LIFESTYLE
adaptability have been invaluable to my running. Over the years I have begged, borrowed and bought favours from friends and neighbours and reaped the benefits of the unique community spirit on RAF patches. Postings never seem to come at a time that is most convenient for my running but that is one of the challenges of RAF life. In August 2010 I had been selected to compete for Great Britain in the marathon at the European Championships in Barcelona, at the same time that David was due to start work at SHAPE in Belgium. Marathons require every drop of energy available and I wasn’t keen to move house, especially overseas, in the week before a major championship. We devised a complicated but ingenious plan for David to move during the championship but our brilliant plan was scuppered by misfortune. I came home in a cast and on two crutches after seriously injuring my foot during the race. Instead David had to drive to Heathrow to pick me up at 9.00 am on a busy Monday morning, detour into central London to the UK Athletics clinic to get the foot sorted out, then onwards to Belgium with all our belongings, our son and the two cats. The only redeeming part of the whole saga was Lord Seb Coe carrying my bags for me at Heathrow Airport.
It can be difficult to make local connections and set down roots with the frequent moves inherent in the RAF lifestyle but I’ve done so through my membership of Bedford and County Athletics Club, established from our time living in our first married quarter at RAF Henlow. My coaches, Alex and Rosemary Stanton, have achieved most acclaim for their role in coaching Marathon World Record holder Paula Radcliffe to her many successes but their commitment and love of athletics has resulted in many more athletes including myself achieving national and international honours at the Commonwealth Games, World Cross Country Championships and European Championships. We only lived at RAF Henlow for four months but the connection I established with Alex and Rosemary and the club has endured through all our moves and continues today.
My advice to anyone thinking of taking up running would be to get a good pair of trainers and give it a try. What puts most people off is trying to run too fast without building up gradually. Even the best runners incorporate some walking and jogging into their training. The joy of running is that you can do it anywhere and anytime. As a family we have started taking part in our local Parkrun which is a timed 5k run usually held at 9am on a
Saturday morning and there are nearly 300 Parkruns in the UK. Parkrun is a great and friendly way to get into running whether you are a total beginner or an established runner and a fantastic way to meet people if you are new to the area. It doesn’t matter if you race round in 15 minutes or walk round in 55 as everyone is welcome and supported to the line. Anyone can register to run at http://
www.parkrun.org.uk. Alternatively if you’d like to run regularly with a group you can find your local running club on the British Athletics website on
http://www.britishathletics.
org.uk. The biggest myth is that you have to be able to run to join a club but most clubs cater for total beginners and have a range of groups to suit all abilities. With the transient and sometimes lonely RAF lifestyle it can be an easy way to meet new people in the local area and you might just find that you make some friends for life wherever you move onto.
And so for us it was on to a new posting in January 2014 to RAF Honington, new running routes, new athletics track and another new reputation as the running woman. It has been a long and winding route to the RAF 10k Championships and it was very satisfying to be able to run and win even if technically I can’t claim the title as a dependent . . .
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