Running

Holy mother of God. Where once I had regular, non-flamey thigh muscles, now I have two large, frayed elastic bands which appear to be ON FIRE.

On Sunday the 14th October I went down to Manchester with some people from the gym (Ally, Marty, Graham and Wee Mark) to watch Master Sken's Supershow. Always a big event in the Muay Thai calender, I wasn't really too bothered about the specifics of who was fighting because I don't *really* care, I just love to watch fights. However, one of ours, Chris Polley was fighting full rules against Alix James and since some folk on the net were convinced this would be a walk in the park for Alix, we were all keen to go along and watch them realise the error of their ways.

Chris is a fantastic fighter - aggressive but composed, really unique style and incredibly fit, and since he'd just come back from Thailand we knew it would be a stormer and we weren't disappointed. He easily dominated rounds one and two, but since it was a 5 rounder and Thai judging scores rounds 1 and 2 of a 5 round fight equally, the first 2 rounds wouldn't normally make a massive difference to the outcome of the fight. However, he opened up quite a nice cut on his opponent's eyebrow in round 2, so that may have had an impact on the scores in Chris's favour.

Round 3, as Ally put it, was like something out of Rocky - Chris took two standing eights which could quite easily have cost him the fight, but his performance in rounds 4 and 5 was epic and he won the fight convincingly and against the odds.

His face looked a wee bit mashed afterwards, but he said he felt he could easily have fought another 2 or 3 rounds if he'd had to, and in light of this and my disappointing performance last week, I've thoroughly inspired to take up running. Alot.

For some reason I'm convinced I hate running, but in actual fact, if the last couple of days are anything to go by, I actually rather enjoy it. It reminds me of being a kid again in the Highlands when it's windy and rainy, and when it's sunny I get this sense of elation from being outside and listening to my favourite music.

Anyway, I asked Chris what he does to prepare for a fight, and apparently he goes running 8 or 9 times a week in addition to his Muay Thai training.

This is just a teeeeeny bit more than I do.

It's about 8 or 9 more runs a week than I've been doing, actually. So yesterday a new era dawned, and I went running round Arthur's Seat in the wind a rain and felt high as a kite afterwards, in addition to the 10 miles I cycled and the hour of training.

Today, my thighs feel as previously described: ouchy. But that's beside the point - I feel more positive, I feel like if I can keep this up for the next 6 weeks I'll mostly be keeeeking some bott at my next fight.

All I need to do is re-read this post every single morning at 5.30 when I need to get up for a run, because I can absolutely guarantee that this is not how I will be feeling when I have to run around Edinburgh in the, cold, wet nasty winter mornings which lurk just around the corner...

In light of this I am making a public pledge and I invite anyone who reads my blog to call me on it regularly and question/hassle/mock me about my running.

I, Aarayan, hereby solomnly swear that I will get up and go for a run at 5.30am every monday, wednesday and friday morning, and that I will also go for a really good run on a Thursday night because there's no training. Furthermore, I swear that at least 2 of those runs will include nasty shit like hill spints and steps. I promise this on pain of mockery and poor performance in the ring.

Watch this space...