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Published: April 8th 2009
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So we came back from England feeling pretty lardy, with a few extra pounds from the Christmas celebrations. On our way back from Addis Ababa Al and I sat up front in the car and it was a tight squeeze I can tell you, I was almost sitting on the drivers lap, to say nothing of Al sitting on mine for the 14 hour journey home.
We came back with good intentions of getting back into a regular fitness regime. But we didn’t realise quite how soon we’d be required to get our lardy arses in gear. Within a week of us returning we heard news on Thursday that the Great Assosa Run was being held on Sunday. This is a bit like the Great Ethiopian Run, and for those of you in England, The Great Northern Run, or Southern Run. The runs are
managed by an organisation Gabrile Haile Selassie has set up and this particular run was one of three in the emerging regions of Ethiopia for girl’s education.
On the Friday we heard rumours of various different distances from 1 Km (Yep I can just about do that) 5 Km, to 10 KM (I might require
some medical assistance) we were totally unable to find out what time the run started. But Al managed to enter us and we got a t-shirt between us, we’d only got one because they’d totally sold out, so by all accounts it was going to be a pretty popular event.
In the end we turned up at about 7.30 am on the Sunday, having called round our friends, being advised of 3 different times and eventually taking a lucky guess. The first hour of the morning was taken up with comings and goings of different officials. Various different uniformed security turned up for the president’s arrival. The Red Cross (I may be needing them later) the local crazy guy, a herd of goats and a stray dog.
The kid’s race was first and a few hundred energetic and fit young kids lined up and warmed up for their 1 km run. When the horn went off they set off at break neck speed, a few little ones hitting the deck as the crowd surged by, luckily they are very hardy children here in Assosa and they seemed to bounce back up and off they went again. It was
a great little run and they were all awarded with a lovely book when they finished.
Next a straggly gang of adults lined up, looking less energetic and much less fit, for the 5 km run. Something makes me think the distances should have been the other way around. There were even a few people fancy dress entries. We warmed up and Al and I pushed ourselves to the back, for fear of being flattened in the expected high speed start similar to the one we recently witnessed, being a little less bouncy than our young counterparts, we wanted to avoid that embarrassment, instead we opted for watching our fellow runners disappear in to the distance as we set off at our usual casual ‘I’m running in the morning heat’ pace, much to the amusement of the onlookers.
We caught up with the main group when we turned the first corner, everyone having over exerted themselves in the first 500 metres. I think a few of our friends couldn’t stand the thought of being overtaken by the two lardy Ferenji and a few short cuts were found along the way. Overtaking people for the second time when you
haven’t seen them pass is a dead giveaway you know!
We were encouraged around the route by plenty of supporters, who couldn’t believe their luck at witnessing such an amusing sight on a bright and sunny Sunday morning, and some young friends who insisted on holding our hands and chatting to us as we ran. It’s highly likely they were concerned about our health and wanted to be on hand in case we required any assistance. Eventually we made our way round in one piece and finished in about half an hour. We were proud to be the first Ferenji over the finish line (there was three of us).
The atmosphere of the whole event was great and it was all managed very professionally. It’s not often that you see something like this happening in Assosa, so it was really lovely to see everyone out, supporting and encouraging the runners and having some fun. Awards were presented at the end and the party atmosphere continued as no one seemed willing to leave when the runs had ended.
We slowly made our way home for a lie down.
Later this year we may get to run the
Great Ethiopian Run in Addis, but I think that will need a bit more training.
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