Meeep Meep

This year I vowed that under no circumstances was I going togo to an Iftar buffet as they are, generally and on the whole, crap. Only people who haven't eaten ALL day would want to touch most of the make 'em cheap stack 'em high stodge that is shoveled out on the buffets......which is probably why Iftar comes right after fasting.

Add to this, when we went out for Mr Bailey's birthday a few weeks ago the Dodd's broke the news to Richard and I that as a birthday present they had entered us in the Dubai 10k!! With friends like that who needs enemies. As so it is that the co-pilot and I are having to embark upon the (very) long road to fitness.

On Wednesday last week Ashley at work decided that we should all embark upon a run as a kind of group team building torture event bt combing these two - avoiding Iftar and running - and enter the Dubai Road Runner 5k Iftar race. This basically involved a runaround Musrif park starting at 6pm and running until Iftar - and therefore no water until the end!!

Ashley then press ganged Mr Page, Gregor, myself, Chris and Matt and Natasha into joining her for this act of stupidity, along with each of our respoective partners.

And so it was that at 5.30pm we congregated in the car park as Musrif, limbered, stretched and generally tried to make it look like Mr Page wasn't the only one who knew what he was doing. We struck off at 6pm and by 6:05 I was crossing the finish line wishing I hadn't agreed to this stupidity.

By 1km I had been passed by the lead pack of girls and by 2km I was passed by Natasha to a hoot of "Camon Mate, are you going to let yourself be beaten by a Sheila" and she might have even said "Struth".......but equally I might be resorting to crude stereotypes and paraphrasing but she said words to that effect as she glided past effortlessly and I cursed her to trip and fall (in a no injuring or damaging way of course).

But 35 minutes later it was all over and I was stumbling over the finish line and completing my first ever running race....and I even beat three other blokes!!

Full results can be found her, and I can be found pretty close to the end of the list

http://www.dubai-road-runners.com/iftarchallenge/iftarresults.html