Settling In

I’m allowed to train whilst in quarantine, and I’ve been using the time to acclimatize to the heat. It is incredibly hot and humid in Kansas – there’s basically nowhere for the clouds to rain on, so it all just builds up and builds up until it breaks. I’m told it doesn’t cool off until around mid – September, so I’ll just have to get used to it. I went for a faster 10k this morning (Saturday) up the straightest and longest road that I’ve ever seen. There was a surprising amount of climbing given that this area of Kansas is pretty open and flat. The countryside here is really incredible. Bethel is right by a town called Newton, which has about 25,000 people. Thirty miles southwards is Wichita, about 300,000, and then there’s nothing in any direction for 50 miles or more. The gravel road on which I was running goes on Westwards pretty much continuously all the way to Missouri. These roads intersect each other to form squares of farmland, which cover vast areas of the state. The enormity of it all is nearly overwhelming: the British Isles could fit comfortably into Kansas and there would be plenty of room left over.

 I think I’m settling in pretty nicely all things considered – I’m in quarantine with an Argentinian and a German, and we get on better than history might suggest we would. One’s here for the tennis team, the other for football. They both get out before me though, which means that I’m going to be by myself for a few days in about a week or so. I’m not really allowed to meet with all of my team yet because of my quarantine, but I’ve met a couple. Isaiah is my roommate; he’s moved into the accommodation and has the room to himself for the next ten days or so until I can move in. He’s a local kid and knows his way around, so hopefully he’ll have some interesting routes for us too run. I’ve also met Mauro, who’s come up from Chile. He’s a really good runner, coach thinks we’ll make good training partners.

The Start of the Course - the only open part really. 

Anyway, I ran with a couple of the lads and coaches on the team this evening – one of the assistant athletic coaches here did 25.30 for 8k on the cross country, which means he averaged something crazy like 3.11 per kilometre throughout that race. They have very peculiar ideas about cross country in the States. All of the courses are very flat and very fast; they basically treat cross country like we treat track. The athletes have PB’s for different courses and they don’t seem to think that the mud and rain that we know and love have any place in their races. Our own course is actually pretty unique since it copies the European style. It’s full of twists and turns and is very compact, rather like the courses you see in the European Championships. Coach wants to renovate the whole thing and construct a permanent start and finish area, together with mile markers, fencing and a viewing platform. I’m trying to persuade him to embrace the European tradition fully and build some log jumps, artificial hills and water filled ditches. I don’t think he’ll go for it unfortunately.  

I’m set to begin training properly in the coming week, our first session is at 6.30 am on Monday morning, which will be a steady run, followed by a session in the afternoon. Over all I’d say I was settling in very well, though I still stand out like a sore thumb. I don’t yet have a tan, and my accent and speech are causing quite a stir. Some of the team seem to have decided that everyone from England is on first name terms with Her Majesty the Queen, and they’re so enthused by the idea that I don’t have the heart to tell them otherwise.

Course heading towards the bottom corner