Tonky Talk
I t’s time to have a relationship audit with my running. Current status: complicated. As a youth, I loved running and running loved me. I ran constantly, often twice a day. I recorded every run, looked for patterns, set goals and schedules, then kept to them. Time was everything in the quest for PBs. Looking back, maybe there were some toxic elements. It was certainly a relationship that brooked no compromise. On race days, I would trash myself like a pain junkie. I remember the shortness of breath, the clamping chest and the screaming muscles. I’d hurl myself down the finishing straights then bend double, gasping for air as life reassembled itself around me.
It was the best of times. I got the PBs, but, more than that, I experienced those brief moments of ecstasy where you feel like you can run forever. It’s not really you running, something else is running through you, as you hurtle through the woods in the lead pack at a cross-country race. A giddy rush that has informed the rest of my life. The search for that flow and power.
Throughout my twenties and thirties, running was an occasional fling. I’d dip into it when I wanted a contrast to the hedonistic roller coaster I was strapped on to. Within a few weeks, I could give you a five-minute mile. It felt like running was just waiting for me to return to it when I fancied.
Then in my forties it dragged me back in. Occasionally at first, to correct a hangover, I’d find myself in the woods for an hour. Then came the column and the podcast and before you know it, you’re back in another marriage. Join a club, don the vest, line up. Three runs a week became five, six, seven. The mileage grew from 25 to 35, topping out at 60 to 70. And improvement followed.
TONKY’S TOP TAKES
...on the taping of nipples (2010)
‘This is a ritual that I only ever do on marathon day and I enjoy it immensely. One year I didn’t do it – by the end it looked like I’d been shot. Twice. I love the gladiatorial, earthy element to the marathon: Vaseline the genitals, tape the nipples, void the bowels. It’s physical.’
....on mid-race encouragement (2012)
‘Maybe we should be issued with special vests singling out those too vulnerable to be egged on. Or a sign that says, “Please do not encourage – anything you say will annoy.’
