If I could walk 40 kilometres ...

WHEN I wake up, well I know I’m gonna be, I’m gonna be the man who wakes up really sore.

When I go out, yeah I know I’m gonna be, I’m gonna be the man who goes along really slow.

But I would walk 20 kilometres, and I would walk 20 kilometres more.

Just to be the man who walks 40 kilometres, to raise money for a good cause. Da da da (da da da) Da da da (da da da) Da da da dun diddle un diddle un diddle uh da.

No need to worry. I haven’t lost the plot... yet.

They’re just the song lyrics I’ve tweaked from the 1980s Proclaimers hit

I Would Walk 500 Miles that have been playing in my head for the past few days as the Surf Coast Trek starts to loom ominously large.

It’s now only 20 days until the 40km charity coastal hike from Aireys Inlet to Torquay and I’m starting to worry I’m not going to be able to finish it. I barely made it last year, literally limping to the finish line, as I’ve painfully detailed in this column previously. This year I promised myself I was going to train for it. This year I promised myself I would reach the finish line “with a spring in my step”. But I’ve never been good at keeping promises. So, with only three weeks to go the best I can hope for is to simply get through it. It’s my own fault. My training regimen has been as pathetic as it was last year. I’ve done one 10km walk to prepare, and when I hobbled back to the car exhausted and dispirited I knew I was in trouble.

And now I’m worried if I do any more training hikes it’ll just wear me out before the big day.

But whatever condition I find myself in at the starting line I’m going to have to grimace and bear it.

It’s too late to pull out now.

I’ve already raised money from friends and family. They’re counting on me. The local charities their money will go to are counting on me, too.

To tweak the lyrics of The Proclaimers’ other hit: I’m on my way from happiness to misery today, Ah-hah (ah-hah) ah-hah (ah-hah).