The skies are bleak. The sun barely lays claim to existence; the wind bites rabidly and relentlessly. In the unkempt thickets of skeletal trees and bramble, patches of snow are disintegrating into crusts of mud and ice. What else is hiding in those thickets, I try not to think about. It is winter in zombieland.
What am I doing here?
I am running. I am a runner, out looking for supplies. I am one of few survivors, huddled together in a makeshift township called -perhaps as a morbid joke- Abel.
If no one goes out running, we will not live much longer. We need food, medical supplies, weapons, anything electrical to make comms equipment out of, and sometimes too, something to play with to pass the time. Eerie time, knowing that the hordes are outside our walls, waiting to sink their teeth into us.
Except right now, I am not inside the walls, I am out here with them. Running.
And so goes the story in a highly creative and hugely effective fitness training app called “Zombies, Run! 5k” which promises to take you from shuffling zombie speed to a fully fledged 5 kilometre runner in 8 weeks – if you can stick to its programme. It’s not difficult: I wait for my next running day with excitement, wanting to know what happens next in the audio-adventure that unfolds via my iPhone as I cover kilometre after kilometre in the urban wilderness of Woolwich Common.
And this is quite something for someone who would always quip, when a friend would say they were going for a run: “Why, when you can just take the bus?” This actually covered the uncomfortable belief, established as a teenager, that I could not run distances. I would get very real exercise-induced asthma as cold air would cause a sort of overblown allergic reaction in my airways, and I would feel like I was being strangled. Easier to just not run very far, under those circumstances.
But that belief would have stopped me from stepping into the shoes of Runner 5 of Abel Township, so I decided that I would just find ways to breathe anyway. It is actually quite incredible what can happen once I don’t believe in my set beliefs anymore!
I now cover my mouth and nose when I run with a fake North Face tubular scarf I acquired in the Himalayas. It gives me a bit of an outlandish look, suitable for a post-zombie-apocalypse runner too. As long as I can keep my mouth covered, the cold dry air gets heated and humidified before reaching my airways, and I can carry on breathing. Which means I can carry on running, as far as my legs will take me.
Today, I have finished week 7 of the training, and I feel rather glorious. Exhausted, but glorious. If you are looking for a way to get fit, become a runner, or just dive into a very well-written voice-acted adventure, I cannot recommend “Zombies, Run! 5k” highly enough.
One word of warning though – if you have a lively imagination, it’s best not to run in the dark…
