Many runners spend their whole life trying to break the 20-minute mark for 5K. P Burton-Morgan, now 42, achieved it in just 18 months as ‘a middle-aged mum who’d done no exercise for two decades’. Keen to hear more, RW sat down with the runner and poet to talk running clubs, recovery and rhyme…
‘After a decade of no exercise, besides child-rearing and reaching for cake, I started running by myself, mainly for my mental health. For my first run, I literally just put on a pair of trainers that had sat in the back of the cupboard for, honestly, 20 years. I mean, 20 years ago they were good trainers, but they’d become completely degraded by this point. I just put them on, did no stretching and ran off down the lane and into the woods, probably way too first. After 10 minutes, I thought, “Well, I can’t keep this up.” So I started walking for a bit, then running for a bit. I suppose, without knowing it, I was doing the whole run-walk thing.
‘Then I did a parkrun in about 24 minutes and everyone went, “Oh, you’re quite fast, actually.” I looked around and thought, “Who are those cool people in the red vests?” My friend told me they were from Frome Running Club. That was last July and, by that point, I knew I was going to make my next poetry show about running. So I joined the running club mainly for content for the show, but soon I was entering races and scoring points for the club. Then I got a charity place in the London Marathon, running for the NSPCC, which I’m now hoping to run in 3:15.
Related Story
‘I’ve managed to get my 5K time down to 19:29 and have also run a 1:31 half marathon. I’m now running five times a week. The biggest benefit of joining a run club is that I’ve learned about different types of running – like interval sessions and tempo running – which are now part of my weekly schedule.
‘My brother, who also runs, got me a Garmin watch for Christmas. It’s so helpful as all the sessions get downloaded to the watch with all the specific paces. My watch keeps saying, “You’re smashing your pace targets, shall we up them?” It thinks I can run a 3:02 marathon, but there’s no way I’m going for that on my debut.
‘If there’s any secret to how fast I’ve progressed, it’s that I put more energy into my recovery than anyone I know. I do 20 minutes to 30 minutes of yoga seven days a week, I do my strength and conditioning three times a week, and my nutrition is really on point now. So that’s all the boring things. And then my secret thing is I listen to a self-healing meditation every night. It says things like, “You have the power to heal; you’re strong”, etc. Perhaps it’s just the power of story and placebo – but it works.
‘Running has formed the content of my Running Commentary show, which is touring round the UK from May to July. Getting the tour together was actually fairly simple as I’ve been working with venues for the past two decades as a writer and director. And there was a real demand. I think that’s because running is so popular and feels so accessible to so many people. But also, I hope, it’s because I’m a single mum, I’m going through a divorce, I’ve got fast and had some minor successes, and there have been some flirty, silly dating moments along the way. So there’s something in it for everyone.’
‘I’m not a stand-up comic, but I absolutely am happy to take the mickey out of myself. And so my Running Commentary show is, hopefully, a bit funny. Some of it’s a little bit sexy, too, and lots of it’s just very silly. For instance, I talk about when I went on a run and I pissed myself. Or the fact that, even though I have got really toned from doing all the running, I’m never going to have a six-pack because of my mummy tummy. I’m very real about bodies, and the whole show is very honest – perhaps too much so at times! It’s so easy for mums to go through divorces and for everything to sort of fall apart. And I suppose, ultimately, it’s a story of me putting my life back together – with the help of running.’
P Burton-Morgan’s show Running Commentary is on tour from May to July. Book your tickets here: mettatheatre.co.uk/running-commentary
Related Story