‘I THOUGHT I WAS THE WRONG SHAPE TO RUN’

I’ve boxed, swum, yoga’d, weightlifted and Zumba’d. But I always swore I could never, ever run.

I’ll say it: I’m fat – and I just thought my body would never move that way. But, it turns out, after starting Couch To 5K, like a total lockdown cliché, I was wrong. What I’ve learned I cannot do is run painlessly and easily (and that that was a stupid expectation). What

I can do – thanks to the excellent coaching of Olympian Michael Johnson and the witchcraft that is Couch To 5K – is just run anyway.

As well as improving your fitness, the programme mentally coaches you to just keep moving. It hurts, it’s hard, I pretty much always don’t want to do it. I only manage it by blasting The Saturdays into my ears to cover my panting (and sometimes lip-syncing to distract myself). I’ve found it hard to overtake mediumpaced walkers. I’ve had terrible conversations with myself, telling me I can’t do it, to stop, not bother, I’ll never manage it, I’m too fat.

But I can. I know, ground-breaking; my longest distance so far, in fact, has been 6K. And yes, annoyingly, I do feel better afterwards. I say all this in an attempt at encouragement and comfort, in case you too are looking at this page, eye-rolling and also thinking you could never run. It’s fine if you don’t want to run. But if you do want to try it, just don’t make the mistake I did and believe you can’t.

What I’ve learned is that runners already come in all shapes and sizes. They’ll probably smile as you pass and think nothing more of you.

There are things that might help

– I liked support from friends also struggling to run; kudos on the running app Strava is addictive; you need good trainers; nice leggings can motivate you; and a banging playlist got me out of the door. But, ultimately, if you’re lucky enough to be able to put one foot in front of the other, then you’ve got all the skills you need. Don’t listen to voices, inside or out, that say otherwise.