The experience of age

8 weeks ago author of "The 50 Greatest Marathon Race" Will Cockerell invited me down to join in a with a group of runners at Battersea park track coached by one of Britain's best coaches 80 year old Frank Horwill.

I hated every minute of the first few sessions. I was unfit, overweight and pretty disillusioned with the state of my own running and the course of the documentary at that time. I did know that if I stuck it out and came week in week out it would get easier and in turn become a more rewarding experience.

My cameraman turned up to film one of the first track sessions, this was at a time when I was still getting quite a few abusive e-mails from runners angry about the way I was making the documentary. I was rather sheepish and apprehensive of the what the other runners down at the track would think. Fortunately for me they are a great bunch of people who are highly motivated and encouraging in equal measures to those around them.

This evening after the first 500 metre rep I had a really painful stitch in my diaphragm. I asked Frank what the best way to get rid of it was. Stitches are something that every runner experiences and over the years I have tried every methods of getting rid of them; breathing all the way in/out, stamping it out etc. Franks said "ahh now, get to your knees and bend over". I cautiously got to the ground half expecting Frank to shock the stitch out of me by kicking me. He picked up my legs and pulled them up over my head so that I was in a vertical handstand position and began to count to ten.

Amazingly after this I ran the remanding 10 sets without any discomfort. After the sessions I thanked Frank and asked him where he had learnt this trick "Ahh, you see the thing is when you get to my age one is very well read. I learnt it from a group studying the causes of stitches in New Zealand. They found out that if you tip someone on their head the ligaments around the diaphragm release and prevent the cramping" he ended this with his trade mark smile and walked off with his hands behind his back.