Star Struck

On Saturday morning I woke up at 6:00. Not great for a weekend, but I was happy to feel rested and getting into an earlier rhythm. Still lying in bed, I checked my Facebook, and saw that a new parkrun was starting that day and it was nearby. Keen for a change of scenery (and hoping it's a bit flatter than my local one), my friend and I headed out for the new challenge.

As we pulled into the busy parking lot, with parkrun banners everywhere, a lady parking next to us asked what race it was. I said it's a new parkrun, and she was quite surprised. She shared that she had actually come for a boot camp, but was reconsidering it for the parkrun.

We were just in time to catch the welcoming speech from the parkrun director, who then proceeded to introduce Bruce Fordyce. He is the ambassador for parkrun in South Africa. If you don't know who he is, I'd encourage you to check out the link. He gave a great and concise introduction to parkrun.

Soon we set off and I was thankful for the park being broad, so that passing was easy. Also, we were running on grass trail mostly, which I love. The first section was a slight up hill and it filtered the front a bit. It's a double loop, so once you've run the loop, you know what's coming. On the second uphill, Bruce passed me, but I kept on his shoulder. I stayed with him on the downhill and then passed him again on the flat section. On the second loop the same thing happened. 

I was a bit star struck, as I realised I was running behind South Africa's most acclaimed ultra-marathon runner. A deep sense of gratefulness filled me. 

On Bruce Fordyce's (right) shoulder.Post by parkrun South Africa.

With 500m to the end I kicked and went to another place mentally. The world faded a bit and everything was burning. I made it to the end and beat mister Fordyce by 10 seconds. I also ran a new PB for 5km. A good day indeed. Below is my Endomondo tracking.

 

---

When my friend and I got back to the car, we saw the boot camp lady, and I asked what she did in the end. "I did the parkrun." she said with a smile. :)

The Gift of Timing

I went for a 10k run at lunch time. I want to get more conditioned for heat, as most of my training runs are early in the morning or at dusk. I definitely sweat a lot more, but wasn't abnormally thirsty. The route is along all the busy roads surrounding our suburb. About halfway I saw a police helicopter circling up ahead and the traffic was starting to pile up. I got to the scene. It was cordoned off with police tape, numerous police vehicles and some bumped cars lined the road. Initially I was annoyed as this accident was in the way of my route. It was also right at an intersection that would not compromise on the distance too much. So after standing around for a while I diverted down the other route, as I wanted to do a good time too.

Later that day, my house mate asked if I heard about the shooting on that road. I was shocked. He gave me his grape vine version. You can read the news article here. One man was killed and three others wounded in the shoot out. Immediately I realised that if I had gone for my run a bit earlier, I might have been in the crossfire. 

I thought through my morning. How annoyed I was about the small admin time wasters. I realised that those time wasters were a gift. Those things that "wasted" my time, might have saved my life or have prevented trauma.

I now try to see everything as a gift, and I'm grateful for it, even though I don't see the purpose immediately.