Well first things first and last night I trod the boards for the first time in many, many years in a murder mystery whodunit play called "Who Killed the Vicar?". It was a fund raiser for the church roof (no, seriously!) and I played the part of the Reverend Tobias Byrne, the curate of St. Ignatius the Unflappable, in the parish of Steeply Willows. We had an audience of about 150, raised about £3,000 and had a very fun night. And no, I wasn't the murderer, but I was the murderer's accomplice! Thanks to everyone who came and supported a worthy cause. Anyway, we had a bit of an after show drinkie back at Chez Richardson, and I must admit I wasn't feeling 100% this morning. I'd left my car at the hall last night and had planned on doing an amended version of the Sheep Walk 8.1 miler, taking in a Spire and ending up back at Walton to pick it up. However things didn't go quite to plan, it was all a bit laboured today, although the uphill bits didn't feel as hard as usual so maybe the hill sessions are beginning to pay off. That in itself wouldn't really have been too much of a problem, I would have been quite happy to plod along at a slower than the normal pace, no the trouble was that bane of a runner's life, chaffing! I had applied my Bodyglide as normal (ooh errr Vicar!) but wasn't wearing my normal running undergarments, and consequently my inner thighs started to chaff. Now, any of you that have experienced this particular phenomenon will know just how bloody painful it can be! I was only about 3 miles into the run and already things were heating up below. Every stride was beginning to sting just a little bit more, I was half an hour from my car and obviously didn't have a handy travel pack of Vaseline about my person! On the big city marathons you always see the good old St. John's Ambulance people with their rubber gloves and big globs of Vaseline at the road side, and they have brought relief to thousands, but unfortunately there weren't any lurking around all greased up on Epsom Downs today. There was nothing for it but to get back to the car asap and try to minimise any damage. This meant cutting out the Spire bit of the run and settling for 6.1 miles, but I didn't care by that point. Red raw and grateful I finally got back to the Beastmobile and drove home, my legs apart the whole way. A footnote to this story will be a couple of pieces of advice, firstly make sure you are adequately lubed up or have sufficiently long enough pants or running shorts to avoid inner thigh friction on your run and secondly, once you are safely home be very careful, hot water and shower gel can sting like buggery! Toodlepip and may your God go with you. (S)
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