Lessons in Japanese

Dedicated followers of my blog will remember my recent angst at Schipol when I wrestled with the decision to buy Haruki Murakami’s What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, [henceforth referred to as WITAWITAR]. I saw it again in Borders on Saturday, quite by accident and, taking it as a sign, I settled in one of their comfortable club armchairs and read a chapter at random. Which proved fortunate in retrospect. You see, I broke down on my long run that morning after mile 11 of a prospective 18. The last seven miles home were as bad for morale as any I have run. Fatigue swept over me and I slowed to a walk several times. Not surprisingly, I was a little down about this: if I broke down on an 18 mile training run how could I expect to finish a marathon? The answer lay in Murakami’s experiences. Part biography and part training log, the book is very conversational in style. The chapter I read described the fatigue he felt at a particular time prior to a marathon and his experience then very much mirrored my own. The lesson was that what I was feeling was normal and that it was time to start scaling back my weekly mileage now that race day was so close: exactly what my own schedule prescribed but hearing it personally, so to speak, reconfirmed my belief. I bought the book. Was it luck or synchronicity that led me to it? In any event, it was the right message at the right time.

I have one last long run scheduled this Saturday but otherwise my week is light and the miles drop off further as race day approaches. Today's run was 4.26 miles which I clocked in 32:17.