One fine day I'm gonna be the one

[venta]

Yesterday, quite early on, there were sums going on in our house. Let's see, 9 o'clock, one and half miles, say five minutes a mile absolute tops...

Just before 9.10 we were in the road outside, ready to cheer on those running in the Ealing half-marathon.

Last year, we thought we'd stir ourselves to watch the half marathon since it goes literally in front of our flat. Actually it turned out to be a hugely fun community event and - despite neither of us having the least interest in watching any kind of athletics in the general case - we walked along chunks of the route to the finish.

It's not a high-profile race. Anyone can enter, and the standard is hugely variable. People run in club shirts, charity shirts, hi-tech running shirts and ordinary t-shirts. They wear hats or turbans or wigs or hijab. It's not a destination event for big-name runners.

Mo Farah polished off the Great North Run in 59-minutes-something this year, the outright winner in Ealing took a still-impressive 65. A colleague of ChrisC's claims the Ealing race is unpopular, because it is a wiggly route with too many corners. But the corners are where people gather to spot their friends and cheer for strangers.

At one and a half miles, the runners were still quite closely packed. There was a clear leader, an early register-er with the lowest number we spotted: 10. Towards the back, a few people were already slowing to a walk. Not quite at the back was our favourite runner from last year, a rhino. In between were people in tutus, people with determined expressions, people pushing wheel- or pushchairs as they ran, and people who gestured to the cloud to cheer and clap louder.

Again, we were caught up in it and headed down past sections of the route to the finish. We got ahead of the runners, and paused to wait around mile 11. The race motorbike came through, then the push bikes checking the route was clear. An ambulance pulled up, but it was just hanging around in case anyone fancied it.

Then came green shirt guy, number 10, looking in very good shape. Then.... Nowt. Big empty space. Then some random cyclists who were just chancing it down the closed road. Then a bit more nothing. And then, in the far distance, a few more people. Let's just say Mr 10's victory was convincing.

I hope people cheered him over the line. When he was finishing, we were probably in the little snaggle of residential streets by the last water station. A gang of under-tens were spotting anyone with a name on their shirt and yelling for all they were worth... "Come on, Mike! Come on, Mike! Kev-in, Kev-in, Ran-deep, Ran-deep! Go, Nicola..."

We made it down to the finish around the time the hundred-minute pacemakers - giant "1:40" flags strapped to their backs - came into view. There were flag bearers setting the pace at ten minute intervals; in between, the local club (Ealing Eagles) had unofficial-looking sticks marking the five-minute intervals. Earlier, we'd seen Mr 1:35 running along, holding both his placard-on-a-stick anda conversation.

On the finishing straight, some people had enough left for a sprint finish, some people jumped and played to the gallery. Some limped in, with pained expressions that suggested they probably should have pulled out. A couple ran in, arms round each other, having clearly done the whole thing three-legged. And plodding along, in his huge and cumbersome costume, came the rhino. Massive cheer for the rhino.

And people crossed the line, and got their medals and their free, err, coconut marshmallows, rather oddly. And then they joined the huge festival crowd in Lammas Park, eating burgers and stretching hamstrings in equal measure.

Last year, I decided I'd like to run in this year's event. Then I realised how much time it'd take me to train, and backed off. Again, this year, I found I wanted to join in. Not because I want to run a half marathon particularly, but because I want to be part of this amazing event in my doorstep. But do I want to do it enough to give up that amount of time to training? Tune in next year...

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[venta.livejournal.com]

Weirdly, every time I see the title I start singing "One fine day, you're gonna want me for your girl", which isn't even the right song!