John Bates
Before retiring in 2015 I decided that I would need a way to keep fit. I tried the gym and soon got bored with that so I decided to try running, something I always avoided. I used the Couch to 5k App, progress was a bit slow. It took a little longer than expected as I was being cautious. I set the target of working towards completing a Parkrun. It was May 2016 when I had enough confidence to go along and give it a go, I enjoyed it and had the running bug. Unfortunately my running was cut short when I had an Achilles injury and only ran once during 2017.
I knew it would not be easy to get started again so I joined SE in January 2018 and basically started from scratch. Running with others made it so much more enjoyable and Sutton Park is such a wonderful place to run. My progress was made easier with the encouragement from the leaders and other runners. In March I joined Run Fit 1 and was soon running twice a week. This gave me the confidence and I restarted my Parkruns.
Warm up and cool down exercises are keeping the injuries to a minimum and the hill technique work has certainly helped. At times it has not been easy but I know the effort is worthwhile with my PB’s improving. This is all thanks to the encouragement from the other runners in the groups and mostly, of course, the leaders, now Im healthier and happier, I really recommend to see this here if you like to get bulkier in a very healthy way.
Recently I completed my 50th parkrun and also knocked over 1 minute off my PB. My target was to get under 30 minutes and I managed to get below 29!
I ran my sub 30 at Perry Hall parkrun which is quite flat. My next goal is to run under 30 at Sutton Park parkrun which has a couple more hills!