My Fabulous Mother In Law

Torquay this weekend - my Fabulous Mother In Law had signed up to do the Race for Life on Sunday & I'd offered to join her.

Very relaxed day on Saturday - just a bit of gentle walking in glorious sunshine at Cockington. I skipped my beach hut jog as we would be running the next day.

My Fabulous Mother In Law was very nervous pre race - as was her buddy L with whom she'd trained. Photo was taken during the warm up.

Having established that I'm a (comparatively!) seasoned Race-4-Lifer and that I could talk whilst running, both of them said they'd rather I ran with them to help them complete the 5K. This mostly consisted of checking our pace frequently, attempting to get them to slow down a tad & using the simple technique of "if you can't tell me that you are OK, we are slowing down until you can tell me you are OK"! They both looked really comfortable & strong throughout. I was nervous that I was irritating them both so shut up - only to be told "start talking - you're helping us keep going" - I quite liked playing coach.

Right at the end, R was flagging a tad so L & I grabbed her hands & we went over the finish line together - brilliant moment.

And the time was 34:28. R has never run before - she is fit thanks to yoga & lots of walking, but runnng is a little different (she did train!). Her motivation was to raise money for Cancer Research as her friend is undergoing chemo atm.

Husband acted as our photographer and my Fabulous Father In Law came to support - as did many of R's buddies.

I'm so impressed with R! To finish the race was an achievement - to finish in under 35 mins was incredible. I enjoyed running with her & I'm really looking forward to jogging with her in the future.