I've thought about this for a while and for no real reason decided that today, whilst sitting in a team meeting discussing structural layouts, I'd get this started. And who said we can't multitask.
It's been nearly 9 months since I took up running - and probably 20 years since I have ran anything competitively. At school I was an adequate 800m runner (2 mins 6 secs - not too shabby) but as there was nothing cool about middle and long distance running and as I was only adequate rather than good - it was quickly abandoned for the mud, sweat and beers of Sunday league football.
This being said, I've always been an aspiring marathon runner, on paper at least. I write 'run a marathon' every year on my notebook alongside 'learn a musical instrument', 'learn a foreign language' and 'finish decorating the house'. Every year it falls quickly by the wayside when I notice 35 mins into my 3rd or 4th run that it demands significantly more effort and time than the effort it takes to add the words to the paper. This dance with my goals has occurred for more than a decade until I reached my late 30's (now 37 - urgh), a slightly unfit father of 3 young children.
Moving on....In the year 2020, the world economy has collapsed. The great freedoms of the United Kingdom are no longer, as the once great nation has sealed off its borders and become a militarized police state....
You might think that was the opening line to the storyline of the Running man from IMDB, and you are correct. (I just changed the date to 2020 from 2019 and United States to United Kingdom). But what we were left with wasn't far removed.
Lockdown provided the dystopian future where we fought over toilet rolls, were forced by the government to spend extreme amounts of time with our close family, pubs were banned and we could only exercise once a day. Like Ben Richards (the Butcher of Bakersfield played by Arnie in "The Running man"), I needed some freedom (but from my kids rather than a militarised gameshow). Let the game commence!