Newsletters

News from Mr Grady

Hello Everyone,

Well, it’s June, and the school feels warmer and sunnier, and it is fantastic to see our students out on the field at break and lunch and not cooped up in their bubble classrooms, huddling into cardigans, hoodies and coats in what were well-ventilated covid secure teaching spaces.

The bright weather got me worried that, having missed out on quite a lot of training in the last year I should get back out and running, as I was not reaching my potential.  Given that I’ve not run any distance since October last year, and only really did my exercise bike during lockdown 3#, I was expecting a pretty challenging “first run.” 

I was not wrong.  I was also an idiot. 

Given my lack of continuous training, I should have gone out for a short, gentle jog to assess my ability, fitness and needs (and indeed assess how my legs, and heart felt being subjected to something more rigorous than walking from my office to the English Department.)  But no, because I have been fixated in the last few weeks, on “how fit I should be” and “how ready I am, given what I’ve missed” I set off into the countryside, purposefully choosing a “no quick exit route,” that meant once I’d run two and a half miles, at the best I could just run back, but at the worst I’d commit to a further 3.  I committed to a further 3. I didn’t need to, it wasn’t going to help, but I thought because I hadn’t done as much as normal, I should cram more in now.  This was an even worse plan.

I arrived back at home a sweating gibbering mess.  Within an hour my legs had pretty much seized up, and because I’d had to stop to walk, and at one point sit until my vision stopped blurring, I’d also got an average pace of about 11 minutes a mile.  All I had done was compound how I felt about what I might need to catch up on.  I had also, because I didn’t think carefully about my approach to getting back to a level of fitness that I’d be happy with made it even more difficult to do so.  My legs were so sore, and I’d overdone it so much, that the next couple of days I could only manage a jogged and walked 1 mile or 1 and a half at best.  Realistically, even further away from my goal than before.  I did manage to get back up to three mile runs, but I’m still finding stairs a challenge. Not the glorious athletic feat I had imagined.

Wrapped up in my anxiety that I might have missed out on something, I’d ironically made it harder to actually do what I was trying to do in the first place.  As we all continue to reflect, and think about what we might need in the coming weeks and year, it is very definitely not going to be more achievable if we try and “do it all now.”  A careful plan and approach, a calm and measured taking stock is what is needed.  I know, that we will all get there, just as I know I’ll be back to enjoyable runs that don’t leave me a small puddle on the floor.  Let’s see where we’re at first, and what we need before we set off with the finishing line a distant dot, and no sense of how to get there in a timely fashion.

With very best wishes, stay well and safe everyone,
Mr Grady