Runner Profile: Robert Walker
A most enjoyable read last month. I’m really glad you have found your running mojo again Sharon and that you keep at chasing that Yvonne Murray! Thank you for the nomination.
Having read many of these bio’s over the year I have also been trying to catch up on some of the past ones and how varied they are, what a prolific team! – marathons, triathlons (I can’t swim for toffee), ultras, ekkidens, never mind the adjunct activities. I applaud all of you for past achievements and including those new to it for just getting out there and doing it, yeeha and long may it continue.
I didn’t expect to have the baton so soon having only joined this January 2025 but I have to say right up front I have very much valued the warm welcome from everyone and the continuing encouragement from everyone all round – thank you FRR – it’s great to be back in the flow.
Early Skirmishes
Possibly born to run but more likely to wander, I was a tad hyperactive as a tot and I think it was Seamus (Bennett) who said he’d been dragged back from the High Street by the police as a child for escaping the clutches of his parents, and I can very much identify with that! As it was in those days I was always out, back in when the streetlights went off, and much time was spent park-side, kicking cans and jumping burns, always running. I think it should have put me in good stead for an outfield place in the primary football team but as usual they needed a goalie. Running wise though I clearly remember sprinting competitions and coming out of those reasonably well, so my VO2 max was developing fairly early! With base building at primary complete, secondary was mainly football focused – promoted to left back and centre half now – and played at district and county level (I know there’s only 5 of us up there anyway!). Even with a completely full heartful of hope my Scotland Schoolboy’s trial was dashed due to bad weather (SNOW!!) and the opportunity passed on by without recourse.
So, all the usual stuff, but then came the real uplift in my tempo-focused running journey: at age 14 I started a Vernon’s coupon round (and kept it going until 17, paying for all those albums and the odd guitar). Now if you’re younger than 40 you may not know what I’m referring and it sounds archaic now, but folks would fill out a paper grid with 7 crosses against that week’s football matches, predicting which teams would draw their game and pay a £1 or so for the gambling privilege and hoping to win £1m if they predicted them all correctly. No such online convenience in those 1970’s days. As a keen earner I ran around three different estates three nights a week collecting, with an increasing monetary load testing and filling out my quads in multi-storey flats. Oh, to have that base and VO2 now.
Was it that that got me my 100 and 200m school athletics places?! Most probably. I loved the fast pace of those events but never took to school cross country as I most probably went out too fast (note for later!) never mind the thought of tramping about in all the cold weather. I can’t recall my times but it did open up an opportunity to meet with Alan Wells the 1980 GB Olympic 100m Champion (he also took Silver in the 200m Olympic final that year and he had secured other gongs in World, Commonwealth and European Championships too), for an interview for the school magazine and we went off to visit him at his modest flat in Edinburgh – and yes, of course we were allowed to touch those hallowed gold and silver medals. Running was suddenly cool albeit I railed at the suggestion I’d have to get my hair cut over my ears like Alan’s now.
Stretching Out
With school gone the focus was on work and the other .. and I started an apprenticeship with BT, up poles, down holes, fitting switchboards (remember them?) all that kind of thing. I still ran around my jobs though and got told off (it was heavily unionised in those days) so I put my energy into running half-marathons instead as my legs were missing the coupon round. All the local ones like Dunfermline (my hometown) Glenrothes, Kirkcaldy, Loch Leven, Lochgelly, Edinburgh, some more than once, in between wangling a place at university and getting married to Janet. 1:34 sticks in my head as my best time but not 100% sure, I’d have to go up the loft!!
And then a move to Felixstowe and Suffolk – we had a wreck of a house to fix but I did a few of the Felixstowe Halfs at that time, so late 80’s early 90’s.
Work, family – a son and a daughter – and a wee band took up my time back then, but I was very keen to do the Flora London Marathon and secured a place not really appreciating the training involved (I like to try and do things as per the recommended plans!). I recall the last 20-miler before the ramp down and taper phase and thinking ‘right that’s that I’m ready’ – and promptly got a real downer flu the week before the race (yes man flu!!). Long and short I didn’t go and I couldn’t take them up on their auto-entry the year after. Hey ho, never say never. I did put a part of that ghost to rest when I did the Edinburgh Marathon in 2014, my only, with 4:24. The New York Marathon was on when I was over there once and determined to have some involvement I registered in the UN building and ran the pre-day 5k which if I recall is the last part of the marathon route finishing in Central Park and it was a real buzz to ‘run those streets’. Thus, it was great to see Debbie Catling and Sam Fulcher actually do the full proper gig this year – fantastic! – and it brought back a few memories for me.
My 40’s apart from the ever-present work was all about mountains so the Lakes, Wales, Scotland, the Pyrenees and the Alps all featured in regular yearly getaways and cracking gigs they were. Did a few of the classics: 24 Peaks Lakes Challenge, 3 peaks stuff, about 6 or 7 of the 4000’s including Mont Blanc, Toubkal, Cuillin Ridge, over the Tatras, etc so was always trying to keep reasonably fit throughout it all and strangely did my Mountain Leader (Summer) training only after climbing them! The running angst that emerged though was that on downhills in the mountains and on returning for training runs I had a constant knee niggle and it was ever persistent. Physios, heel inserts, etc wouldn’t fix it so I gave up any notion of ever running ‘seriously’ again.
Cracking On …
After 34 years at BT I left and continued my Program Director work into consultancy for a couple of years but shut that down to regain my health from an ongoing thyroid issue, enjoy some travelling, getting back into my art (@theartistrobert if you fancy a follow!) and music, and learning to fly (I’m well out of check now but running up and down a gliding airfield all day is incredibly good base building!). Long story short the pandemic hit so our travel plans were cancelled and I turned all my efforts to strength training doing a few different programs with ex-forces folks (my lad Scott was in and I had always wanted to try out some of his shenanigans!!) and the programs became a great routine to abide by, never mind the daily walks building up all that great base and the odd bike run.
And then alas unfortunately my wife Janet was taken very ill for a couple of years and so the routine and job role changed yet again and thankfully and most gratefully all is well these days.
After a gradual return back to normal life you can imagine my joy therefore when our daughter Jenna invited me to a ‘parkrun’ – the first of the New Year – with some of her old school mates, a running thing that I had sort of heard of but had passed me by. Wow, somebody flicked a switch, it was like being at one of those old running events again, it definitely had that buzz, right here on my doorstep, and even better my first run invoked no knee issue but certainly a very humbled old fella as, how out of breath was I? I know what you’re thinking .. so you started running every week? No, I left it another year .. and then another. I had a few other things on and inside I just kept telling myself my knee wouldn’t be able to stand it .. and yet 10 months after joining FRR things appear to be going very well.
So much so that when Ian (Duggo) asked around if anyone would like to help out I stuck my ignorant hand up and became a Run Leader not really knowing what was involved! I’m an avid lifelong learner and I like to help where I can so I thought why not? Besides I’ve always just ‘gone out for a jog’, they never had ‘tempo’, ‘intervals’ and ‘80/20’ and all that jazz in my day – or did they?! – so I’m learning a load. The support I have received from all the coaches and fellow runners in getting this in place has been fantastic so much thanks go to everyone, I hope I can aid on the day sessions for a few years yet and keep learning from the more experienced runners.
And this year .. well wow .. what a run (no pun intended). I’m on parkrun #40, volunteer #32, back up to Half distances in training and knocked off the Kirton 5, Framlingham 10k, Ekiden 5k (my first proudly vested FRR run – thanks Robin), the Coastal 10, Stowmarket Scenic 7 and the Hadleigh 10. My 5k PB is 22:57 and some will know I’ve been chasing 22:30 as a main goal this year set back in January, before thinking about improving any other distances so hopefully it will come soon so I can let a bit more fun back into those parkruns! A public thank you to Solly (Dave Solomon) for squeezing out my best mile (6:42) at the Northgate track a month or so back despite my totally inadequate pacing strategy – I just ran off to complete exhaustion and Dave really helped to get me over the finish line! Those moments stick in the mind, and a big learning opportunity was had right there, so trying to better apply pace thinking to all my runs now as well as adopting different types of training runs.
.. and what?! Doing cross country? I must have picked up a bug (thanks Stuart (Mason)!). Framlingham Moat done and Woodbridge this very weekend, 4 to go! Seriously though, I’m delighted with progress, no injuries thus far touch wood, and looking forward to the winter runs and beyond and sharing those days with all of you the FRR crew*.
*and yes Maz, Lucy, Dawn, Sharon, Kaye and Rob even those FRR post-parkrun dips!!
I’d like to nominate Lucy McAlpine for next month’s read!
All the best and Merry Christmas everyone!
Robert
