SPORTS DAY
It is the Office Sports Day and I am lining up at the start of the veterans’ 3,000 metres race. Anybody who has read my previous posts may be wondering whether they are reading the right blog. This opening sentence comes way out of left field and is the literary equivalent of turning on your TV to find Jeremy Clarkson hosting a late night discussion on gender equality issues. The image of me in shorts and running shoes will jar with the mental picture you have built up of someone more at home in the pub with drink in hand so let me rewind.
It is April when an e-mail drops into my inbox at work. “Wanted! Volunteers for the Compliance team on sports day.” My finger is poised over the delete button when I hear a low throaty chuckle from the desk opposite. It is Chuck Pangodje, the Carl Lewis of Office Sports Day. Every year he returns with a clutch of gold medals. “Are you going to enter?” he asks with a wolfish grin.
“Oh no,” I reply shaking my head in a sorrowful way which I hope will subliminally communicate to Chuck that I would dearly love to but that matters far too painful to mention prevent my participation.
Chuck has many admirable qualities but reading subtle non-verbal communication is not one of them. “You should,” he says, “You would do well in the over 40’s races.”
“Really? Do you think so?”
“You could win a medal.”
As a child you are compelled to run around muddy fields in the cold in the name of physical education and whilst I would finish school races ahead of those of my classmates who suffered from morbid obesity, asthma and chronic lack of co-ordination, I was no athlete. But, as the years pass, memory fades and I find myself watching sport on TV and thinking, I could do that. Chuck is pushing at the open door of my self-delusion and so it is I find myself travelling by train to Sports Day with Chuck seated alongside me.
******
Back on the starting line; I am looking around at my fellow competitors. Some are built like racing snakes. Slim and muscled; they have all the right kit and complicated watches to monitor their progress. These people have obviously done this type of thing since leaving school and irrationally I feel that they are cheating. I mentally concede that unless I am lapped this is the closest I am going to get to these people.
The starting pistol sounds and I start running. The true athletes effortlessly leave we lesser beings trailing in their wake. I settle into a kind of rhythm but the act of running seems laboured. As we round the first bend I find myself on the shoulder of a short, Asian man. He is a little overweight with a baseball cap covering his thinning hair. His shorts are knee length and khaki, his socks grey. This man has surely never run in his life. I will overtake him and he will feel deflated as I motor past and disappear into the distance. But whilst my mind is having this thought my body is sending out quite different messages. I’m breathing heavily and I find I do not have another gear.
Then the PA system bursts into life and I can hear the announcer’s tinny voice, “Ladies and Gentleman, if I can draw your attention to the over 40’s 3,000 metres which has just started on the running track. It would be great if you could give all the runners your support but in particular Hanif Butt…” I look at the chap I am chasing. He is the only vaguely Asian looking runner and so I conclude that he is Hanif. He too has heard the announcement and he puts on a spurt when his name is mentioned leaving me panting as I try desperately to keep up. “…..it is two years since his heart transplant and this is his first race since the operation”.
From across the field I hear a ripple of appreciative applause and I die a little inside. I finish the race well ahead of Hanif but he is without doubt the winner.
I wander across to the start line where Chuck’s race is about to start. I see that he is hobbling and wincing. “Problem?” I enquire.
Chuck nods, “I’ve strained my calf muscle warming up.”
I grimace to show I understand. “You can only do your best,” I say, “in the end the only person you are competing against is yourself.” I look off to the middle distance in a John Wayne sort of way to make sure Chuck appreciates the profundity of my words. He stares at me blankly but deep down I think he has a new found respect for me.
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