RUN FOR YOUR LIFE
Coach, author, Apple Fitness+ trainer, RW columnist and running torchbearer Cory Wharton-Malcolm on why he runs – and why everyone should
FIRST GREAT NORTH RUN WAS TOTALLY CRAZY for a number of reasons. It was crazy because I’d never done it before. Now it seems like the norm, but back then, running in a race with 35,000 other people seemed crazy. Running along a closed motorway or dual carriageway seemed crazy. But it was crazy mostly because it was the first time I realised that running was doing something not just to my body, but to my mind as well.
I had been on runs before where my mind started to wander, but I’d always fought it; I’d always done my utmost to shift my attention to things that I actually wanted to think about, things I wanted to process, things that would help me deal with whatever my body was physically going through.
This was different; this wouldn’t shift. I kept thinking about someone whenever I tried to slip into the Zone, into that state where all you can think about is what you need to do here and now, where everything else is blocked out.
Instead of finding the Zone, I found the woman who raised me – I was thinking about my gran. I kept seeing her face, hearing her voice, either willing me on or just being there – present. It was as if a live feed of memories was being beamed directly to my glasses. I lost count of the times I stopped myself from crying. It wasn’t until I was about a mile or so from the finish line, just as you start to go downhill before you turn left on to the seafront, that I couldn’t hold it in any more and I cried all the way till I crossed the line. It was half happiness and half sadness. I kept thinking, “I miss her so much, but she’d be so happy with me.” I had finished my first race, my first half marathon, I had a medal and a smile, and I was happy. I couldn’t walk properly for days. But was it worth it? Hell yeah. This is when things really started to change.
During the Great North Run (GNR), I realised that I still hadn’t mourned my gran’s passing, but I’d found something that might help me do so.
For so long, I’d run away from this pain, this feeling that any minute I might think about her. But now I sought it out, now I wanted it to come – I wanted to deal with it. My gran raised me when my mum was back home in Guyana, South America, working. She looked after me and my sister when my mum was back in London and at work. She picked me up from school, took me to church, cooked for me, bathed me and looked after me when I was sick. She was my rock.
When she passed, 20 or so years ago, I was in my twenties. It really did a number on me, as prior to her passing I hadn’t really had to deal with a big loss like that. No one really wanted to talk to me ab
