremely complicated. Whilst having a chat a
few weeks previously with the girls from The Prostate Cancer Charity
I had mentioned that I would be doing the Edinburgh Marathon for
them in May. They had asked me why I had chosen to do Edinburgh
and not London, and I had explained that, even though it's every runners
dream to do the London Marathon, it was too late to get a place other
than a Bond Place with them, and that I could not commit to raising the
2000 pounds pounds to guarantee a bond place anyway. Since then they had
clearly had some internal discussions, and as a result of the large sum I had raised for them through The Great North Run, but particularly
because of the incredible publicity I had got for them, they decided to
give me a place anyway, without any fund raising commitment at all.
This was totally unheard of, and an offer I couldn't possibly refuse - I
might never get another chance to run London as long as I was running.
So now I had the awful knowledge that here I was in December, trussed
up in my corsets, stitched together like a patchwork quilt, but on 13th
April I was intending to run The Flora London Marathon, followed
by the Edinburgh Marathon on 25th May for good measure. A normal
training plan for a marathon I was assured took at least 16 to 20 weeks,
but here I had only 17 weeks, and the first 4 of those would be in
a corset, with 37 inches of stitches trying to knit together properly.
Maybe Mr Malata had been right in the first place. Maybe I DID need
psychological evaluation.
To take my mind off all this, I had to find my way to Edinburgh for
the annual Xmas lunch of the ERA on the 18th December, where the
news of my impending marathon exploits was greeted with a sort of
resigned incredulity. After the debacle of the replacement coaches on
their trip to watch me at Newcastle, they instantly opted to concentrate
their efforts on the Edinburgh Marathon, rather than even think about
London. It was the blindingly obvious approach anyway, and part of the
reason that I had entered the Edinburgh one in the first place. I'm sure
if it had been somewhere completely different I would probably not
have given it a second thought when the email came through. After the
previous year's disappointment with the change of ownership of our
normal haunt for these lunches, we were trying out a new location The
Mussel and Steak House in The Grassmarket just below the castle.
Although they didn't have a Xmas Menu available, we had a terrific
meal and probably overstayed our welcome by a large margin, not that
they would ever have told us that. The bottom line was that it received
sufficient approval for a repeat booking to be made for the next year.
Xmas was spent at home at the flat, with the girls all coming round,
with current victims in tow, to do the cooking. We had a great day, and
got through the usual routine of Star Wars Monopoly and a very late
night of Texas Hold 'em accompanied by a variety of liquid refreshments.
The girls had, of course, decided that they were all coming to London for
The Marathon, and so they took the chance while they were all together
to cook up their plans. I was still restricting myself to the treadmill at this
stage, but had also begun to sneak in some core exercises on my abs and
mid-section, partly because they are excellent for running, but also just to
see if I could do them without doing any damage.
By the beginning of January 2008 I felt ready to try a run outside, but
the weather was not very kind, so I stuck to the gym and added a few
more of the core sessions. I now felt that enough time had passed, so
ditched the corset, and went shopping. This was one hell of an ego
boost, as I could finally find out what my waist really was now after the
surgery had removed the last vestiges of the old stomach. At my worst
I had a waist of 61 inches, but now it was a staggering 38 inches! I had
gone down 23 inches on my waist, and I was once again able to buy
clothes on the High Street everywhere. In any shop, if I saw something
I fancied I actually knew it would fit. Until you have been there and
done it, it is virtually impossible to know what an intense feeling of
pleasure and satisfaction this simple thing can bring. After years of not
being able to shop for clothes, that easy step was a deep psychological
joy. I did not go mad, as I would take my time and just get stuff as the
need arose specifically, but knowing that I could just nip out and buy something was a totally new experience.
I also knew that I should be looking around for a warm-up race to get
back into the swing in the run up to the London Marathon. The classic
idea was to do a half-marathon in early March, and the usual one for our
area was the Silverstone Half, which took place on the track at Silver
stone motor racing circuit. For some reason I didn't fancy that race,
probably because I had seen some reports about it being a bit boring
and windswept which were obviously just the views of a couple of runners
out of many thousands, but I avoided it anyway. I spotted another one,
just a bit earlier on the 24th February at Sleaford which wasn't too far
from home, so I duly entered as my first race of 2008.
Now, I was talking about the Law of Unintended Consequences
before, and suddenly I was faced with another complete surprise - two
of my girls, and their respective boyfriends, had decided that they would
like to have a go at doing The Great North Run with me this year. Now
it would be perfectly fair to say that none of them had ever done any
running like this before, but basically they had been inspired by watching
the run in a very up close and personal way, and really wanted be part
of something like that. This was completely out of the blue for me, and
whilst I expected that Number Four would go through with it, as would
Number Three's boyfriend, I was less certain about the others. Number
Three had suffered from knee and ankle problems as she grew up,
and had required surgery on her ankle at one stage. In the light of this
I was fairly confident that such a distance run would be beyond the
capabilities of that ankle, but I promised to support her all the way, and
even got a sports physiotherapist to take a look and give her some advice
about training on it. The same applied to Number Four's boyfriend, in
a different way. He had been a promising young footballer in South
Wales until a bad injury had required knee surgery and put him out of the
game permanently, so again I offered support but without expectation.
They all put their names into the ballots for places, and we waited to see
the outcome.
The Edinburgh Marathon people were by now sending out regular
email newsletters and had well over 10,000 runners registered, so it was
going to be a good event. The latest newsletter had requested interesting
stories so I had sent off a reply with a few details, and they had come back
showing keen interest and asking for a few more details. When I got the
next one on the 22nd I was casually reading through when I suddenly
realised I was looking at pictures of me. They had put a whole section in
on my story with some pictures they had got from my website, and were
extremely complimentary, which was a great boost for the training I
was putting in now. This was all going very well, and I was enjoying the
running more than ever. I had even bought myself some running tights
for the cold weather, but carefully avoided any pictures for a while. A
day or so after the piece in the Edinburgh newsletter I had a phone call
from a lady at the Scottish edition of The Sun newspaper, wanting to
do an interview for an article, so I chatted to her for a while but she
wasn't sure when it would appear. On the 31st I noticed an interesting
article on the BBC News website about the use of anti-obesity drugs,
and as they asked for comments, I duly made some. I was quite shocked
to get a phone call later that morning from one of their journalists wanting
to chat about my comments. The upshot of that conversation was
that they sent a car to pick me up that afternoon to take me to their
Cambridge studio and before I knew it I was doing a live interview on
the BBC News that evening. The fascinating thing here was that they
were not intrinsically doing an interview about what I had done, but
were genuinely seeking my opinions about this breaking news story.
This was a whole new departure, and I must admit that I enjoyed the
experience immensely, and they were again complimentary about the
interview. While I was sitting around waiting for the interview, I got
chatting to the BBC Look East lady who was operating the camera for
the London end, where the main News Presenter would be doing the
actual interview over the live link. When we had finished, she asked
if it would be OK to give me a buzz sometime, for their own local
programme, and of course I said #"Yes" and thought nothing more of it.
In true never a day goes by style, I was then told that a double page
spread on me running the local marathon was being published in The
Sun in Scotland that Saturday, and they were kind enough to send me
a copy. It was a typical Sun style article, but nowhere near as bad as I
had feared. In fact their sub-headline announcing the fact that I had
shed the equivalent of 44 big bags of spuds brought a wry smile to my
lips, not only because it was so graphically accurate, but also as it was
such a clever connection to the main sponsors of the Edinburgh
Marathon - the huge Scottish potato producers Albert Bartlett. Almost
before I had got over that one, the lady from BBC Cambridge really did
phone me, wanting to arrange to record a short profile film on me for their main evening programme on the 4th February. We ended up in the
local country park where I did all my training, as the crew who came
out thought that there were some very photogenic spots to use as backdrops.
They asked if I would come to meet them there in my running
kit, so that they could get a few shots of me running in the park, so I
duly obliged. It was all very well doing repeated short runs alongside the
lake till they got it right, but then they wanted to set up the camera on
the back of their truck and film me running along immediately behind
it pretending that it wasn't there. Next they wanted to repeat this, but
with the truck driving along beside me to get some good side-on
footage. I covered over 3 miles while they got a few shots of me running,
and of course most of it never saw the screen. However they did put
together a terrific little profile film which went out on BBC Look ELast
that night.
Once that crazy couple of weeks was over, I could get back to pre
paring properly for my approaching runs, and by coincidence received
an appointment to see the surgical team again on the 25th February,
the day after the Sleaford Half Marathon. This was excellent timing, as
at least it would be too late for them to stop me doing that run. I also
suddenly realised that there had been another dramatic change in my
life without me properly recognising it. The whole of the previous year
had been totally focussed on the attempt to do something amazing The
Great North Run. Something so immense it had surprised everyone
I knew, including myself. Now suddenly, without clearly thinking about
it, I was about to run another half marathon, within 31/2 months of the
last operation, just as a training run. Had I quietly slipped through a
time warp into a parallel universe while I was on the operating table? I
checked back on my training stats from my Garmin and realised that on
my training run on the 2nd February, only my third run outside
since the operation, I had actually run farther than the Great North
Run, and that I had passed the half marathon distance 20 seconds faster
than I had done the distance in Newcastle. I think at that point it was
fair to conclude that I was pretty well recovered from the operation,
and that training was going well.
By the 24th I was good and ready for a decent run, and drove up to
RAF Cranwell, near Sleaford, where the run was based. It was one of
those rare events which turned out to be a bit cliquey and elitist, but
what the hell, I was there now, they had taken my entry fee and I was
going to run whether anyone would speak to me or not. The race was
due to start just across the playing fields from the main stand, go across
the sports field and out onto the roads away from the base, eventually
returning to finish in front of the stand. There was also to be a 5k Fun
Run after the main race had started, which would be based on some
long loops within the playing fields. When the main race started the
runners all followed the lead car with the timing clock on its roof, and
we ran across the field, then round a large loop back past the start and
then out across the field onto the roads and away. I spent the first half of
the race wondering why Dippi (my Garmin) was giving me a completely
different distance totally at odds with each of the mile markers, till it
eventually dawned on me that the classically elitist organisers of the
race had completely cocked up beyond belief. The loop round the field
and back past the starting line was obviously a horrendous mistake the
driver of the lead car had clearly got himself totally confused and
taken us round the first loop of the fun run course, adding a significant
chunk to the race distance! The penny finally dropped for me when I
realised that the mile markers were wrong by the distance I had checked
when we crossed the start line once again. This would either mean that
we were going to have to run a fair bit further than a half marathon, or
that the organisers would be currently buzzing around like the proverbial blue-arsed flies desperately trying to measure a new finishing point some
distance from the planned finish line. The latter proved to be the case,
as we were suddenly shouted at by marshals as we ran past them telling
us that the finish line had been moved.
I didn't enjoy the race much, especially not the two miles off road on
frozen, rutted, motorcycle tyre-gouged tracks through fields, and it was
quite a lonely run amongst the stragglers near the back of the field, but
I actually finished in 2 hours 18 minutes 27 seconds and came 285th out
of 304 finishers. This was fully SVi minutes faster than my Great North
Run time, and therefore my Personal Best time for a half marathon. The
long cold trudge back across the field for another mile to get back to the
changing rooms was extremely unpleasant, and the walk was punctuated
by loud complaints from many other runners. Although the organisers
must have been hugely embarrassed by their overt demonstration of total
incompetence, no matter how many times I checked their website I never
saw them post an apology up to the runners. Needless to say this one was
NOT placed in the must do again column of life's little shopping list!
Next day was the appointment with the surgeon again, but when I
turned up I was introduced to a new slightly younger consultant surgeon
who would be seeing me, Mr Gillespie. He had a bit of a poke around,
took the blood pressure and heart rate again, and then said that he had
noticed from my notes that I had done the Great North Run. He then
offered me the good news that I would probably be fine to start running
outside again now, if I felt up to it.
 When I couldn't stop myself from
bursting out laughing, he looked perplexed, so I explained that I had
just got a PB in the Sleaford Half yesterday. Once he had digested that
fact, and reaeljusted his thinking about how well I was doing, we got
into a conversation about running as he was a runner too and had done
one or two marathons himself. He then switched back to clinical matters,
and told me that he was the guy who would be doing my thigh surgery
in due course. I had almost forgotten about that for the moment, but he
explained exactly what he was intending to do. I asked him about when
he would put me on the list, and he said immediately, which would
probably mean doing the operation in about eight weeks or so.
At this point I asked if I could influence the timing at all, and
explained my plans for the London and Edinburgh Marathons in April
and May. At first he couldn't believe that I was intending to do a
marathon so soon after the abdominal operation and then refused to
believe that I was intending to run two marathons in six weeks. Once
we had established my racing programme, and that I was also going to
do the Great North Run again at the beginning of October, he asked me
if it would be convenient to do the operation just after Edinburgh. He
reasoned that doing it then should give me enough time to recover for
Newcastle, so I agreed and he made the entry in his diary list. I must
admit that this co-operation was so far away from my expectation of
the NHS, but nevertheless I knew perfectly well how lucky I was, and
well aware of how grateful I should be.
As life drifted into March, I was thinking it was about time that I
had a quiet few weeks in order to get myself ready for my first
marathon, and hopefully without too much extra stuff going on. It
seemed as though my wish would be granted, and a couple of weeks
drifted past punctuated by some very effective training runs round the
park. On the 6th I realised that it was now exactly a year since I started
my blog on the Realbuzz site, which had by now become almost a daily
routine. I had a look back at some of my early posts and could hardly
believe the progress I had made. I also took a note of the statistics showing
on the blog, which revealed that my idle .ramblings on there had
received 163,358 visits, and 1,802 comments had been left by visitors
in that time. Although it had taken some time for the traffic to build up
as people got to know me, the blog had now reached the stage where it
was attracting about 400 visits every day.
Then I got a call from Sam, the lady that owned and ran the local
running shop where I get my running shoes and most of my kit, Advance
Performance. We had often chatted over the last year, and she was very
well aware of my story - she had even put a little piece in one of her
shop's newsletters which went out to all her online customers as well as
callers at the shop. She wanted to introduce me to someone and have a
chat about The Great Eastern Run, the local annual half marathon
in Peterborough, if I was free to join them for a coffee one morning.
Intrigued to find out what Sam was up to, I agreed and immediately
went on to the internet to see what I could find out about this race, and
try to work out why I had never come across it, or seen it happening.
It turned out to be quite a large event organised by the city council, with
over 2,000 runners the previous year, and took place around the centre
of the city, starting and finishing at points within a couple of hundred
yards of home. The reason I had not come across it at all was that it
always took place in early October, when I was historically away in
Spain with the boys, and of course in previous years there is no way I
would ever have been interested in running. This year it was scheduled
to be held on the 12th October, exactly one week after The Great North
Run, so I went for that coffee and chat at least with some basic knowledge
so I wouldn't look a complete idiot.
It transpired that the someone to whom she wanted to introduce me
was the Assistant Race Director from the Council, and after a chat about
my story they explained that they would like to ask me to become the Official Inspirational Ambassador for the Great Eastern Run. You've
got to love the sound of that title, but I had no idea of what this would
mean in terms of time and effort on my part, although it would clearly
mean something was required. Basically we could work out what the
role was as we went along, but they wanted to put some details of my
story on the Race Literature, and a page about me on the website for the
race. Also I would perhaps do some local radio interviews, and turn up
on the promotional stand that they put up in the local shopping centres
three or four times during the summer. It also, of course, meant doing
the run, and as I had already confirmed my Great North Run entry it
would mean doing two half marathons on back to back Sundays. Once
I remembered that my main weekly long runs on Sundays in my build
up to London were well over that distance anyway, I agreed to go ahead,
but on one condition. My terms for taking on the role, and letting
them use the story to hopefully inspire other local people to take part,
were that The Prostate Cancer Charity should be made one of the main
charities associated with the race, and that they should have a free stand
at the little promotional exhibitions and a free spot on the field at the
end of the race itself. All this was readily agreed, but nothing was to
be announced until they had got the new printing done, prepared the
necessary press releases, and had the idea finally signed off by the main
race director. At times like this I would wonder whether Dr Ken had
the slightest idea of what he was unleashing with his little running idea a year or so ago.
Apart from this interesting little development, March remained blissfully
quiet, and my training went according to plan. I even took a notable
diversion one Sunday morning at the end of the month to pop out to do
the Thorney Road Runners 10k Race, just for a change and to support
a great little local running club which had the knack of putting on some
excellent races and being extremely welcoming to stray private runners like me. It was a glorious spring morning and somewhere near 300
runners turned out from all around the area. I was not intending to bust
a gut here, just try to put in a good time without disturbing or damaging
any part of the organism only two weeks before London. As so often
happens when you take that attitude I was going extremely well as I
passed the 8k marker, with a Personal Best for the distance clearly up
for grabs. As I try to do in every single race, I was now starting to overtake
those people who had gone off too fast in the first half of the race,
using the backs of runners ahead as targets to overhaul. I had been
tracking one particular big guy who was starting to slow down a bit as
we neared the 9k mark, and as I passed him he stopped dead in his
tracks. I called out:
"You OK, mate?"
And he responded with a gasped:
"It's my first race, and I'm not even going to finish it."
Without thinking, my immediate retort was:
"Sod that! Of course you are - we'll do it together"
I handed him the remains of the drink I had been carrying, abandoned
the idea of a PB, and proceeded to encourage and goad him towards the
finish line. To my mind that is what running is all about once you get a
little way back in the field with those who are not there to win, but just
to take part. It is about a shared experience and exploring the art of the
possible, and I just wanted him to achieve his goal of doing that race.
If I had left him there, he might never have entered another event, even
hung up his running shoes for good so as not to experience that failure
again. As it was, he had no idea who I was, and all he would remember
in the future is that he did the race, and finished in front of his family
crossing the finish line with a huge grin on his face to a large round of
applause. It was a sensational way to spend a Sunday morning, and I
drifted back to my gym afterwards for a well earned session in the steam
room and Jacuzzi, contemplating upon how terrific life could be just
when you weren't expecting it.
But now it was April, with the Flora London Marathon looming very
large (and very long) on the 13th. I had just found out that by one of
those strange quirks of fate I had landed upon a very special running of
the race. It was going to be the 100th Anniversary of the London Olympics
Marathon of 1908, which was the first time that the Marathon Race had been run over the precise distance of 26 miles 385 yards. Since then
that exact measurement has become the officially recognised standard
distance for all Marathons the world over, so the medals this year would
be special commemorative medals for "1908-2008 100 years of the
distance". How cool was that!
This was one of those races where you had to go to a special Expo
in the few days before the race to collect your Race Pack (bib number,
timing chip etc). The Expo was down at an exhibition centre in London
Docklands for the four days from Wednesday to Saturday, and I
applied some logic to determine that the least busy day would be the
Thursday, on the basis that the excitement for London-based runners
would get them there on the Wednesday, and that any runners having
to travel and stay in London would not arrive before the Friday at the
earliest. So on the Thursday I headed off down to London and across
on the Docklands Light Railway to the Expo, where the queues were
very light, with only one person ahead of me in my number block for
the race packs. Nice to know you can get some things right. However,
on that subject I had booked an overnight stay on the Saturday night,
just to be on the safe side, with a package which included a pasta meal
on the Saturday night and transport to the race start by coach on the
Sunday morning. When I arrived at the Expo I had a bit of a look round
on the way to it from the DLR station, and spotted that my hotel was
right opposite the centre there, and quickly realised that as I was going
to be checking in there on Saturday afternoon I could actually have
saved myself the bother of today's trip. So nice to know that you can
also get things horribly wrong at the same time as well!
As I wandered around the Expo, I collected all the free bits and
pieces being handed out by the various stalls; some good, some not
worth having. Then I took off my jacket to change my appearance, and
reversed my direction to go back round and see if I could blag any
more of the good bits and pieces, as you do at these things. Suddenly I
spotted a stall which immediately drew my attention, and I headed
across to pick up some literature and have a chat with the Greek lady
on duty there. There were a lot of stalls advertising great marathon
races around the world, but this one particularly took my eye. Ever
since becoming involved in the world of marathons and half-marathons
I had taken the trouble to find out what I could about what lay behind
this famous race distance, and the legend of the run by the messenger
Phidippides, from Marathon to Athens. He was instructed by the Greek
general to take the news to Athens of the small Greek Army's defeat of
the massive invading Persian Army at the Battle of Marathon in 490
BC, and he had run all the way, passed on the message and then fallen
down dead on the spot. This stall was advertising The Athens Classic
Marathon, the one and only authentic Marathon, re-tracing the route
Phidippides ran from Marathon to Athens, with a finish in the original
Olympic Stadium. I had absolutely no idea that this race existed, but I
was instantaneously hooked. I knew that whether I finished London or
not, whether I finished Edinburgh or not, however many times I ran
races that were marathons, I could never truly and honestly call myself
a marathon runner in my heart of hearts until I had run THE
MARATHON! I did have the presence of mind to take the details and
not actually enter the race, which was scheduled for the 11 th November.
Let's face it; I hadn't even tried to run any marathon yet. I had two
coming up, and then I was facing surgery on my thighs in June, so this
was absolutely no time to be entering another marathon in November.
But I knew it was going to have to be done one year. In that flash of
seeing the stall and realising what it was advertising, I had acquired a
new long term target. But now it was time to stop dreaming and get
organised, I had a race on Sunday!

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

THE SPRING DOUBLE

I AM ON THE EDGE OF TOTAL EXHAUSTION; COED TO THE MARROW YET dripping with sweat; it has gone deathly quiet, and I am running slowly
down a long dark tunnel. No, not completely dark, just a shimmering dull
orange glow - orange stripes above me along the ceiling, ranks of orange
blobs down both sides of this orange tunnel. What am I running on? Its
not a road, its a surface of orange glue which is trying to grab my feet,
which only just escape from its clutches at each faltering step with a faint
squelch which becomes louder and louder to banish the deafening silence
of the tunnel. Heavy breathing around me, others squelch through the
tunnel at my side, glazed eyes focussed unwaveringly ahead.
Is there a light ahead?
Will this silence ever be broken again?
How much more glue will there be spread across this road?
It's funny how the mind works sometimes, but that little episode is
one of my clearest and most lasting memories of the 2008 Flora London
Marathon. The experience had started with the train down to London
on the Saturday afternoon, dumping my bags at the hotel and walking
across the road to soak up the adrenaline-fuelled atmosphere of the
Expo on the afternoon before THE RACE. I had used the mobile to
hook up with a couple of other bloggers who were at the Expo at the
same time, Martin H a rugby player from near Manchester, who I had
first met at the City of Manchester 10k last year, and who was a first
timer like me, and his Mum Mother H who was an old hand at this
and there to do it for the fifth or sixth time. Eventually I tore myself
away, and whereas earlier in the week the staff had been guarding the goodie bags at the exit with their very lives, they were now desperate to
offload the rest to anyone and everyone who would take them away

for them.
Back at the hotel, the company I had booked the package with were
holding a get-together for their customers, and passed on a few great
tips from their years of experience to make the day go smoother for us
all. I headed up to my room and carefully laid everything out ready for
the race, just as I had in Newcastle. The list was identical in every way,
except for two key extras. The first was the new laces for my running
shoes. About a week or two before the race, everyone who runs the
London Marathon gets sent a lot of information about the day to help
their planning. Included with this pack is a set of RED shoelaces, provided
by the charity HEART UK, exclusively for London Marathon runners, and I had now installed these ready for the race. If you ever see a runner
out on the roads who has red laces in their running shoes, take it as a
sign that they have run the London Marathon, and they are wearing
them with pride. The second addition to the list was a handful of Gels
- small energy gel packs with rip-off seals to use as boosters during the
run. The simple fact, as I know I have mentioned before, is that running
a marathon will use up, according to the size and shape of the runner,
anything up to, or even over, 4000 calories. The human body cannot
physically store that much energy, so you have to adopt whatever strategies
you can to make sure you don't hit the wall, where you reach that point where the body has simply run out of glycogen stores and however
much you want to run, there is simply no fuel left in the tank to make
the muscles move according to the brain's instructions. My strategy,
along with many of the other runners, was to take an energy gel every
few miles along the run. I would carry the first few in my belt pouch,
and replenish them from my girls who would be waiting at The Prostate
Cancer Charity Cheering Stations at around mile 14, and around mile
20. (This didn't mean they would have to run those 6 miles faster than
me. While I was running the 6 miles on the big loop around Docklands
and back, they would just have to cross the neck of the loop.) Once this
was all set out ready, I wandered down to the restaurant to get my fill
of one of the special pasta dishes they had laid on for the many runners
staying there.
Just as I was finishing up, and wondering how on earth I was now
going to fill the nervous few hours before I could at least start trying to
go to sleep, I got a text from another blogger Angie K, asking me what
I was doing. She was down in London for the run, and had her husband
and two daughters, who were about the same age as my younger ones,
with her. They were in the West End, and she quickly persuaded me to
jump onto the DLR and meet them in Covent Garden, where we met at
an occasional haunt of mine when I was in town called The Crusted
Pipe, a pleasant wine bar downstairs in the old market. Neither of us
was certain that going out in the West End of London drinking red wine
was anywhere in the text books about preparing for your marathon run,
but it certainly took our minds off the next morning, and her family did
their best to keep changing the subject to more mundane matters (without
much success!). Before it got too late I finally made my excuses and
went in search of my bed.
Sunday 13th April 2008 dawned stunningly bright and still, if a little
chilly, with a crystal clear blue sky. The weather could not have been
more perfect for long distance running at that point, and it seemed the
gods of running were on our side for once. The previous year had been
the hottest race ever, and the water stations had run out leaving desperate
runners begging water from concerned spectators down at the back of
the race. This year was obviously going to be fine and clear, and the
temperature would definitely not climb too high. A quiet and pensive
atmosphere among runners in the dining room was offset by the dawn
chorus of their kids anticipating an exciting day of spectating. Once
kitted out, and with everything else stuffed into my baggage lorry
duffle bag, I wandered down with ages to spare before the coach would
leave. The hotel was alongside an old wharf off the River Thames, so
I wandered along by the water, watching vapour trails criss-cross the
perfect clear sky. Suddenly my mobile phone started buzzing, and the
first of many text messages wishing me good fortune arrived with a
shiver and a shake of the phone.
Just as I was herded onto the next coach, ready to be transported to
my doom, I received another text. This one was from a lady blogger in
Cheshire who went by the name of Kitten, and with whom I had been
exchanging comments on the blogs almost since my very first blog
post when she was a new blogger too. I had eventually met her and her
family at that great bloggers meet The City of Manchester 10k the
previous year, and since then she had displayed an amazing talent for
sending me texts at just the right moment before my races, and her
timing that morning was impeccable just as I was climbing onto the
coach. The emotions of the impending challenge were at that point
hitting the heights, so I sent her back what was to turn into an absolute
classic text message once she immediately copied it onto a post on
Realbuzz for all to see! The text I sent back simply read,
"OOOOOHHHHH SSSSSHHHHHIIIIITTTTT!!!!!"
This succinctly summed up the moment for me. I was later told that
it had sent her into a fit of hysterical laughter from which she took some
time to recover.
In no time we were deposited at Blackheath, and I commenced the
long walk to find my start area. The FLM utilises different start areas for
the Elite athletes, the Ballot runners and the Charity Bond Place runners
to avoid too much congestion near the start. They all run the exact same
distance but the routes don't finally merge until about three miles into
the race. I headed for the charity area which was my designated start,
and very soon came upon a large gathering of bloggers from Realbuzz
for a pre-arranged meet next to the Lucozade Tent in the holding area.
A few chats later, and having checked that Angie K had survived the
previous night intact, I deposited my bag on the designated lorry, and
we were told over the PA system to enter our pens, where adrenaline
overload seemed to be the order of the day. According to my predicted
time I was in the last but one pen, but unlike many runners I really don't
mind where I start, it's the taking part that counts. Before we had any
more time to think about it, we heard the klaxon go, and the race begins.
We stand around a bit more, waiting for our pen to be released, and
then begin the long, slow walk towards the gates of the park a few
hundred yards ahead, through them and round to the left and another
couple of hundred yards to the start line. As we shuffle along, a TV
cameraman on a cherry picker high above the gates starts waving madly
at the crowd of us below as he prepares to go live, so we all wave and
scream back at him for the folks back home on their sofas. The thought
flashes through my head that this is where I always used to be... Oh
My God - how life has changed. It had taken 3 1/2 years to make this

utterly incredible journey from sofa to start line, from a 28 stone hulk
to a 13 stone marathon runner. What odds would I have got for that
bet, I wondered?
We shuffle through the gates, and the road became wider so we can
finally start to jog towards the archway across that start line. Now we
can hear the whine of the red computer sensor mat across the road, and
we all push the buttons on our watches as we cross the line.
"I AM RUNNING THE LONDON MARATHON."
The first 9 or 10 miles I'm cruising along in a fair crowd, comfortable,
trying not to overdo it, keep to my pace plan, keep hydrated, take a gel
every 5 miles, applaud, like all the other runners, the bands are playing
for us and there are disco parties outside every pub even at this time in
the morning. The crowds are simply amazing, wall to wall people along
both sides of the road. As we get to the merger point with the other
runners from the Ballot start, both sides are good naturedly booing each
other, and as it's a large road junction surrounded by shops and pubs
there are huge crowds watching at this point.
There are portaloos placed along the course every few miles, but
being gentlemen, of course, we leave these to the ladies and make the
best we can of handy plantations when the need becomes overwhelming.
There can surely be nothing more disheartening than standing in a
queue for a portaloo with the time ticking away, but this can often be
the inevitable side effect of keeping well hydrated.
Still cruising, about mile 10, maybe near enough two hours in or
something near, when the beautiful crystal clear blue sky suddenly turns
dark, menacing and then black. This does not look particularly good,
but now that I am well warmed up and jogging along it is getting just a
tiny bit on the warmish side so the runners friend - a little light drizzle,
would not be entirely unwelcome. Unfortunately it isn't a little light
drizzle, but a very substantial downpour of freezing sleet, accompanied
by the ambient temperature falling through the floor like a lead balloon.
This is disastrous for warmed up muscles, and before long we are all
suffering as this arctic monsoon takes at least 15 minutes to pass, leaving
the runners at that point knocked completely out of their stride and
freezing in soaking wet sleet covered kit. I had been very comfortable
in just my single thin running vest up to that point, but the next few
miles were a struggle to get back up to running temperature, and get the
muscles loose again.
Pottering along about the 12 mile mark, remembering to whip the
camera out and get shots on the run of all the interesting things that
caught my eye, and especially trying to get shots of the mile markers
and the clocks on each one as a record of my run, I suddenly recognise
Jamaica Road and realise we are about to turn onto Tower Bridge. This
will be a spectator hotspot and is also one of the special photo points, so I unashamedly position myself on the road with as few runners
around me as possible, and prepare to look my best running over the
most famous in the bridge in the world. It's always looked so flat from
a car or taxi, but there's quite an incline up to that bridge when you are
trying to run and look good for the cameras at the same time. The crowds
here are just awesome, as is the noise they make as they look out for your
name on your running vest and scream personalised encouragements
at every runner. As we come off the bridge, we have to turn right and
head towards Docklands, even though we know that if we turned left
here we would only be 2 or 3 miles from the finish line. As we head the
other way, the faster runners are streaming past on the other carriageway
heading to the finish line, and must be at least 10 miles ahead of
us travelling approximately twice as fast as we are, and they're not the really fast people who have probably already finished. Just down the
road we pass the 20k sign, closely followed by the 13 mile marker, and
then the HALF WAY sign. As some around me groan, I just decide it's
all downhill from here (metaphorically) and look forward to spotting
The Prostate Cancer Charity's cheering point ahead. One of the big
sportswear manufacturers had kindly donated a huge number of Tshirts
to them in their pale blue colour, with Prostate Cancer Charity
Supporter printed on them, and they had supplied them to all the
supporters of their runners. The idea was that they would all gather at
the same point and cheer anyone in a Prostate Cancer running vest to
give them a huge boost. All the charities did this sort of thing, and some
of them even got sufficiently organised to make their points based at
pubs. I very nearly ran right past them in the end, as they were in a
fairly narrow part of the course there, but the girls saw me coming and
were screaming at me enough to grab my attention. I took a brief stop,
grabbed another drink from them, and a few more gels; reassured them
that I was perfectly fine and enjoying it and hit the road again.
By now the effects of that ghastly sleet shower had finally disappeared,
I was warmed through, well fuelled, jogging along nicely, and starting to
feel extremely confident. I even began to watch out for the consternation
on spectators' faces as they tried to scream out my name and realised
they had no idea how to say TISM - the name I now always had on my
running vests. I suppose it was a bit naughty, but I generally have it on
my vests as ID to other bloggers running in the same races. As we came
through amongst the towers of Canary Wharf the sky began to darken
again, and the temperature commenced dropping like a stone again.
Before long, as we wound our way back through the community streets
of East London, the heavens opened and this time dumped a large mass
of freezing sleet and snow on all the slower runners still in this area. At
this point it slowly dawned on me that I could no longer feel my fingers,
on either hand and that even though I was still jogging along, I was
actually violently shivering at the same time. My worst fear at that point
was that I could no longer hold a drink bottle from the water stations
or a pouch from the Lucozade energy drink stations, and I couldn't get
the gels out of my gel belt. It was going to get serious if I couldn't keep
myself topped up, even though we were only maybe 8 miles from the
finish. It would probably have been alright from this angle, but the
psychology was the important thing at that point of the race.
The fabulous St John's Ambulance Service First Aid stations came to
our rescue at just the right moment. Realising that the likelihood of
cases of collapse from hypothermia was very high, they started unwrapping
and handing out the featherweight foil emergency blankets to
every runner, and telling us to wrap them round us as we ran to try to
increase our core body temperature. I grabbed one and did as bidden,
even wrapping my hands tightly into the corners as I ran with my arms
crossed across my chest buried in silver foil. I reckon I ran for about 3
miles wrapped up like this, and could probably lay claim to running in
fancy dress as a turkey ready for the Xmas day oven! Things started to
get just a little hazy round about this point, and although I can recall a
few key moments, I can't be sure how I was in between, or whether the
memories are even in the right order!
I remember that when I started thinking that I would probably be all
right without the blanket now, I noticed that all along the roadside,
used blankets had been discarded by stuffing them between the railings,
creating a weird silver foil barrier all along the side of the road. It was
obvious that everyone had started to have the same thoughts at that
point, and it occurred to me that while I was running in a blanket I
wouldn't get any photos as my number was covered up, and no one
was calling my name out as my name was covered too. At that point my
blanket joined the foil wall, and I only regretted it for a short while as
my body readjusted to the cold again.
At one point the route ran around a large roundabout, underneath a
wide railway viaduct, which meant we were underneath it for a couple
of minutes at least. Right in the middle of the roundabout itself was a
group of extraordinary drummers, beating seven bells out of a set of
enormous Chinese-style drums and the sound reverberated underneath
the viaduct in an unbelievably physical barrage of sound. Those guys must
have been beating those drums for hours, and I hope they understand the
wonderful way that the sound picked up the runners, hurled us around
that roundabout and spat us out with a gut-wrenching adrenaline boost
which made everyone pick up the pace for at least a mile.
Somewhere around 19 miles I was verbally grabbed by the girls again,
and picked up the last of my requirements to get me to the finish. I
nearly missed them as they were positioned just past a bend near a pub,
I think. They had been getting a bit anxious as I was now just a little
behind schedule, but I was in no mood for hanging around for a chat
and getting colder stood still, so I grabbed my bits and took off again,
leaving them to find their own way back to the finish.
Then there was the extraordinary orange tunnel incident. At various
points along the course, Lucozade energy drink stations were set up,
where volunteers handed out small plastic pouches of orange-flavoured
Lucozade Sport drink. The idea was to squeeze the drink through the
spout, which helped prevent choking on it as you ran, and when you
had had enough, you just threw the remains to the side of the road for
the cleaners to collect later. Very few people actually squeeze the last
drops out of these packs, and if any get trodden on by following runners
they tend to ooze out their remains on to the road, and turn it just a
little bit sticky. Under normal conditions this doesn't have much effect,
but you sometimes notice one or two slightly sticky footsteps for a few
hundred yards after an energy station. In their infinite wisdom, the
organisers had positioned the last energy station immediately before the
long underpass tunnel which eventually turns up onto the Embankment
for the run down to the Houses of Parliament.
The stretch from the Tower of London to the Embankment was really
bursting with spectators still making a huge amount of noise, even
though this was now about 3 hours after the front runners had passed
by. So by now we had covered probably about 24 miles already, had
been enjoying a long stretch of raucous support, got a last pouch of
energy drink, and then ran straight into the tunnel, which was lit solely
by the strange orange streetlights in the roof. Added to this effect were
the tens of thousands of discarded energy packs thrown to the side of
the road by the 25,000 or more runners who had preceded us, all oozing
their remaining contents slowly across the road. And YES - the packs
were all bright orange, the contents were orange and by now the road
was virtually orange. No spectators were allowed in the tunnel, so it
had suddenly gone deathly quiet apart from the laboured gasps of the
runners all around me and the sound of all the feet sticking to the road
at every step. It was a totally surreal moment indeed, and an amazingly
clear memory of it for all that.
Then we were running up the short rise out of the tunnel onto the
Embankment itself beside the River Thames, and I could see Big Ben
straight ahead through the trees. From that point to the finish the energy
of the extraordinary crowds simply carried me home. As I approached
the turn into Parliament Square someone let out an ear piercing shriek
of "TISM" and I recognised another fellow blogger Supercaz, who had
come along to support all the bloggers running, and had stood there
for hours watching out just to give each of us that extra boost for the
last mile. Running across Parliament Square with only about a mile to
go my spirits were really lifted even more by the biggest crowd of
the day, making the biggest racket of the day. I was all smiles now,
grinning like the proverbial Cheshire Cat, as nothing would stop me
now. I spotted one of the official photographers ahead of me, sitting on
the ground in front of a bollard in the middle of the road, so I ran
straight towards him with the smile on full wattage, in the absolute
certainty that this was going to make a fabulous picture (it now hangs
framed on my lounge wall, and is all the more stunning because that
genius photographer had put himself there for the simple reason that he
could frame his subjects as they ran towards him with Big Ben on their
left shoulder - it is the ultimate photo of running London).
Now it was Birdcage Walk, 800 to go, 600 to go, 400 to go and
coming round past Chelsea Barracks in front of Buckingham Palace
the 26 mile marker with a huge banner draped across the front of the
footbridge above our heads 385 Yards to go. Onto The Mall and now
I could see the finish line and I was still concentrating enough to
REMEMBER TO SMILE FOR THE CAMERAS! Arms aloft and cross
the line - officially 5 hours, 46 minutes, 05 seconds after I had crossed
the Start Line.
STOP! This can actually prove to be quite difficult after that distance.
I was directed to a little ramp, where some wonderful volunteers were
sitting low down to remove our timing chips; then the medal placed
round your neck; on to pose in front of one of the special backdrops for
the photographers to get the I'VE finished and here's my medal shot; across the road to pick up a goodie bag which had a bottle of water, a
bottle of energy drink, an apple, a bag of Mars Planets and all sorts of
bits and pieces making a basic survival kit; keep moving towards the
baggage lorries to get kit back; get bag, step away from lorry towards side
of road, lean against a convenient tree; realise that you are about to pass
out and stuff yourself with the chocolates, the energy drink, anything
for the fastest possible energy hit (that's why they are in the goodie bag).
Stabilise without falling over - but only just.
Then realise that walking straight towards you, with her kitbag and
goodie bag, is Katie H, another blogger with whom I had been part of a
double act of mutual support all spring, and we just stopped and hugged
each other without saying a word. What an amazing coincidence,
because in the chaos and crowds we could have taken ages if we had
been deliberately trying to meet up. Then it was the long trek together
down the rest of the Mall to the family reunion area on Horse Guards
Parade, where my crew were waiting impatiently under the letter H.
After a quick diversion to get a few photos with Katie's Crew, we set off
in the cold and damp to the hotel near Victoria Station where The
Prostate Cancer Charity had a large function room set up with hot drinks,
snacks and that most wonderful combination of sheer luxury at that
moment - massage tables and sports massage therapists. Two steaming
mugs of coffee and a gorgeous leg massage later, I effected a quick change
into some street clothes and we were off to Kings Cross for the train
home, accompanied by medal spotting, and that silent exchange of smiles
of respect and acknowledgement between the wearers.
I was now officially, and forever, a marathon runner. And I had
another of these to do in six weeks! At least I now knew exactly what
I was letting myself in for, but more fundamentally, I also knew that I
could do it. The first half of my Spring Double was done, now onwards
to the other half.
First thing to do on the Monday was to get photos to the local paper
of their round-up of local runners who had done the run. By now the
word was out that I was The Ambassador for The Great Eastern Run,
so I updated the website with that piece of news, and added my race
report to the ever growing collection on there. I had written a post on
my blog about this appointment, and as a result a number of bloggers
had entered the race already, and a couple of them had even decided
that although they were not ready to attempt a half marathon, they
would come along anyway and registered as volunteers to help marshal
the race. This was just typical of the quite phenomenal community spirit
that had grown up amongst the Realbuzz bloggers over the last year
or so.
To be perfectly honest I did very little training for the next week or
so, but managed to get in some very good quality steam room and
Jacuzzi sessions. Over the past few months I had evolved a theme on my
blog characterising my running as a basic long term battle between ME
(my brain and personality) and THE ORGANISM (my body, which
constantly tried to get out of doing too much). If I got in a really good
long training run I would often take a rest day the next day as per all the
good training plans, and I now referred to these as Organism Pamper
Days (OPDs for short) when a rest day was enhanced by a session in the
steam room or Jacuzzi at the gym. I had noticed that the term had now
been adopted by many folk on the blogs as different runners referred to
taking OPDs when they made entries on their blogs. Well I can only
describe the week after the Flora London Marathon as a full scale
Organism Pamper WEEK, where I relaxed all the rules, allowed myself
some treats on the dietary front, and generally indulged The Organism
in any way it wanted. Running a marathon takes a lot out of a body,
quite literally, and it does no harm whatsoever to allow it some serious
healing time.
However, all good things must come to an end, and Edinburgh was
getting closer and closer and nothing was going to stop that process. I
started to get some short runs in and check that everything was still in
full working order with no obvious after effects lingering in the shadows
waiting to pounce. By the end of April I was back on schedule, or at
least back running as smoothly (if you could ever call my running smooth) as ever. I actually had no idea what training to do to cover a
six week gap between marathons, as it turned out to be something that
very few people attempted. In the end I decided to just keep my fitness
levels up, put in one good long run every Sunday and a couple of shorter
ones during the week. Nothing I could do in that short period of time
would have any fundamental effect on my core fitness or running speed,
so there was no point in pushing boundaries.
May was going to be a busy month whichever way I looked at it.
The only free weekend I had was the first weekend of the month, so I
made sure I got a good run, and then generally took it easy. The second
weekend I drove across to Southport on the North-West coast just north
of Liverpool for my nephew's wedding. The ceremony was in Kirby, but the do was at a hotel in Southport and all the families from across the
country were staying at the hotel to keep life simple (and avoid driving under the influence). I was to be there from the Friday afternoon till
the Sunday, with a very long drive indeed there and back.
We had a great weekend, and the weather was extremely kind to
everyone. I had taken my running kit with me, as it had seemed like a
great chance to get a run along the famous promenade there next to the
sea, but the weekend had been meticulously planned and I rapidly
realised that no allowance had been made for any free time. The word
had been put out about my weight loss and running, and it seemed that
everyone there wanted to have a chat about it. I had actually packed my
London Marathon medal to show my Mum, but it proved a tricky job
to keep an eye on it as it got handed round at every opportunity. To be
honest, during the Saturday evening dance, when the numbers had
swelled considerably with everyone who couldn't fit into the church, I
actually retrieved it and went and hid it in my room for fear of losing
it completely. It was a great weekend, but I was relieved to complete
the long drive home and settle back into a routine in the run up to the
next marathon.
By now the entries to this year's Great North Run had been sorted
out, with Number Four getting very lucky with a place through the Daily Telegraph special first 2000 for readers ballot, Number Three
and Number Four's boyfriend getting main ballot places, and Number
Three's boyfriend having to resort to my arranging for him to get one
of The Prostate Cancer Charity's Bond places. He was always going to
run for them even if he got a ballot place, not out of some misguided
loyalty to me, but because his Grandfather had been a victim of it. Once
we got them into some serious training runs, it was quickly confirmed
that Number Three and Number Four's boyfriend would not be able to
manage the training with their respective ankle and knee conditions,
but the other two were coming along fine.
So on the 18th May, just a week before the Edinburgh Marathon,
Number Three's boyfriend and I headed out to run The Deepings 10k,
which for me was the anniversary of my very first race. The excuse I
shall give for the completely devastating distance by which he beat me
is simply that he is a fit young man in his early twenties, and there
would have been something severely wrong if he hadn't soundly beaten
me. At least I managed to beat my own time from the previous year by a
minute and a half, so left with some dignity still intact. I know it wasn't
perfect training by any manner of means, but I have a great affection for
that race, and the fun I had there the first time round, and it is good to
support local small races which are, really, the lifeblood of the sport
throughout the country.
On the Wednesday I had to go in to see the surgical team for my
pre-operation checks, and was relieved to find that they were perfectly
satisfied with all the tests and declared me a suitable case for treatment. I think they were referring to the operation there, and not making some
oblique reference to the two marathons. Thursday was spent checking
that I had everything I would need for three nights in Edinburgh, plus
all my race kit. This again was an Expo race, so I didn't have my bib
number and chip yet, but was intending to collect it when I got to the
Expo on Saturday morning.
I travelled up on the train on the Friday afternoon, and checked in
to the hotel where I would be staying. It was in The Grassmarket, right
opposite The Mussel and Steak House where we had enjoyed our annual
Xmas lunch, and where we had coincidentally booked for dinner that
night. Some of the boys would be working on race day, and one was
away somewhere, so we had opted for an informal gathering on the
Friday, mainly because I didn't trust myself in their hands the night
before a marathon. One of the main topics on the agenda that night
was planning the October trip to Spain as we would all be together with
diaries ready. To start the process, they now knew to check with me
whether I was racing, so I told them that I would be doing the Great
North Run on the 5th October, and the Great Eastern Run on the 12th
October. Jokingly they asked if I had any others planned, and I casually
mentioned that although I didn't yet have an official entry bought and
paid for until after that weekend's run, I was thinking about possibly
doing The Athens Classic Marathon on 11th November. I had to explain
what the race was all about, and they immediately understood why I
was interested in doing it. At that point, the Auld Git threw into the
conversation that he had never actually been to Athens before, and soon
it was established that none of us had been there before. We'd all been
to one or other of the islands, but never to Athens itself. The decision
then followed fairly quickly that the Spanish trip would be abandoned
this year, as the boys had decided to come to Athens instead. By now I
was bowing to the inevitable, and knew that I was definitely going to
be having a go at it this year, rather than in later years. All I had to do was
survive another round of surgery, get healed up and back into training as
soon as possible after the operation, and then get fit enough for another
marathon within about 4 1/2 months of the operation - which this time
would have been carving up my LEGS! No problem then.
The Expo on the Saturday morning meant a long haul down to Leith,
where it was being held in an indoor sports centre. It was probably the
saddest, sorriest excuse for an Expo you would ever come across, and
once I had collected my race pack it took all of five minutes to see everything.
The only giveaways were in the goodie bag handed out at the
exit, and whilst I am certain that the pack of the sponsors very own
baking potatoes was of the topmost quality, I quickly decided that I was
not prepared to lug them round for the rest of the day and so declined
the kind offer. Just as I was about to join the mass rapid exit I spotted
one of my very special blogger friends, Russell Nimbus from Liverpool,
with his wife, about to pick up his race pack. I had been quite involved
in his decision to run this race as his first marathon, and we had plans to
meet for dinner the following night after the race. We got the obligatory
photos done, and I left them to enjoy the rest of the Expo and went to
find a ride back into the city. This proved damn nearly impossible as there
were massive queues at the bus stops and quite clearly no additional
services laid on to cope, which should have been a no-brainer with
11,000 runners and their supporters all having to arrive and depart
from that bus stop in 2 days. I am now given to understand that they
have abandoned the idea of an Expo in future and will be mailing out
the race packs.
After a quiet night I was up with the lark (which was singing with a
definite Lothian brogue on that fine morning), had a light breakfast, and
then headed off to the start area in full running kit. It was wonderful
to be able to get ready in the room and then just stroll across town
towards the start at a respectable time, and the crowds grew as I neared
the launch pad. The whole start area was cramped and thoroughly
disorganised, but I eventually bored my way through the glutinous mass
of bodies to the relative quiet of the last pen. As the pens and road here
were very narrow, we were stretched a very long way back from the
start, and it took a few minutes of jogging once we were released to
even get a sight of the start line and hear the familiar whine of the
sensor mat. I knew that there would be TV and newspaper cameras in abundance at this point, so decided to run alongside a very large
rhinoceros running for the WWF as it would be a camera magnet at
this point. The crowds were immense here, and making a really good
racket as we took off down a long slow decline away from the city
centre, and I remember thinking that with all the wonderful sights and
architecture in Edinburgh we seemed to be pursuing a route which
would carefully avoid all of them, which was such a shame. Almost as
soon as we were out of sight of the start line the crowds quickly dwindled
to virtually nothing, and the route wound through some edge of city light
industry areas as the runners became strung out into a thin ribbon.
We passed the new parliament building, almost without realising it,
then headed off down to Portobello Promenade straight into the teeth
of a half gale whipping up the Firth of Forth and creating a nice sandblasting
effect as it crossed the beach. What followed was 14 miles
along the coast road, straight into the teeth of that wind, with the added
benefit of really strong sunshine as the day progressed. The horizon for
much of that stretch was artistically dominated by the massive twin
chimneys of Cockenzie Power Station, whose motivational properties
still continue to elude the most diligent of seekers after truth. They had
conspired to include a ghastly mile or two on farm tracks with lurking
ankle breaking stones strewn about to make life interesting, which took
us through the Gosford Park Estate, and then it was across the front
lawn of the big house, through a wood and back on the coast road to run
all the way back to Musselburgh Racecourse for the finish. Of course,
having made the turn at about 18-19 miles, the wind immediately
dropped for us slower runners so we didn't have it on our backs for the
last 7 miles after all, just the ever strengthening sun.
There was a stretch here of a mile or two where the out and back routes
shared the same road, and as I was heading back through Longniddry
Bents I spotted the unmistakeable blogger Kizzi 10000 still coming
along in the other direction. We had been chatting on the site for ages,
as she was another weight loss wonder woman, but had never actually
met before despite our best efforts, and she spotted me about the same
time. Race etiquette about crossing over the centre line went straight
out the window as we both veered straight towards each other and
indulged ourselves with a huge hug, before plodding on.
Shortly after this my shins began to ache quite seriously, which dictated
a slow final section with a few walk breaks, and by now there weren't
even noisy gatherings of supporters outside the pubs we passed, just the
odd policeman, first aider or marshal to give us a little bit of support.
Of course those architectural masterpieces atop the power station added
their own special flavour to the majority of that return leg, but once I
passed them again I knew the finish was not too far.
Eventually I painfully passed one last pub, rounded a corner and
the racecourse appeared and lifted my spirits. No countdown markers
here, but the route turned in through the fence and then we were on a
temporary surface over the grass of the home straight in front of the
now sparsely populated stands, and with a clear road ahead I made one
last sprint for the finish with my arms raised. Regrettably, 10 yards
further on there was a sharp right turn guarded jealously by some iron
barriers, but this supertanker by now had a much wider turning circle
and longer stopping distance, so I just ran right into the barriers as the
most effective solution to stopping. 5 hours 54 minutes and 57 seconds
after crossing the start I finally brought the race to an end.
Then it was chip removal, medal, water and a banana. The highly
professional photography team the organisers had contracted had gone
for a cuppa, so there was no chance of a medal at the finish photo in
front of the very nice backdrops set up there. So I wandered through to
the baggage lorries, picked up my kit, and then hooked up with a local
blogger Lynda L who had been on finish line volunteer duty for most of
the day. She kept her promise and plied me with some wonderful jelly
babies as we sat in the sun and chatted for a while. Now Musselburgh
Racecourse is a good few miles out of Edinburgh, so the final delight
was the massive queue for the shuttle bus service back to the start, where
standing on the side of a road in a slowly shuffling mass of knackered
runners and by now bored supporters was just what the doctor would
have ordered for my shattered legs.
After the stiff-legged shuffle back across the Royal Mile to the hotel,
and the miracle cure of a long hot shower, I was raring to go again and
grabbed a taxi for the hop to the Omar Khayyam at Haymarket. Way
back in the distant past, before I started on the weight loss project, I
adored Indian food (or at least the variety served in the UK). Although
I could never understand the attraction of the nuclear fusion in your
mouth variety, the more elegant flavours of the subtle end of the menu
were where I found pleasure. Such delights had been one of the first
casualties of the healthy eating regime, but remained firmly fixed at the
head of the soul food list, and it had now become my celebration meal
of choice for after big races. When you've just run a marathon, burnt
off over 4,000 calories, and are in dire need of a well deserved treat,
then the answer is an Indian meal. Russell and Marie didn't stand a
chance on this, so we had booked this restaurant, weeks before, as I
had eaten there on numerous occasions in the past. It was the perfect
way to recover from a difficult day, and Russell was justifiably on a real
high after completing his very first marathon.
An exceptionally good nights sleep, and a relaxed train ride home
on the Bank Holiday the next day, and the Spring Double was in the
bag. Once I'd got the washing machine buzzing away, I popped to the
club for what was almost becoming a ritual session in the steam room
and Jacuzzi, and wondered about the next operation in a fortnight. I was
beginning to look forward to getting this thing over and done with once
and for all. For the last few years life had been completely dominated
by weight targets, the running bet with Dr Ken, then the upcoming
reconstructive surgeries. Right now I was just a fortnight away from
the LAST operation, I was at my desired weight and I was fitter than I
had ever been.
Back home, I went straight on to the internet and booked a place in
The Athens Classic Marathon. Then I emailed the boys to tell them I
have an entry and am definitely doing it! After all, what's life without
an exciting target or two?! The Spring Double had been done, now it
was a case of:
"Bring on the Autumn Treble. Great North Run 5th October, Great
Eastern Run 12th October, and Athens Classic Marathon 11th November!
WOW!"

CHAPTER NINETEEN

THE FINAL CUTS

THERE WAS SIMPLY NO REAL POINT IN DOING ANY SERIOUS TRAINING FOR the next couple of weeks, bearing in mind that I was about to have my
legs carved up and would be out of action for an indeterminate period.
So I took it fairly easy and just got on with the daily grind. A couple of
days before I was due to go into Addenbrookes Hospital again for the
Reconstructive Surgery unit to do their thing, I was wondering how long
I could expect to be in this time, and in the end I just called them to find
out. Mr Gillespie, my new consultant surgeon, wasn't available, but
another of the team was happy to have a chat. He told me that I should
reckon on probably three days after the operation, and then added:
"But as this particular operation is highly susceptible to many complications,
you should be prepared for potentially a longer stay."
This probably well meaning remark left me absurdly worried. If this
operation was more prone to problems than the last one, and last time
I ended up still in hospital three weeks after the operation, was this
going to be worth the risk? The stomach skin had been a huge problem,
and the removal had without doubt fundamentally made my life easier,
but this time it was nowhere near as crucial for me. I started to question
the whole rationale for having this surgery, and debated with myself
whether to just cancel it and forget about it. I got out my file of the
hospital letters, and was checking through the details when I came
across the letter from the Board of the Primary Care Trust which said:
"This procedure is included within the Low Priority Procedures list.
As such we do not normally fund this procedure, but will do so if there
are exceptional individual circumstances.
Having carefully considered the clinical information regarding the
above named patient, and in view of his substantial weight loss, I can
confirm that we will fund this patient to have an open T scar thigh lift."
This got me thinking that I was a very lucky man to have my local
PCT be prepared to spend an awful lot of money getting one of their top
surgeons to perform this operation on me. This was obviously a once
in a lifetime opportunity to finish the job properly, and the sensible thing
was to bite the bullet and get it over and done with once and for all.
With that in mind, on the 10th June I presented myself to Ward 15 in
the Addenbrookes Treatment Centre and was immediately greeted with
a cheery:
"Hello again, Mike, we've been expecting you. A Bay, bed 4 - you
know the drill and how to find it. Make yourself at home and someone
will be along with a coffee in a few minutes."
Talk about being put at ease! The staff were pretty much, the same
crew as last autumn and for some reason mostly remembered me well.
I introduced myself to my fellow inmates in the bay, unpacked my bits
and pieces and popped to the machine at the end of the ward to pay the
extortionate fees for a five day card which would turn on the TV and
phone over the bed. I never actually used their phone on any stay, as
contrary to my expectation it was perfectly fine to use mobile phones
anywhere on the ward.
Mr Gillespie came round for a final pre-operation chat when he had
finished his list for the day, and if I hadn't known better I would have
fallen into the trap of thinking he was having one last go at putting me off
completely. While he was making sure I was in sufficiently good working
order to withstand the rigours of his handiwork the next morning, he
dropped a classic comment into the conversation:
"Of course the area where we will be operating is the most difficult
area to get to heal properly anywhere on the body, so you'll have to be
very careful and not move much for a while."
I was about to rise to his bait when I thought better of it. It was way
too late to be backing out now, so I resigned myself to my fate and tried
extremely hard to forget about it. I got myself a sandwich, and settled
down for the night. In the morning of course it was back on the nil by
mouth routine and strict instructions not to go anywhere as they could
come for me at any time.
Finally the theatre porter arrived, unplugged my bed, (they were all magic electric beds, with a remote control thing which could send it
into all manner of contortions), and we were off on the familiar route
to the Carvery. The chatty sleep therapist had me under in a flash...
Recovered some semblance of consciousness back at base again, and
was immediately given some fairly strict instructions not to try to move
about, to drink as much as possible, and "use the bottles". I promised
to comply with lying still instantly, and for as long as they wanted, but
pointed out politely that I would need them to go and get me a good strong
coffee and a jug of iced water if I was to comply with the drinking
instruction. They also kindly offered to order me dinner, which was
possible at later hours for immediate post-op patients, but by now I
knew that was not a sensible option if you wanted something edible.
The alternative was a completely free choice from their entire stock of
sandwiches, which meant cheese on white bread, but also meant speedy
and filling, so it became the chosen solution. Drips on hooks, attached
to needles in the back of my hand, with new bags regularly - each one
accompanied by a variety of pills, and frequent vital signs checks just
about sum up that night.
Woken very early, before everyone else, for more bags to empty
through needles in the back of the hand, but at least I got a wake up hot
drink. I was still not allowed to move, so it was all really boring for a
while. Just before morning rounds one of the nurses came along and
removed some of the dressings which were no longer as clean as they
might have been, and I got to sneak a look at a corner of the handiwork.
Much to my consternation, the top few inches of the cut on my right
thigh didn't seem to have any stitches in, and was a very neat thin line
indeed. My first thought (and it probably sums up the state of my brain
at that time of the morning) was to wonder just how long I had been
asleep, as it almost looked as though the wound was healed already.
My query to the Eastern European agency night nurse was rebuffed with
instructions to ask the doctors when they came on their morning rounds.
One of the distinct advantages of Bay A was that we were always
first on those morning rounds, and as the catering girls usually made
everyone wait for breakfast till they had been seen by the Medics, that
put us at the head of the queue and more likely to get properly hot drinks
and fresh toast. So it wasn't long till the white coats began to gather, and
I could raise my query. The explanation was very straightforward.
"That part of this particular operation wound probably wouldn't be
able to take stitches without problems, so we use superglue instead at
that point."
I'd got quite used to getting stitched up by the team in there, but
when they started to resort to superglue you had to wonder what things
were coming to. But once I got to see the whole area of the wounds on
both legs, I realised that they had glued about 5 inches at the top of each
leg, and the rest was good old fashioned dissolving stitches. Just for the
sake of clarity, I should point out that the operation had officially been
a bi-lateral thigh lift, the purpose of which was to remove the redundant
loose skin on the inner thighs. The wounds started at the very top of the
front of my thighs, cut straight right round to the top of the inside edge
of my thighs, and then down the inner thigh to not far short of my
knees. Each leg had a scar about 14 inches long, which significantly
enhanced my score in the show your scars stakes! Not, you understand,
that these particular scars were suitable for too much display, bearing
in mind their sensitive location.
While I was having the dressings cleaned up first thing, I had noticed
something completely unexpected. Quite apart from all the dressings
that I had obviously expected down the thighs, I also had some large
dressings at the outer extremities of each hip, roughly around the ends of
the old scars from the first bit of work. Now seemed to be an appropriate
moment to wonder what on earth these were there for, as I couldn't see
the slightest connection.
"Oh - while I had you on the table, and I was on a roll with everything
going superbly, I thought I might as well have your dog ears off
as well. It was a sort of tidy up, while the going was good."
"Err fine, thanks." was about the most erudite response I could
muster at that point. This was utterly amazing, and I just didn't know
what to say next. It was certainly something that I had never thought
would ever be sorted out. Yes, I knew they were there, but, compared
to what was there before, these were insignificant, and the thought of removing them had never once crossed my mind.
Dog ears is obviously a highly technical, medical term in the field of
reconstructive surgery, so I'll try to explain. When they removed the
loose skin from my stomach the previous year, they had more or less cut
out a large 3 leaf clover shape, and then just pulled the edges together
and sewn them up. If you have ever tried to do this with paper, or some
sort of material or cloth, you'll readily know that the point where you
start to pull the edges together gets a little rucked up around the end of
the cut, and there's nothing you can do about it. Well the same applies
to skin; the result of the operation was a quite small but marked wing around the very ends of the scars on each of my hips (or dog ears in
surgical parlance). Once they have settled down, as mine had, apparently
you can then get rid of them by doing a mini repeat operation, just
through the dog ear itself, which restores the area to smooth and flat.
This was precisely what he had done, while I was there on the table, so
I had small dressings on each hip covering about six inches of new
stitches on each side. They should heal up very quickly, and I would
probably not be able to notice any new scars in the end as he had carefully
married them up to the old scars. Don't you just love a man who
takes pride in his work?!
The rest of the day passed in mind-numbing boredom, interspersed
with even more mind-numbing short busts of daytime TV. Every now
and again I was ministered to from the drugs trolley, or the coffee
trolley, usually just a minute or two after I had finally managed to doze
off. All in all not what one would call a fun day, and eventually it
passed, lights were out, and I tried to get some sleep.
Friday was an altogether different affair. Morning rounds brought
up the big question,
"Why haven't you got up yet?"
"I was told not to move, to give the legs a chance to heal properly."
"That was yesterday. Today is get up and get cracking day."
He then checked the little drains sticking out of each leg just beyond
the end of the main wounds and decided that they could come out later
as well. That was something to really look forward to then. If last time was
anything to go by that should be more painful than the operation, and
heaven knows where these ones went inside. In fact the possibilities
there didn't bear thinking about!
Remarkably, I managed to get mobile again without too much fuss
and bother; the pain pills were obviously doing their job extremely well.
I was frankly petrified about having the drains removed, after the intense
pain with the last lot, but again these were not too bad. The main
problem was the act of standing up or sitting down. Once vertical I was
OK, even if I did need a slow moving vehicle sign on my back! I had also
figured out from my working knowledge of the place that I would
almost certainly be kicked out the next day, so I put Number Three on
notice, and managed to waste the rest of the day failing as usual to
complete the Daily Telegraph crossword (one day I will - if dreams do
really come true!).
Saturday morning brought the inevitable order of the boot, even
though there was one area on my right thigh which was still playing up
a little. But I got a right talking-to from Mr Gillespie, who had come by
especially to see me even though it was a Saturday.
"I know by now exactly what you are like! So let's have no misunderstandings
here. You are absolutely not, under any circumstances, to
come even close to doing anything that in any way might be construed
as running until I personally give you permission. Is that understood?
Have I made my instruction plain enough for you?"
I think I got the message, and it turned out during the conversation
that he did really know what it is like. He and his wife had both got
entries to the Flora London Marathon 2008, but had to defer when she
became pregnant. They were now looking to run it in 2009. He had
already run the Jungfrau Marathon, and was about to do so again later
in the year, so this guy was a serious runner indeed.
So I was duly ejected with the usual mathematical conundrum of the
pill collection, a bag of extremely long dressings, and some strange
brown pads in foil packets to put over the bit that was still leaking. I
also had instructions to attend the dressing clinic at the Edith Cavell
Hospital in Peterborough the following week. I persuaded Number Four
to do some shopping, and then settled down for a quiet evening, and
what turned out to be a comfortable night. I was religiously taking the
antibiotics like clockwork, but as the painkillers were optional I opted
not to take them. I did have a couple of paracetamol before turning in,
but that was the last I took of any sort of pain relief. It was astounding
how such a large operation, leaving me with a sum total of over 30
inches of stitches on my thighs and sides, could be done in such a way
that, 72 hours later I was feeling fine and in very little pain at all.
I was still worried about possible infections, especially after having
been dragged back into hospital for another 10 days last time. I kept a
very close eye on the wounds, or at least as close as I could when I wasn't
supposed to touch the dressings, and whilst the left leg seemed to be
healing very quickly and more or less perfectly, the same could not be
said for the right leg. I had to constantly change one particular area of
the wound, just beyond where the stitches took over from the glue. I
was also developing a swelling about the size of an egg a little further
down the thigh, and a smaller one in a similar spot on the left leg. When
I went in to the dressing clinic on the Friday they thought it wasn't too
bad, but I had to go back again early the following week for another
check. This time they were a little more concerned, and after a telephone
call to the ward at Addenbrookes I was sent straight down there again
for them to have a proper look. I absolutely refused to accept that
the same thing was happening, and in defiant mood I went down with
nothing to facilitate a stay. Perhaps a bit daft, under the circumstances,
but I was determined not to give them the slightest excuse if they weren't
totally convinced I should stay.
As luck would have it, they just poked around a bit, washed it,
dressed it again, and sent me packing with a huge smile of relief. I
suppose I should have been annoyed at being sent on an 80 mile round
trip wild goose chase by train and taxi, but I was too happy at having
escaped with my freedom to feel resentment. They were only trying to
ensure my well being, after all.
To take my mind off all this, the 28th June was the first of the Expo
things for the Great Eastern Run, which meant having a big display up
in the centre of Queensgate, the big shopping centre in the middle of
Peterborough. The idea was to encourage people to take part in either
the main half marathon, or the 5k Fun Run, and at the same time try
to recruit as many volunteers for the day as well. The stands were to
be open from 10 till 4, and I had especially arranged for The Prostate
Cancer Charity to have a free stand, so two of the community fund
raising team were coming up for the day with all their display stuff. No
one had given me the slightest idea of what was expected of me, except
to be there, but someone had suggested I bring my medals, so I took
along the Great North Run medal, the Flora London Marathon medal
and the Edinburgh Marathon medal just in case.
When I finally pitched up a little late, excusing myself on the basis of
the legs still being swathed in dressings, they were already set up and
chatting to a few people, so I just wandered across and browsed through
the literature they had prepared for the run. I hadn't seen any of it yet,
and they had various leaflets about the details of the run, the fun run, volunteering, and the regular fortnightly training runs on Wednesday
evenings starting from my gym, by coincidence. The gym people were
there as well, with a stand offering free blood pressure and heart rate
checks, and promoting the gym, obviously. As I was browsing, I realised
that practically all the leaflets had either my photo and a paragraph or
two about me, or a reference to me being the ambassador. I was quite
surprised at how much they had involved me, but slightly miffed that
no one had given me a chance to see what they were printing about me.
I checked it through thoroughly and at least they hadn't printed anything
wrong.
The team on the stand was made up of representatives of a couple of
charities inviting people to run for their charity, some reps for some of
the local running clubs which helped to organise the event and organised
the training runs, and the sports development team from the city council
whose baby this really was. Before I could work out what I was supposed
to be doing, I found myself being drawn into various conversations and
introduced with the leaflets which had my photos on. Apart from a
short break for a sandwich and a drink for lunch, I was pretty much on
my feet and chatting to people right through virtually to 4pm, and it
was only when I finished that I realised it had probably been too much,
really. But it had been a lot of fun, and if people were to be believed, and
they weren't just humouring me, then my involvement was having the
desired effect and people were actually signing up for the run with my
story as their motivation. Whichever applied, I know it all made ME feel
good that evening with my legs up and a glass of wine in my hand
(purely for medicinal purposes, you understand - full of good antioxidants).
About
this time I received an email out of the blue, (or out of cyberspace,
anyway) from a public relations firm wanting to see if I would
phone them about possibly doing some publicity stuff about my blog.
I had no idea who they were, but as they mentioned the blog I thought
I'd call and see what it was all about. It transpired that they were the
agency for Realbuzz, the blogging site, and they wanted to do some bits
and pieces to try to get more people onto the site and start blogging.
They said that they had asked me because my blog was one of the most
popular blogs on the whole site, and got one of the highest numbers of
visitors, (plus it was a very interesting story). Not really knowing what
to expect, but always having had tremendous support and motivation
from all the users of the site, and never having had to pay anything to
use the site, it seemed only fair to help out, so I agreed to go ahead.
They prepared some notes to send out to people, and I checked them
through, and then promptly more or less forgot about it.
Eventually I got to see the surgeon again exactly one month, to the
day, after the operation. This time it was not one of the team, it was
actually Mr Gillespie himself, and in between telling me about his
preparations to run the Jungfrau Marathon in September, he prodded
and poked around the undressed wounds. When he felt the swollen
areas on each leg, he thought about them for a minute, then grabbed a
needle and shoved it straight into the right leg, and then proceeded to
use a plunger to draw out a lot of some clear liquid. As he did so, the
swelling went right down, so he repeated the exercise on the left leg,
with the same success.
"You are producing more lymph (or something that sounded like
that) than you can currently get rid of naturally."
I was told he might have to do this again, or it might now be OK;
there was no way of knowing for sure. The left leg in all other respects
was fine now, well healed up and the bit that had been glued looked
really neat and tidy to the point where I seriously wondered why they
don't just glue everything if the scars look that good. No doubt they
have their reasons, but I wasn't going to try to find them out now. The
right leg was not doing so well, with one section of about an inch of the
stitches having opening itself up, and this was going to require constant
re-dressing to keep it clean and avoid the risk of infection. I decided
that I just had to ask about getting back into training, even though with
the leg not healing properly it was obviously still going to be some time.
I really needed to know whether I could sensibly still target doing
the runs lined up in October, especially the Great Eastern Run as I was
now all over the literature, and they had put up that big section on the
website too.
He told me that the legs were coming on really well (I would have
hated to see what they would have been like if they were doing badly),
and he thought that I should probably be able to start a bit of treadmill
work quite soon and then build up at whatever speed I could manage
from there, as long as it felt comfortable.
uBut what do you mean by soon? Next week? Next month?"
"How would tomorrow suit?" was his astonishing response! I couldn't
believe it, but he was perfectly serious, as long as I was careful and
stopped at the slightest adverse reaction. The right leg was dressed once
again, but the left leg was now OK on its own, and with that I was
politely shown the door, with a request to drop in again in two weeks
to see how things were doing.
It just goes to show what a remarkable thing the body truly is. On
11th June my thighs were carved open from hip almost to knee, the
loose skin was cut out and the edges pulled together, stitched and glued
up, and on 12th July there I was, back on the treadmill in the gym,
doing 15 minutes at 5 mph for the first session, exactly as per the fine
details of his instructions. I had to wear my short running tights, just
to help hold it all together, and as I finished with a short cool down
I noticed that they had ridden up a bit when running and a large slice
of gauze and micropore was now uncovered, but nobody seemed to
have noticed.
Best of all was the feeling that the surgery was now over and done
with. The end was in sight.

CHAPTER TWENTY

A TALE OF TWO HALVES

WHEN I STEPPED ONTO THAT TREADMILL AGAIN, I CONFESS THAT I HAD NO idea how my legs were going to react. Not only was I worried about
whether they would be OK after the operation in a general sense, but I
was really concerned about whether they would be able to cope with the
level of training that I was going to have to put in. At that point, I was just
12 weeks from the Great North Run, 13 weeks from the Great Eastern
Run and 17 weeks from The Athens Classic Marathon, and my ability
to get to their start lines was dependent upon my still having retained a
good level of core fitness since having a break after Edinburgh. I knew
I would have lost a lot, you can't go that long with no exercise at all
without losing a lot of fitness, but as long as I hadn't got too much
actual muscle wastage I could probably bring myself back up to scratch
fairly quickly. Various studies have been done looking at how quickly
you lose fitness when you reduce your training habits, but the results are
a bit varied depending on whether you reduce frequency, duration or
intensity. Not much has been done on what happens to your fitness when
you grind it down to absolute zero in all directions, and have your legs
carved up into the bargain, so this would have to be my own personal
research project.
As luck would have it, and not a little obviously down to the incredible
skills of Mr Gillespie, I was fine after that run, and quickly
built up the distance each day. The strangest thing of all was that the
more days I ran, the better the legs seemed to be healing up, and the
small problem area finally closed itself up to the point where I could
stop using dressings on it. Admittedly every now and again it would
flare up again, and a new little hole would develop and leak all manner
of obnoxious substances, so I always carried a small spare dressing or
two, just in case.
The following week brought home to me with a bang what I had
casually agreed to with the Realbuzz people. They had sent out their
press release with my details, and all of a sudden the phone hardly
stopped ringing. The first thing that was needed was a photoshoot with
one of the big news agencies which had picked up the story, but they
were absolutely gutted that I didn't have any of my original clothes from
when I was at my biggest, as they do love their pictures of thin guv
in huge old trousers and shirt. 1 explained that I had never actually expected
to need them for anything like this, but they compromised by
checking on what size I had been, and promptly going shopping for
a pair of trousers and a shirt. Well, the media is all about creating images,
isn't it! Before he left after an intense two hours of photography in a
nearby park, I managed to achieve two results for myself. I got him to
let me have some of the photos that the agency decided not to use, and
I also got him to make a present of the trousers and shirt to me, as I now
wished I had kept some once I had seen that size on me again.
As a result of all this activity there was a full page article in The Daily
Mirror, another in The Daily Telegraph online, and on the Wednesday I
had an ITV camera crew dragging me around for a shoot alongside the
river. When they came back to the flat for some footage of a conversation
in front of the computer with my blog on show, we coincided with
Number four coming in and she rapidly became the centre of attention
and got herself on the TV too. Mind you, with her thespian talents she
has always had a built-in light that turns on whenever a camera points
in her direction, so I was beautifully upstaged but didn't care a bit. The
profile film was broadcast on their local evening news programme and
I was delighted with the piece they had created. Within a couple of days
the Realbuzz PR people had taken the footage from the TV, added sub
titles back and front, a bit of music over their intro bits, and it was on
Youtube, which was a first for me. A few radio interviews filled the gap*
for a day or two, until it all started to die down again.
On the 27th July we had another Expo day for the Great Eastern
Run, this time in Cathedral Square in the centre of Peterborough, and
it was a scorching hot day. I spent the day again, with my medals round
my neck, chatting to all and sundry and signing up runners for the race.
Apparently their publicity about the Expo, as a place to get your race
entry done with a small discount, had included a mention about meeting
me. Although I had been chatting to people on the blog, and also through
the message facility on my website, it was a whole new experience to
meet real live people in the flesh who wanted to talk about it. When
they asked me to be The Ambassador, it had seemed just like another
piece of publicity someone wanted to use my story for, but this was
actually starting to bring home to me with a sizeable clout that complete
strangers were genuinely interested in what I had done, and wanted to
do similar things, if on a smaller scale, as a direct result of my having
done it. People were actually signing up for the half marathon or even
just the 5k Fun Run, just because of me. This was getting very personal,
and I wasn't sure how to react, but I knew it felt good.
Next day was another visit to Mr Gillespie, and another needle session
in the swellings, which had returned but nowhere near as badly as before.
He got less stuff out of them, and thought that they probably wouldn't
need doing again. I also got the all-clear to start running outside again,
when he realised how well it was going on the treadmill. As a runner
himself, he was well aware of how ghastly running on a treadmill is
compared to the real thing. We talked about this for a bit, and I explained
to him that I only usually get on a treadmill for speed work sessions. These
are a very useful part of any running training programme, where you alternate
between sustained sprints, and slower recovery bits. Typically I
would run at about 5 miles an hour to get warmed up, then do 2 minutes
at 6 mph, 1 minute at 4mph, 2 minutes at 6.1, and increase the speed
intervals by 0.1 mph each time up to around 7 mph, and then back down
again. It was quite intense, and over time it had the effect of slightly increasing
your normal running pace, and improving your endurance. The
speed controls and clock on the treadmills in the gym made it possible to
do these sessions very accurately, which was virtually impossible outside
where you had to rely much more on guess work. They were also a lot
less boring than just plodding away in the heat of the gym going
nowhere not very fast.
August was a fairly quiet time, going for my training runs in later in
the day when it was cooler, and generally making good progress towards
the big Autumn Triple. We had another Expo at a big out-of-town shopping
centre at Serpentine Green mid-month on a Eriday evening, but
surprisingly there were very few people about - probably because of
the fine weather. Something that was said during the evening prompted
me to do a bit more homework on the Athens course. I knew the Great
North Run course, as I had already run it, and I also knew that the
Peterborough course for the Great Eastern Run was already renowned
in the running world for being a good course for Personal Best times as
it was so incredibly flat. As Peterborough is on the edge of the Fens, the
spiritual home of all flat earth types, then this just had to be true anyway,
without even checking what roads they were to use. But Athens was a
different kettle of fish completely. I'd never been there, but all the good
tourist photos of Athens are dominated by big hills, and mountains all
around, but it had never occurred to me that anyone would possibly
organise a marathon route over anything other than a virtually flat
course, or over the odd bridge or two. I realised I had broken my golden
rule, and entered a race without checking the course first, but this one
was different - this was THE COURSE, the authentic one, and it HAD
TO BE DONE!
I got on to the race website, and immediately realised from the information
pages that they had not been able to choose the course for
this race, as it had been dictated by history! When I downloaded the
cotirse map and profile, I instantly realised why a number of runners I had
spoken to had wished me luck but sworn that they would never do it. It
also became quite plain why Phidippides had keeled over and died when
he finished. A close inspection of the download revealed that there was
effectively one stretch in the middle of the run which was uphill - one
long uphill stretch that was FOURTEEN MILES LONG. It went from
around mile 5 to around mile 19, but the route didn't give it all back in
a nice equally downhill stretch, as the finish in Athens is higher above sea
level than the start at Marathon. After I had caught my breath again, i
realised that it would have made no difference if I had known before,
I would still have entered as this was THE RACE. What I did do, however,
was to immediately include hill runs in my training programme, and
went looking for a suitable one, which was difficult to find in Fenland.
As it happens, I did find more or less the perfect little hill, very close
to the gym, and just off one of my main favourite running routes. It was
around 400 metres long, with a steady rise at a much steeper gradient
than the Athens route, and was perfect for doing hill reps, run up, jog
down, run up, jog down, always trying to beat the previous time. One
session a week doing about 8 reps was substituted for an ordinary run,
and I also tried to incorporate this little hill into longer Sunday runs. In
my slightly quirky way, the hill from Milton Ferry Bridge up towards
Castor became Acropolis Hill, at least until I actually walked up the
real one on the Saturday before the race, anyway. It was murder on the
quads, the big thigh muscles which took the brunt of running uphill,
for the first few sessions, but they soon started to show the benefit.
It also taught me a valuable lesson about understanding what you are
letting yourself in for when you get carried away with new masterplans
- however inspiring they may seem.
The month was rounded off with a photoshoot again, this time with
Number Four, for Chat magazine. They wanted to do a piece on me,
but from her perspective as most of their readers were ladies. The
photographer was an American called Joe, who did a lot of these types
of shoot, but was primarily a sports photographer. He had learned
his trade photographing American Football in Florida and after that
Saturday morning session with us he was heading off to a Premier
League football match in London as his next assignment. We had a
good gossip between shots, and he told me how he was hoping to get
some work with Marathonfoto, who took the pictures of runners at
some of the big events. I mentioned that I had actually arranged for
them to come and do the photos for the Great Eastern Run, and we
agreed that he would email me if he was on the team there.
September was an even quieter month than August had been. One
Expo again, this time back in Queensgate where we had the first back
in June. By now it was way too late for anyone to start preparing for the
half marathon, so we were concentrating on the 5k fun run, but more
on getting volunteers signed up to help organise the crowds on the day,
and act as marshals. Alongside the committee made up from the local
running clubs, and the City Council Sports Development Team, we
would need about 350 volunteers on the day, or the runners could
not run. There also had to be a significant turn out of the police, and
paramedics, and first aid stations manned. By the end of the day we
were just about there or thereabouts, and we had got a good few fun
runners signed up too.
Number Four and Number Three's boyfriend were both just about
ready for their first half marathon race. I had very deliberately not got
too involved in trying to make sure that they had trained properly, as
I really didn't want them to feel that I was in any way, shape or form
creating pressure for them to do this run. I was fabulously excited at the
prospect of them doing it, and knew that they would do well and enjoy
themselves immensely, but I only wanted them to do it because they
wanted to, not in any way because I wanted them to. We had quite a
little party heading for Newcastle, or Whitley Bay which was where our
hotel was located. We only wanted to stay one night, and none of the
hotels near the centre of Newcastle would accept one night bookings
that weekend, as they knew they could get all the business they wanted,
and at ridiculously high prices too. Apart from me, all four girls were
coming, and three boyfriends, so it was one car from Manchester for
Number One, and two cars from Peterborough making the trek.
The party for Athens had grown a little too. The original plan was
that the boys would come to Athens in November instead of going to
Spain in October this year, although sadly a couple of them couldn't
make it in November in the end. Luckily The Poseur, The Auld Git and
Auld Thai Tarn were able to make it, and were already all booked up.
I had initially issued severe warnings about being on good behaviour
before the race, so we had decided to head to Athens on the Thursday,
spend Friday and Saturday doing Athens, Sunday would be the race,
and on Monday we would head for the coast for the rest of the week
and quite probably let our hair down a little, maybe. The Auld Git had
been left in charge of finding and booking suitable hotels, and the plan
was for them to fly down from Edinburgh to Gatwick and I would hook
up with them at Gatwick from where we would fly down to Athens
together. Numbers One and Two had by now decided to join us, and
once I had cleared it with the boys (family were NFiVER allowed near
the boys' week normally) they had booked to come down from Friday
to Monday, and found a hotel quite close to ours.
On the Monday before the Newcastle run, I had a session with my
sports massage lady, Dorothy, a delightful and petite lady whose thumbs
I once described on my blog as having been forged in the furnaces
of hell. Luckily I didn't need to see her very often, as I always did my
muscle stretching religiously; short stretches before a run, long stretches
afterwards, and small stretches most days. However with such a long
lay off, I wanted to be absolutely sure that everything was loose and in
good shape before taking on two half marathons in eight days, so had
booked for a leg massage to be on the safe side. I also always made sure
there was a good few days between a sports massage and a race, as it
could sometimes take a day or two to recover. There had been occasions
when my calf muscles had got really tight, and the pain she inflicted
then whilst getting all the knots out was unbelievable, but her hands
were magic and she really knew her stuff well. After every session my
legs always felt better than ever, so this session was as much about
feeling good as it was about making sure it all worked well on the day.
On the Saturday we loaded into the cars and headed for Whitley Bay.
I was driving Number Four and her boyfriend, and the others were
coming in Number Two's car. We got there well ahead of the others, as
Number Two is notoriously bad at getting going in the mornings , so I
left the others to wait and once I had checked in I got the metro straight
into Newcastle and headed for the Expo. This was one that we didn't
need to attend to get race packs, which had all come in the post a couple
of weeks before. It was also not a great Expo from the content and
interest point of view, but there was always an excellent atmosphere,
and most importantly it was the place where a number or bloggers would
be hanging around for a meet up. In most cases it would be the only
chance of meeting up, as the race was so huge and it was impossible to
spot people in a crowd of 40,000 runners. I spent a great afternoon just
sitting around chatting with running friends from the blogs, and mid
way through the girls turned up for a look round as well as they had not
seen the Expo last year as they only came for the race day itself.
Back at the hotel in the evening we had dinner quite early for us,
and of course played spot the other runners in the restaurant and bar.
A late evening stroll along the rather windswept promenade just to
make sure there were no cobwebs left, and then it was back to the room
for the ritual laying out of the race kit. This year was going to be very
different to last year's experience, and I was really looking forward to
getting into the pens with the ordinary folk, and being part of that great
running fraternity up the back. Last year had been a stunning experience,
but this year I was looking forward to doing the real world thing. I was
also a hell of a lot more relaxed because I knew the race, I knew the
course, and I knew I could do it (even though I wasn't in quite as good
shape (well running shape, that is) as last year bearing in mind the
operations I'd had since then.
Great North Run Day, Sunday 5th October, dawned with a fine look
to the weather, and after an early breakfast we kitted up and headed for
the coaches to take us to the start. The others would be coming in later
on the metro, but our package included transport so the running team
went off to take full advantage. With everything that I had to go through
the previous year once I arrived, I hadn't noticed that the coaches drop
off their loads of runners incredibly early, because the coaches have to
get off down to South Shields, or out of the area, before the roads are
all closed. To make matters worse, with the others at the hotel we had
been able to do without the hassle of the baggage buses, as our bags
would be ready for us at the finish area courtesy of the support team although
we had promised to keep them light and in back packs! This
all meant that we arrived at the start with absolutely ages to hang
around doing very little except keep hydrated and try to keep warm
and our muscles stretched.
Finally it was about time to wander down to the motorway itself and
find our pens. These were just a simple method of keeping some semblance
of order amongst such a huge number of runners at the start, and for
the early part of the race. The theory was that you estimated your time
for the race when you made your entry, and the fastest runners went
towards the front, and the slower runners at the back, and you were
split up into blocks of about 1000 runners penned together and each
pen was released in turn. Number Three's boyfriend had estimated his
time a bit faster than Number Four and I had, so he was allocated to a
quicker, white pen whilst Number Four and I were luckily both in the
same green pen, just a couple of pens back from him. The walk amongst
the crowds from where we joined the motorway a couple of hundred
yards after the start line took us up past the celebrity pen where I had
been last year, and it occurred to me that I might just have got in there

again with my security pass from last year if I had got lucky, but soon
got over that thought. The walk on towards our pens was endless, and
really brought home the immense size of the field of runners for this
race. Any runner has the option of dropping back to start with other
runners in a slower pen, but we knew that Number Three's boyfriend
was keen to set himself a really good time for his first big race so we
shoved him into his fast pen and kept going to find ours. We were
determined to run a little way together, but I knew that soon enough she
would probably leave me in her wake, and so she should, for goodness
sake she was 36 years younger than me and if she couldn't run a bit
faster than me, then something was drastically wrong. In the end we were split
up long before the actual start line was crossed, as when the pen was
released I was stunned by how much of a rugby scrum it immediately
became with folk elbowing and barging their way through as if there
was clear open road 10 yards ahead. Little did they know that it was
going to be crowded all the way to South Shields. I had been barged into
the fence three times before I even got to cross the start, but nothing
was going to spoil the day, so I kept smiling and got on with it.
The biggest difference I noticed from the previous year was that now
that I was running at the slower end of the field, not only was it slightly
more crowded, but there were far more people who had clearly no idea
of any sort of race etiquette, and also who hadn't the first clue about
pacing themselves. I spotted the support crew in the same place again
on The Tyne Bridge, and got a shout and a high-5 as I ran by. Not long
after the Tyne Bridge the route swung left onto the first short rise and I
was staggered that we were temporarily brought to a virtual halt by the
number of people walking up the rise after only about 3 miles. Not to
worry, I started to weave my way along and was enjoying the atmosphere
which was, to be fair, just a little bit more excited and fun-filled than the
front of the race the previous year which had been slightly more about
adrenaline and concentration.
As we hit the John Reid Road everything went just a little bit quieter
as we started the long slight incline and I spotted one of those damned
rhinos again. I think the WWF have had a few of these fantastic costumes
made for their runners to wear at these events. They look huge, and are
the shape of a giant rhino head, but are made of something extremely
clever and weigh very little. However it doesn't do your ego any favours
at all to find yourself getting beaten across the finish line by a bloody
rhino, even if it is being worn by some super-hero runner. come to think
of it, anyone wearing one of those for a marathon, or any race, would
be a super-hero in my eyes just to think of doing that feat. Yes, I admit
that I was beaten by one in London, probably by more than one if the
truth be known, but I got my own back in Edinburgh, and I wasn't
going to be beaten again here, so found I had something to concentrate
on for a while.
A few weeks before this race someone had been putting some photos
up on their blog, and we discovered almost by accident that one of the
bloggers from the North East, 'MTS\ was my total double - we almost
could have been twins separated at birth. It was an extraordinary likeness,
and as soon as we realised that he was, as usual, going to be a marshal
at the race and I was running it, we agreed to look out for each other.
Now I know that this would normally be mission impossible to pick one
runner out of 40,000, but I knew exactly where he would be stationed,
just past the water station around 11 miles, and he had helped matters
by fixing up a Realbuzz sign on a pole so that all the bloggers running
would look out and shout a "Hi" to him. As soon as I spotted the sign
I homed in on it, and as my time was shot to pieces by the crowds of ramblers and hill-walkers I stopped for a chat and to get some pictures
for the blog of the two of us together.
A minute or two later I was dropping down the hill onto The Leas
with the final mile to the finish, so tried to pick up the pace and salvage
a few more seconds. As I crossed the line the Red Arrows were just
finishing their display, and there was a huge vapour trail heart in the sky
over South Shields, which just about summed it all up. I grabbed a water
bottle, and a goodie bag and medal, and wandered across the muddy
field towards the T-shirt pick-up points, which were signposted Small,
Medium, Large and X-Large. I was now on fully knackered auto pilot,
but headed for the X-Large queue as despite all the weight loss I knew
that I needed an XL T-shirt as they were always a bit small and I had
a broad chest. However, when under a bit of stress its weird how the
brain reverts to base. There were still times when it was clear that my
subconscious still wasn't fully re-programmed to the new conditions,

and this was one of them. As I joined the queue for the shirts, a very tall
and wide guy in front of me asked me if they had any super-sized shirts,
and the marshal there told him to go round to the last box where they
had the really big ones. Naturally, he had saved me the bother of asking
so I followed the habits of a lifetime and went round to the last box for
a super-sized, tucked it into my goodie bag and headed for the Charity
Village for the reunion.
When I got to The Prostate Cancer Charity tent the gang were all
there, and we very soon got the text messages from the chip timing
computer system with our finish times. Mine was 2 hours 32 minutes
16 seconds, only 8 minutes slower than last year which, given the
crowds, the stop off for a chat with MTS and the operation, wasn't too
bad an effort. Number Four had clocked a brilliant 2 hours 12 minutes
51 seconds, and solidly beaten my time of last year in the process. The
star was Number Three's boyfriend who had set the wonderful time of
1 hr 51 minutes 34 seconds, and who was convinced that in a less
crowded race could have knocked loads off that time, It he decides to
stick with it, he has the potential to become a very creditable runner
indeed. The next hour passed by in pretty much of a blur, grabbing
the odd sandwich, having photos taken, meeting other Prostate Cancer
runners and staff, and some of the other bloggers who were running
dropped by as they knew exactly where I would be. Then it was time for
the long trek to the coach pick-up, and the interminably delayed trip
back to the hotel which we didn't reach till about 6 o'clock.
Our hotel were very generous in letting us use one of the rooms to
shower and change bearing in mind that we had technically checked
out hours ago, so we were suitably refreshed before we hit the road
south again. To be honest, the roads had their moments that night, but
it wasn't too bad and, even with a stop off at Wetherby services where
we actually met up with the other car, we were home by midnight and
deciding the washing machine could wait till the morning!
With another visit to Dorothy on the Tuesday, just to be on the safe
side with another race the following Sunday, the rest of that week was
taken up with last minute preparations for Number Four's imminent
departure to York University to read Philosophy. Originally we had
thought that she would move in to the halls of residence there on the
Saturday, but they had now changed it to the Sunday, clashing with the
Creat Eastern Run which I couldn't miss now as Ambassador. Number
Two had instantly offered to drive her up, and I was sure that her help and
advice would be an improvement on mine anyway as she had already
been to University herself and knew the ropes from the student viewpoint,
which I certainly didn't. During the week I got an email from Joe,
the photographer, confirming that he was indeed on the photography team for the race, and trying to beg a car parking spot, but by then he
was out of luck.
By Saturday I was getting quite excited as all around the City the
signage was going up for the race, and the start and finish area equipment
was being installed. I had a relaxed day meeting up with bloggers as
they arrived in the city, and had a really good chat over lunch with
Shazzoah from Lancashire and her son who was keeping her company
for the weekend. She had run the Great North Run last week, and was not
doing the race here, but had come all the way from north of Manchester
just to volunteer as a marshal as it was my race. This was typical of the
amazing community we had built up over the previous year or so, on
the blog site, and it was fantastic to meet her for the first time.
Later that evening I had arranged for a small gathering of bloggers
and their families who were staying overnight before the race to meet
up for dinner at my health club, and about a dozen of us had a great
time meeting up and getting to know each other a bit better. They were
a little reticent at first about my theory, established with Angie K the
night before the London Marathon, that a little red wine the night
before a race was a good thing, but they didn't put up much of a fight
in all honesty and the evening was a great success.
Race morning dawned and it was terrific to be able to get kitted up
at home and then just stroll out of the door 10 minutes before I was
needed. This more or less coincided with the arrival of Jach222 from
Northampton, another blogger who was coming over to marshal and
who had bagged one of my car parking spaces early in the planning stage.
I had to move on though, as I had been warned that I might be required
for some radio interviews early on. When I arrived in Cathedral Square
the place was beginning to buzz, and the race director was going
through the final check list so that he could officially sign everything off
and declare the race a cgo'! I was immediately intercepted and introduced
to Iwan Thomas, who was appearing as the official starter of the race.
This was another of my sporting heroes, a guy who had represented us
winning Olympic medals, and was the British record holder at his event
- the 400 metres. He was very relaxed, and a lot of fun, and took a
great deal of interest in my story. Once we had done a couple of radio
interviews he was kind enough to allow me to get a photo or two with
him, then was happy for me to drag him around the square introducing
him to various bloggers and friends I spotted in the crowds and having
endless photos taken with all of them. Mind you, he very deliberately
got his own back in style when the time came for him to get up on
the stage in front of all the assembled runners for the official warm up
exercise routine led by a personal trainer from my gym. He absolutely
insisted that as he had willingly gone everywhere with me, it was now
my turn to go with him. That was NOT funny!
Minutes later he was dragged away to the starter's rostrum, and I
slipped quietly into the crowd of runners and we were off. To say it was
strange running amongst 4000 people along streets I normally drove
down every day was an understatement. But it was enormous fun, and
it was also a great feeling knowing that there were NO hills of any kind
to have to deal with. The way my legs felt after the half marathon the
week before I'm not entirely certain how I would have fared if we had
been faced with any serious inclines. As we jogged merrily along I was
particularly struck by the number of people who were lining the streets
and cheering on the runners, and there was even a few bands along
the way lifting our spirits. The weather became unseasonably hot for
an English October, and kind folk along the way had set up their own
impromptu water stations for thirsty runners.
I have just a few abiding memories of that race. The fun ones were
when I reached a point about a mile from the finish and spotted Shazzoah
and Jach222 marshalling away at adjacent road junctions. In the heat,
and that far into the race, I was pretty well soaked to the skin in sweat
and not something you would want to get too familiar with - but I'm
sorry to say that in a sudden fit of mischievousness I managed to give
each of them a huge enveloping great hug! They were still uttering good
natured expletives when we met up again after the finish - at least 1
assumed they were good natured. A little further on as we passed
through the last terraces of houses I took a short walk break and an old
couple standing on their doorstep tried to lift my spirits and urged me
to get to the finish. My explanation of taking a quick breather so that
I could do a photogenic sprint finish left them chuckling as I headed
on. The other fun memory was when I was approaching the final turn
into the finish area, and saw Joe on photo duty there. He had been looking
out for me, and was jumping up and down and yelling at me, then
completely ignored the other runners around me and tried to break the
world record for the largest number of photos taken in the shortest time
as I passed him with a wave and a grin.
The best memory of all was a much deeper affair, and one that will
stay with me for a very long time. About 8 miles into the race I was
plodding along minding my own business and enjoying the whole friendly
atmosphere surrounding the day. I realised as I jogged along that I had
somehow seemed to pick up a number of runners who were in close
formation behind me, and who, for want of a better explanation, seemed
to be deliberately running with me. After a while I asked if everyone was
all right and enjoying themselves, and got strong affirmative responses,
even if some of them looked as though they had had better days. One
of the guys then said to me:
"I hope you don't mind me running with you. I only entered this race
because of you, and I've never done anything like this before. When I
saw you come past I just wanted to be able to say that I had run with
you on the race."
The others more or less said the same thing. I really did not know what
on earth to say in reply. This was uncharted territory from a different
planet. What on earth was I supposed to say? I had no idea, so I just said
something like:
"You're more than welcome, and it's a pleasure to run with you guys."
I wouldn't exactly want to suggest that I was welling up or anything like
that, as I don't tend to do that sort of stuff, but it was a really emotional
moment, and it made me feel so good about myself in a way that I hadn't
felt before. These were a bunch of ordinary folk, out on a Sunday doing
something extraordinary which may well enhance their lives and self
respect more than they could realise. And they were doing it because
of me? That was stunning.
As I crossed the finish line in what I later found to be 2 hours 29
minutes 05 seconds the announcer spotted me coming and was giving
me quite a reception on the PA system, but at that point I just wanted
to get a water bottle and my medal and T-shirt and have a lie down in
the sun. Unfortunately I had been instructed to show my face in the VIP
tent when I finished, but as no one had supplied me with a pass I had
the devils own job getting past security and was only finally admitted
when one of the council people came by and vouched for me. I shook a
few hands, grabbed a drink and some sandwiches, then made my excuses
and left to join the crowd of bloggers and supporters who by now were
sunbathing outside the Prostate Cancer Charity stand. Soon enough it
was time for folk to start their long journeys home, but Pam and Chris, a blogging couple from Manchester were staying over for the extra
night, and I had arranged the evening schedule for them. I took them
out to the country park where I did all my training runs; then we
popped to my gym for a wonderfully relaxing session in the steam room
and Jacuzzi before heading to my favourite floating Chinese restaurant
on the river to round things off.
When I came to report the day on my blog I remember trying to sum
up how I felt. My final comment on the day was
uTo call my expression tonight SMILING would be akin to referring
to the Sistine Chapel as having a nice picture on the ceiling."


CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

A NEW BEGINNING

BY NOW ATHENS WAS DOMINATING ALL MY THOUGHT PROCESSES, AND THE challenge that it was going to present. As a result of the publicity campaign
that Realbuzz had involved me in during the summer, and probably
because they had put a write-up about me and a link to my blog on their
home page, I was currently receiving over 1000 visits a day to my blog,
and the support I was getting because of this was tremendous. I couldn't
wait to get out there, and I had been soaking up all the information on
the website like a sponge. My sense of history was in full overdrive, and
I was sublimely convinced that this race was certainly the best possible
marathon to run. It was nowhere near as big as the World Majors in
London, New York, Boston, Chicago and Berlin, or even as big of some
of the others like Rome and Paris, but this was probably as much down
to its extremely tough course, and even maybe to its location as well.
Just to take my mind off it, I had one more appointment with Mr
Gillespie coming up at the end of October, when I hoped he would sign
me off for good. When I got in to see him he had one more go at getting
anything out of the now very small swellings without much success, and
declared himself satisfied with the healing process. He also took the
chance to tell me about his Jungfrau Marathon in September, in return
for my tales about my two half marathons. He had not really been
aware of the Great Eastern Run, but told me that he would look out for
it and do it himself next year.
Then he asked me to undress down to my underpants, put my arms
out, and "Give me a twirl". I did as I was bidden wondering what on earth
he was up to, and the nurse in attendance looked a little bemused too:
"Damn it. There's absolutely nothing else I can possibly do to improve
anything."

A NEW BEGINNING
227
He had been reluctant to let me go, and was actually checking to see
if there was any other loose bits anywhere that he could work his magic
on. He told me that not only had he never seen anyone lose so much
weight the way I had, just by diet and exercise, but that he had never
seen anyone work so successfully to make sure everything ended up well
toned - no bingo wings, no saggy jowls or neck wrinkles. Nothing he
could possibly work on. Sadly he told me he would place me on his SOS list, which he explained meant that if I ever wanted to talk to him
about anything to do with medical matters relating to reconstructive
surgery I wouldn't need to go through the usual channels with my doctor
referring me, but that his secretary would have me on his special list
and all I had to do was phone him.
This was the most wonderful news I could possibly have had a week
before going to Athens. Four years and 1/2 weeks after the car crash I
now had an organism that the top reconstructive surgery team at one of
the top hospitals in the country couldn't improve upon. I felt totally elated,
and unbelievably proud of myself. It wasn't just a case of who would
have believed it, it was a full blown case of I wouldn't have believed it back then.
Almost naturally now, I took one final precaution before catching
the flight - I let Dorothy loose on my legs again just to be sure. Then
on the Thursday it was off to Gatwick to find the boys in a bar there
moaning about the price of drinks in airports, but seriously ready for a
good trip. I managed to impress upon them the high importance I placed
on being fit and ready for the race on Sunday, and to give them their due
they behaved impeccably for as long as it was required.
The plan was to spend the Friday getting our bearings, and going to
the Fxpo to pick up my race pack, number, chip and goodie bag so that
we would be free on the Saturday to do the sights with the girls who
didn't arrive till Friday evening. The Expo was in a conference and
exhibition centre with the grandest of entrances that only the Greeks could
do with such style, all marble and looking like a massive old temple.
Unfortunately we only discovered that later as we had managed to find our
way to it via the back door, which was significantly less than impressive.
We played who can acquire the most baseball caps, stress balls and
bananas for a while, then once I had registered and got all the necessary
paperwork I got very slightly carried away and bought some great Tshirts
with various designs around the race, especially for use in the gym
when I got home. As usual there was a wall for sticking up messages about
anything you wanted to say about the race, and whereas I normally pass
these by, I decided I wanted to put one up this time. Nothing fancy, or
emotional, just my personal mantra for runs of this magnitude:

"It's not the time - it's crossing the line."

I would never be a fast runner, but running these races wasn't about
beating anyone or anything but my own expectations of myself. Talking
of which I had made known my target for this race on my blog before taking off. Bearing in mind that I had done London in 5:46:05, and
Edinburgh in 5:54:57, and these were both relatively flat courses, I had
given considerable thought as to what I should aim for here, especially
as I was going public on it on the blog and didn't like reporting missed
targets without a plausible excuse. The race itself had a 6 hour target
time, which meant that the sweep up bus woulel track the route picking
up stragglers and those injured at exactly the speed it takes to complete
the course in 6 hours, and although you were under no obligation to get
on the bus if it passed you they would be reopening the roads to traffic
behind the bus and if you were overtaken you had to stick to the pavements
from then on. There would be the added complication that all
water stations, energy drink stations, and first aid posts would also close
down as the sweep-up bus passed them. This race had a 14 mile uphill
section in it, which warranted serious consideration in target setting,
but nevertheless I wouldn't be entirely happy with myself if I didn't beat
the bus back to the finish, so I had set my official, public target as 6
hours exactly, with my heart in my mouth when I did so.
Once we got out of the Fxpo, this time via the front door and saw
how spectacular it was, we got some team photos, and then suddenly
spotted the Acropolis just through some trees. We also noticed that there
were all sorts of historic things all around, with the Temple of Zeus a
couple of hundred yards down the approach, and the Panathinaikon
Stadium just away to our left. First things first though, as we had spotted
a good looking alfresco bar about 50 yards away, it transpired that
they served excellent cold beer and hot pizza, even though after a short
while they rapidly switched to hot beer and cold pizza if you didn't get
on with it. Duly refuelled we headed down the way to look at the Temple
of Zeus (we only discovered that was what the impressive marble
columns actually were when we got there at five past three and read
the sign on the gate, although we hadn't bargained on the smaller sign
underneath announcing that it shut at three).
Undaunted by this set back, we gave it the once-over through the
fence, and duly decided that it was probably best viewed from a little
distance anyway or we might get sore necks. We headed back up towards
the Parliament Building and then onwards towards the hotel, but to be
honest the air quality in Athens is pretty diabolical and by now we were
ready for a quiet little relaxation somewhere while we waited for the
girls to arrive when we could find a good spot for dinner.
Saturday was a great day, but by the evening I realised that it had been
a lousy way to prepare for a marathon the next day. We had started off
joining forces with the girls at our hotel, and then had simply walked in
the general direction of the Acropolis on the basis that it was probably
too big to miss. We worked our way past the edge of the flea market and found a road train - the sort of train on ordinary wheels, not tracks, you
normally find running around theme parks, or along promenades which
took us halfway up the hill, and completed the rest of the climb
on foot. The Parthenon and the other temples around there, and the
theatres along the side of the hill are without doubt some of the most awe
inspiring sites I have ever had the privilege to visit. The view from the top
of the hill is a 360° panorama of Athens, and I couldn't help myself but
try to work out the route I would be taking the next day, and try to
capture a bird's eye view of it. Looking at the hills surrounding Athens
I sincerely hoped my geography was wrong! Once we had hitched a ride
part of the way back with the next road train, I couldn't help but drag
everyone round to the Panathinaikon Stadium for a proper look at where
the race would finish. A lot of the barriers were already up, and feverish
activity was under way with all the preparations, but this was truly a
magnificent sight. It was rebuilt as the stadium for the first modern
Olympic Games in 1896, and is a classic u-shaped, open ended stadium
seating 80,000 people and built entirely of marble. The five rings, iconic
symbol of the Olympic Games, still proudly dominate the skyline above
the stadium, and I could almost feel the power of the track there. The
race route ran into the stadium, up onto the track, and finished at the
far end, and I memorised that image ready for when I would really need
it the next day.
By now it was very late in the afternoon, and it suddenly occurred
to me that my usual careful fuelling strategy had gone right out of the
window, as we hadn't actually stopped anywhere for a meal all day. I
simply had to get something to eat, and we ended up in a souvlaki bar
just round the corner from the hotel experiencing Greek chicken and
chips (I know - terrible thing to eat before a race, but so much better
than nothing at that point in the day). Once back at the hotel we got a
shower and a change, and planned to meet up to go out for dinner
somewhere that I could get a decent bowl of pasta. While getting suitable
directions from reception, I also asked about a good Indian restaurant
for the next night. This might be Athens, but by now it was part of my
rule book - an Indian meal after a marathon was essential, and I knew
that all the rest of the crew liked Indian food so we just had to find one.
After a short stroll we pitched up at an obviously popular local
hostelry to get dinner, and my bowl of pasta. Unfortunately time appears
to stand still in Saturday night restaurants the world over, and this was
a prime example of that phenomenon. It took absolutely hours to get
seated, place our orders and eventually get served, by which time I was
in two minds whether to bother. When the food arrived I just tucked
straight in, got it down as fast as sensibly possible, made my excuses and
left the others to enjoy the rest of their night while I went straight back
to the hotel, laid out my kit and hit the sack just after midnight. When
it comes to preparation for a marathon, the day had been utter madness,
an absolute classic of ineptitude, bearing in mind that I had to be up at
about 5 o'clock. I was sharing with Auld Thai Tarn, and I had left him
with the absolute certainty that he would suffer irreparable damage to
certain more sensitive parts of his anatomy if he either disturbed any of
my kit laid out, or disturbed me, when he eventually arrived back. To
his eternal credit he did neither, and he was still peacefully dreaming
when I headed down for a light breakfast in the morning.
I was surprised to see quite so many runners in the breakfast room, but
it turned out that one of the inclusive package deals was based here. When
I had got kitted up and headed out about 6:30 they were all gathering
in the lobby and being ticked off on a list before boarding a coach. I
decided that rather than experiment with the metro I would stretch my
legs with a walk down to the stadium where we had to report by 7
o'clock. When I arrived there, a huge, but fast-moving, queue had
already developed, and I quickly discovered that it comprised runners
from all over the world in a magnificent multi-cultural adrenaline soup.
The town of Marathon, site of the original Battlefield and where the
race started, had no direct public transport links with Athens, so the
organisers, with whistle blowing efficiency, transported the entire field
there by coach, and then once they had transported the runners, they also
took any spectators out there free as well. My crew were going to do just
that, and had planned to get to the stadium about an hour after me.
As my part of the queue approached the coach line and the whistle
blowing got louder and louder, I found myself swept up in a group of
Belgians resplendent in matching Medecins sans Frontieres track suits
and looking great, even if I couldn't understand a word of their excited
chat. On the coach I found myself sat next to a Greek runner but once
we had exhausted the sign language exchange covering the fact, I think,
that this was his first marathon and my third (or perhaps he had one
child, who knows?), and he discovered another Greek guy sitting across
the aisle, I settled down to the view of the course that we would inevitably
get on the drive out to Marathon. Actually I ended up dozing off for a
while; I must have looked really relaxed! The bits of the road I did see
were totally daunting anyway, so I contented myself with the suggestion
that they were probably taking us a different way via a shortcut the
coach drivers knew. Naive or what?
Arriving at Marathon we got off the coach to be greeted by some
young volunteers handing out large clear bin liners to everyone as they
stepped down to the road. This was a thoughtful touch indeed, as we
had probably got a little too comfortable on the coach and it was still
quite chilly out there. Banks of portaloos were lined up on the edge of
a piece of rough ground, and there were a few straggly bushes about for
the men, too. Basic, but most practical, and nobody seems to mind if it
relieves the stress of the moment.
I followed the general trend across the main road where we had been
set down and up a broad side street to where the baggage lorries were
waiting, in a large car park, each one marked up with a section of
running numbers ready to receive our Athens Marathon plastic kitbags
with number duly stuck on the side. Water bottles were freely available
everywhere you looked. I sorted myself out, dumped off my bag and
followed the flow further up the road to what turned out to be the small
marathon stadium running track with banked seating all round. A lot
of runners were warming up on the track, but I reasoned that this was
a day for conserving as much energy as possible, and I would use the
first mile or two in the crowd as my main warm up rather than wraste
any by running anywhere before the starting gun. Small children were
weaving amongst the crowds of runners handing out tiny olive branches
to every runner, which was a genuine delight, and such a great gesture
by the organisers. By now I was beginning to think that whoever was
responsible for managing this event was a total professional, as everything
seemed to have been thought of from the runners' perspective,
with the emphasis on safety, comfort and enjoying the experience.
As I wandered along soaking up the atmosphere I heard my name
shouted out, and realised the crew had arrived and spotted me. None
of them had actually seen the start of a race like this, and I think at that
point we were all pretty excited. Then we spotted something I had been
looking for as I had walked towards the start area. There on a plinth,
at the top of a flight of steps, just behind the start line, was that most
potent symbol of all, the Olympic Flame. It had been brought by the
historic torch relay to Marathon on Saturday lunchtime and would
remain lit till we had departed for Athens. There was just no need to say
anything, standing there, waiting for the start, with the Olympic Flame
burning brightly high above the runners. What a moment!
Someone started saying something over the PA system, but it was all
Greek to me (sorry, that had to be said at some stage, and at least it's
out of the way now!). As they chatted, an American lady runner and
a friend she had just made from London looked at me and started
chuckling to themselves. One of the extra touches the organisers had
thrown in was putting your name clearly on the bottom of your bib
number, and they had obviously been struck by the fact that my name
was Hare, which they thought most appropriate for a runner. I tried to
make them understand that something had been lost in translation and
it should have read tortoise, but they refused to believe me, especially
when they got out of me that it was my third marathon of the year. This
little bit of banter passed those nervous few moments before the gun,
which almost took us by surprise as we hadn't understood what was
being said. I had one last look around Marathon Stadium, the sky was
clear and TV helicopters hovered overhead, it was not too warm, forecast
to be around 18 degrees with only a light breeze off the sea. The gun went
off, and we shuffled forward, walked forward, jogged forward, then there
it was - that familiar whine of the computer sensors reacting to all the
timing chips attached to running shoes as we passed through the Start arch to the accompaniment of cheers from the supporters; we were off.
This one didn't feel like the others. There was an extra something
you could almost feel it in the air, and it looked as though most runners
were aware of it as we started the run to Athens. The course quietly
wandered along a fairly open, more or less flat, road for the first 2Vi miles or so, and then we took a very sharp turn left up a side road with
runners coming back towards us on the other side of the road. There was
quite a crowd of supporters at the junction, with coaches at the ready
behind them for the trip back to Athens to watch the finish a bit later on.
This little section off the main road was the single most important part
of the course. We ran for a few hundred metres through the sweetest
smelling orange groves literally dripping with ripe fruit, and then the
route slowly circled its way around the Marathon Battlefield where the
Greek Army had defeated the invading Persians. There in the centre of the
Battlefield was the mass grave mound where they had buried the 180 fallen
Greek Heroes, and in front of it the flame burning in a small memorial.
Now we were definitely running in the original footsteps of Phidippides
2,498 years ago, and what a privilege to be allowed to honour his
story in such a tangible way. The course returned back onto the main
road to Athens - Marathon Avenue, and the field slowly strung itself
out more and more as we passed through villages along the way, amid
knots of supporters and spectators from whom the international cry of
support needed no translation for any of us, wherever we were from:
"Bravo."
Just after mile 7 or so, the road started to climb gently towards the
hills. Here we go, I thought, and battened down the mental hatches as
this hill would last for nearly 14 miles and over that distance rise around
1000 feet. This would be the equivalent of running an entire half
marathon, and a bit more for good measure, on an incline of about 3%,
but I banished such thoughts. As far as I was concerned it was just going
to be a short hill that only lasted until the next bend, and was therefore
not a problem. Once round that bend, we had another short hill section
just as far as that little village up ahead, which wasn't that far in real
terms. And so it went on, just a consecutive series of short hills, each one
perfectly manageable in its own way. There were water stations every 1 kilometres, energy drink stations every 1/2 k, they even had the odd
energy gel station, and banana station. First Aid posts were dotted along
the course, and there were toilet blocks alongside every water station,
and sponge stations now and again just so that you didn't have to waste
a bottle of water tipping it over your head. It was just as though the
organisers were acutely aware of how tough this was, and they would
do anything in their power to help us to succeed and stay in reasonable
shape. Everything was going fairly well, and although I wasn't travelling
too quickly I was travelling. At about the 20k mark (nearly 13 miles in),
just before half way, I had to take a rapid toilet break and was heartened
to see that because of their abundant supply there was no queue. In short
order I was back on the road and forging along in my own sweet way.
Then I became aware of some sort of PA system and some bloke
chattering excitedly away, but didn't take too much notice as I couldn't
understand a word of it. But it went on and on, and seemed to be getting
very loud and close behind me. On runs like these my rule is never look
back, but it seemed necessary to break it at this turn of events, and to
my utter dismay I discovered it was the sweep up convoy, with the
course director exhorting runners to get on the bus as it passed them as
the road would be reopened to traffic right behind the bus. At this point
I realised that I had paused my Garmin inadvertently at some stage, and
all my calculations of time and overall pace were completely up the
spout. Even so, I reckoned the sweeper was slightly ahead of schedule,
but not by that much so I couldn't argue.
My target was to beat the bus to the finish, so I dug in and tried to keep
ahead of it but the constant uphill was by now wreaking havoc with
my quads, however well I had prepared them. The whole organism
started whingeing and whining fit to bust, and to make matters worse
the lead car of the sweeper convoy had now driven up alongside me and
the guy was trying to tell me something. I made the international face for I don't understand you, and he switched to fluent English to exhort
me to get on the bus or I would be on my own, and on the pavement.
The devil in the back of my head began making a rapid list:
We don't know the way from here to the finish without marshals
and roads closed, and they will take down the signs as soon as the bus
passes by.
We're still only half way there.
These hills go on for miles yet.
There will be no more water stations
There will be no more first aid posts
There will be no further chance to get on the bus when it passes
We'll be on our own, knackered, no money...
The worst thing about it was that I knew perfectly well, (Spock would
have called it "entirely logical"), that it would actually be foolhardy
not to get on the bus, it was the only sensible option, and at that point
I actually found myself checking to see how full the first one was.
That was the low point, about as deep as I could sink without actually
going under. This was a place I hadn't been to before in a long time failure.
Certainly my first failure since I began this project. As 1 plodded
along beside that car, I was staring defeat in the face and it was NOT a
pretty sight. The voice in my head was screaming
"GET ON THE BUS - we can't take the risk, at least we tried/'
"NO WAX AM 1 QUITTER?" I screamed back, and then wondered
how on earth I could possibly get to the end without water and all
that stuff.
The answer was simple, stay ahead of the bus!
By now the car had gone on ahead and he was shouting at some
runners up ahead as he had shouted at me. Don't blame him, I thought,
it's just his job today. But the bus was alongside me now and it was now
or never, the chips were down, a defining moment.
I let it go, and my game plan now was to try to keep it in sight as long
as I could while we were still on the hills and then try to get it back
again when the course flattened out a bit into Athens. For the next kilometre
or so I could still see it way up ahead now, but it didn't seem to
be getting any further away, and I started to focus on it to the exclusion
of all else. I slowly but surely started to gain on it and gnnel it down,
until around the 26 kilometre mark I overtook the bloody thing (it was
by now a very personal battle between me and that bus). I even got past
the car again very slowly, and got a huge smile from the guy doing the
shouting as I gave him a thumbs-up and a crooked grin.
Next in my sights were a small group of five American runners who
were wasting way too much breath, chatting as I passed them. But over
the next few kilometres I have no idea what the route was like, what the
scenery was like, how many spectators were around (although I vaguely
recollect a smattering of bravo's and a band playing). I had become
focussed completely and utterly, as you do sometimes in situations like
that, on an pair of exceptionally long, well tanned and very feminine
legs emanating extremely high up from a very close fitting pair of brown
shorts which just happened to be running at exactly the same pace
as me at that point. Well sometimes you just have to take inspiration
and motivation from wherever you can find it, and I'm certain I was
neither the first or last gentleman runner to be inspired in the presence
of lycra shorts.
Regrettably the legs ahead began to waver on the continuous climb,
and I was forced to play the cad and overtake them, leaving them to their
fate on that country road. I did have the decency to mentally concede
that it was extremely unlikely that she would find an equivalent level of
inspiration from our reversed positions, so had the good grace to move
on as fast as I could to save her from undue suffering on that count.
Even in such inspired mode, I was still only just ahead of the convoy,
which had clearly decided to play cat and mouse with me. There was now
only a couple more kilometres of climb left before we would flatten off
and actually get some downhill bits, and I had to let the convoy go past
this time without further discussion. I promised the guy in the car that
I would get him back when the road flattened, but I doubt that he was
either aware of, or bothered by my muttered threats.

I concentrated now on keeping a couple of runners in sight ahead,
to know where to go if the road re-opened in front of me. Luckily the
re-opening wasn't very efficient and never actually caught up with me.
The convoy was still visible on straighter sections, and although the water
stations were busily closing down they were still looking out for runners
and making sure we were catered for. At the 32 kilometre mark the hill
finally gave up torturing us and flat road has never felt so sensually
gratifying before, and probably never will again. Flat road meant a release
of tensions throughout my body, and my quads burst into song with
the sheer pleasure of only having to do ordinary running now. I was
back in the game, and caught myself smiling broadly at anyone still
standing along the roadside shouting bravos.
I was getting a whole new buzz from somewhere, and knew from my
Garmin that I was actually picking up the pace again. I mentally clicked
into my own special mode for the last stages of races, starting to actually
target runners in view ahead. No longer were they signposts for the
route, now they were the next person I would overtake, and before long
I was picking them off in surprised ones and twos as we entered the
outskirts of Athens proper. The course still had one or two sneaky little
surprises for us, short sharp rises here and there, and the ghastly down
and up slopes of motorway underpasses, but on the whole I was used
to these from my repetitions up Acropolis Hill during the last few
months. They proved to be a very good hunting ground for overtaking
the odd suffering soul, but I knew what it could be like and shouted a
little encouragement to each as I passed them.
About 37 kilometres I spotted the bus again in the distance, and that
was just the final impetus that I needed. I was going to have that bus!
My target was to beat 6 hours, and the bus was on 6 hour pace, and I
had told my girls I would be there in 6 hours and I didn't want them
worrying. That bus was mine the moment I saw it again and it couldn't
cheat by throwing hills at me any more. By 38k I was past the bus and
taking the lead car in front of it with a punch of the air from me and a
smile and a shout from Mr Megaphone. Central Athens tried to throw
a few little hills into my path, but these were pathetic little hills now that
I brushed aside with the disdain they deserved. By 40k I was getting that
feeling again with only 2k or so to go. The feeling you get when you have
been battling for over five hours on the edge of physical ability, when you
are pretty much a spent force, and running on guts alone, but when you
realise that you have the finish within your grasp, and absolutely know
for certain that you ARE going to cross that finish line.
41k, the crowds are pretty much made up of finished runners heading
home, but giving you the sort of encouragement that comes from their
own recent experience of what you are going through and seems special
because of it. By now I was getting that finishing straight feeling I had
felt before, but very strongly this time. It's the point at which you can
throw caution to the wind and give it absolutely everything you've got
left because there is no longer any reason to hold anything back - there
are no later stages left. I actually dredged the reserves, picked up the
pace, and overtook a couple more runners before turning sharp left and
down the slope of some sort of tree lined avenue, with glimpses of huge
houses, even saw one with guards in national costume standing outside
from the corner of my eye. On down the slope I picked up speed a little
bit more and was feeling fabulous as I came through some gates at the
bottom and straight out across the big dual carriageway and realised I
was about to run into the Panathinaikon Stadium.
WHAT A SIGHT!
Crowds of finished runners gave a good cheer as I ran up across the
pavement, I heard The Poseur shouting but couldn't see him, the course
closed in to a narrow gap through a funnel of fenced crowds on both
sides, suddenly it widened again and I looked up to see the Olympic Rings
above the stadium where I was running on that historic track, towards the
finish line with my arms raised, and my girls yelling from the track side.
5 hours 58 minutes 57 seconds. Yes, I beat my target!
I AM A REAL AUTHENTIC MARATHON RUNNER.
As they say in Athens (and on one of my T-shirts) I have run THE
AUTHENTIC.
The races in London and Edinburgh had been tough, but they were
relatively easy courses, (apart from the distance). This race had used a
fourteen mile hill to bring me face to face with failure.
It was, and will forever remain, a defining moment in every way.
During that race I had learnt what it is really like to dig deep into
dark recesses and take on my demons in hand to hand combat, back
them down, and discover for the first time that I have what it takes to
complete the biggest challenge I have ever attempted.
The surgeon had finally given me confirmation that I had won the
battle over my physical self in the week before I took off for Athens.
In Athens I had finally confirmed that I had won the battle over my
mental self, but the strangest thing of all is that I had never realised that
I was even in that battle, or that it was the most important part of the
project, until I had won it.
I have no idea what the future holds; that's what makes life such an
adventure now. What I do know for sure is that it is going to be a
totally different story, as it now has the benefit of a completely new
central character.

ENTERPRISES LTD

CONFERENCES, SEMINARS &
AFTER-DINNER SPEAKING

Mike Hare is affectionately known to many as The Incredible
Shrinking Man or TISM'l His compelling account of his
transformation from being almost 28 stone, halving his body
weight, incredible surgery and becoming a serial marathon
runner enthrals and inspires audiences,

Mike is an eloquent speaker with very persona! presentation techniques
and relates his unique story with humour, candour and passion. His
experience ranges from professional training through to after-dinner
speaking, delivering his message to a wide variety of audiences and he
has been in increasing demand from broadcasters on both 'overcoming
obesity' and 'running'. He has appeared on BBC Grandstand, current
affairs programmes and regularly on his local TV and radio stations.
Both BBC East and Anglia TV have broadcast short profile films of Mike
prior to some of his major runs. In the last two years. Peterborough
City Council has appointed him as their Inspirational Ambassador' for
the Great Eastern Run.
Let Mike take you on a journey of wide-eyed delight as he describes
what it was like taking part in his first half marathon. Feel your pulse
race as you join him in the Athens Marathon, running into the original
Olympic stadium. Take inspiration from his single-minded determination
to finally escape the confines of his 50 year old, 28 stone body and his
belief that ordinary people can indeed achieve extraordinary goals he
is the living proof, and to many of his friends a living legend'.

To book Mike for conference or after-dinner speaking
visit: www.tismenterprises.com

The End.