On Top Of The Hill Sat A Huge White Buddha...
I am writing from the Katathani Beach resort in Phuket where we have been whisked to today...
It feels again, as this scene opens, as if I am on a film set... My friend Flo from Eastbourne has just sent a text to say that he is in the Coconut bar....
I met Flo in 2001 when he carried out a Vo2 max test 'on' me.
A Vo2 max test is a cruel thing indeed; anyone who has done one will know that it involves self inflicted pain in the name of discovering how fit you are...
The idea being that you will then have an idea of what is required to get even fitter!
Essentially the process involves running on a treadmill until you reach exhaustion and can run no more!
The speed goes up a notch every three minutes, and whilst you run your finger is pricked at odd intervals to take blood; this is done to test the blood lactate levels... All the while you are running with a mask covering your mouth to measure the volume of oxygen that you are using; nose clips are clipped on...! And then how efficiently you use the oxygen is measured...
I had turned up to run this way, like a rat in a testing lab, the day I met Flo!
I was just into my forties and had decided to investigate the chronic injury I had suffered from, in truth, since I was twenty eight years old...
It had got worse since finishing my international running career in 1992 aged 33, and I had not run as much for the past ten years...
I recognised that I needed to re-visit my running, to explore how to unlock the injury pain, with the idea this would also unlock some emotional pain within me...
I felt I had unresolved issues from the past stuck in my body... I believed they could be released through attempting to run fast again...
I didn't want to be telling the story of being a chronically injured, ex international athlete; which is the story I was living at the time!
It hurt to run, in fact it hurt to stand, to sit, and to drive - especially driving a long way; sciatic pain would kick in quite soon after setting off on a journey. And sitting wasn't good either.... My work talking with people involved sitting down all day, and was therefore very uncomfortable.
It hurt so much to run, that I had learnt to swim front crawl; so instead of running, I swum five times in a week and ran just twice....
I had called Rob Harley. another great friend, who like Flo is also a lecturer at Brighton University, and he designed a programme to help me return to running.
Rob introduced me to Nick Webborn, who is a renowned sports doctor and he organised for the Vo2 max fitness testing... Enter Flo!
Thirteen years later, we are both in Thailand... and Flo is texting me from the Coconut bar!
He is getting married to Yiing on Wednesday and we are here to celebrate their marriage with them both....
We got up early this morning, and did a short three mile run back and forth along our road at 7am!
It was very busy with scooters and cars and trucks, crammed with people going to work and school.
The sun wasn't so hot, or so high in the sky, but the humidity was intense, and we returned soaked in sweat to stretch and shower before making our way to breakfast... the bus to the airport left at 10am...
We landed in Phuket after only a one hour flight from Bangkok and the journey from the airport to here also took an hour; we had no idea where we were going or how long it would take.
We sped smoothly through this lush, verdant island; at one point we rounded a corner and on top of a hill sat a huge white Buddha...
A few miles further, the sea appeared in front of us and within a few miles we were delivered to this magical place we now find ourselves...
It took us a while to find the Coconut Bar - it is a big resort...
'We're lost...' I texted Flo, and just as I was asking for directions for the third time on the magical mystery tour to find the elusive Coconut bar, we looked up...
There was Flo, just across the grass, waving and waving...