My Year in Running

Saikat Chatterjee

Like many serendipitous things in life, this too began with a refusal. 

My Bucket list is (was?) to run all the World Majors (4/7!). I don’t remember the exact moment when this morphed into an obsession, but I reckon this was around the time I ran the London Marathon for a second time in 2021. I saw some folks walking away into the sunset with a garland of six medals at the finish line, serenaded by some bugles and gun salutes.

Tokyo 2025 was going to be the fourth nugget in that chase but a recurring injury and the prospect of starting a shortened training block after New York left me with no option but to opt out in December. Pro Tip: The charity spots for the majors don’t take very kindly to you pulling out despite your best intentions so be prepared to get honeyed deferral requests or desperate registration fee refund pleas turned down.

More broadly, I felt I had plateaued in running. Getting sucked into a doom loop of a few weeks of running, then out with some injury for a few months and then restarting the cycle is not a lot of fun. Groundhog Day in running land minus Andie MacDowell! Moreover, I also seem to have taken the adage that I can eat guilt-free because I run too literally. I wasn’t dropping any weight and I wanted to get faster. 

An Xmas gift from Mads (the better half) in the shape of a 3 month subscription with a strength training + nutritionist coach was the spark I needed. 2025 arrived bright and bushy tailed with nary a race in the diary (not even Fred Hughes, a club classic!). It felt strange and uplifting at the same time. Easy running around the hood with friends felt perfect. For perhaps the first time in years, I was running for the love of the sport and not reaching for Strava love.

I complemented the easy runs with strength training (twice a week for an hour each in the gym) and being regular at the track sessions. Being regular at the 14,000 square meter odd area, in biting cold and driving rain, with fellow Hoops felt great and also felt accountable in some sort of way. I can’t remember a single time when I actually wanted to turn up at track after a day in the shop but I also can’t recollect a single track sesh, which I regretted later.

In his semi-biography, What I talk about when I talk about running, Haruki Murakami writes that running is a solitary act. As runners, that is the path we mostly follow and there much to be said for that.

But to feed off the energy from a group and follow a well oiled session in hard training, I would highly recommend the unforgiving brick red track and tagging along with a group, never mind if they are the resident gazelles and you are the lumbering hippo.

In March, I heard from a charity for a 2025 spot in the Chicago Marathon. I said yes with delight because 1) October seemed as close as the next Galaxy and 2) the course was flat as a pancake.

In running, there is no immediate validation and progress is measured by one's own standards. I, slowly but surely, began to see the progress in track and shorter distances and recorded times over a variety of distances that I never thought was remotely possible. 

Finally, I also changed my relationship with food: as an ardent foodie, this was perhaps the toughest bit. I began treating meals as a functional outlet to maximise running efforts than regular excursions in gastronomia! 

There are periods when you are hacking through air when it comes to making progress and then there are times when the stars align and you can do no wrong. This year has felt like the latter.

But injuries and running are two sides of the same coin. We often beat ourselves up when injured and go off our beloved Strava (Sorry Tim!) until we heal ourselves or find solace in alternative sports (which is infinitesimally a boring exercise). But to paraphrase Gildas’s words, it is also important to look back upon these purple patch episodes when we were able to run freely and draw inspiration and strength from that. 

Vignettes from this year as if seen through the rushing carriages of a speeding train:

Running with Sophie on the canal and in pouring rain, hoops cheering & clicking pics at the Summer League Regents Park, racing the kids at the watch tower in Devon, cresting the green carpeted hills in the Lake district and cheering Anastasia through the home stretch of her 50k run, doing a crazy 5K race at the sports center with Leanna, seeing the first rays of dawn break over Tower Bridge among the solo early morning runs, watching Reva graduate to the Saturday parkrun regularly & Shayan completing his 2nd paced by Sarah, completing a 50th at Gladstone, Susan helping a Westside Runner at a track session, Francois leading a Thursday threshold workout, easy laps with Rob & Stephen around King Eddy’s and many more. 

We frequently talk a lot about community, friendship and shared values when it comes to the club. The above embodies that. Running and Queen’s Park Harriers has given me so much and I will always be grateful for that. #upthepark 

PS: Saikat registered a PB at the Chicago Marathon on Oct 12