Medically able to perform.

I ventured to the Riddle Health Center in the ungodly early hours of Thursday morning. It was a small price to pay for what I expected to be an early, yet honorable discharge from Tom Coyne's band of merry men and women.

For 36 years, I've managed to avoid excellence in the pursuit of physical fitness. I played football (aka Soccer) for some excellent trophy winning teams growing up. The high standard of these teams, did little to improve my physical condition, in fact it worked squarely against it. As goalkeeper, I often spent 90 minutes picking daisies or leaning against a goalpost as my team spent the entire game in the opponents half, scoring at will. I then took up Cricket, which I played through school and University. As a game that is very foreign to US viewers, all that needs to be known is that the game can last between 2 hours and 5 days, but takes regular breaks for lunch, tea, drinks and rain (not uncommon in the North West of England). The sport didn't push me to the edge of physical perfection; I became better at playing cards, pool, and darts, and it was on the edge of a green pasture on the outskirts of Manchester, England, that I nurtured my love of sitting down with a beer, watching sport. Throw in some running about, walking from the golf cart to the beer girl, swimming at the shore, good intentions abandoned after day one of a new gym membership, and we have summed up my 36 year training program to date.

There was no way that any sane medical practitioner in the litigious State of Pennsylvania was going to sign off on letting me run a marathon. Tom gave us a number of different options, but if I wanted my vehicle to fail its inspection, I wasn't heading to the back street mechanic who's been putting lemons back on the road for years. I wanted the 200 point inspection and the cautious approach of an employee in a $1.2 bn organization that had more to lose. Bob Bair, Director of Fitness Services at The Riddle Health Center was going to be the guy that broke the news to me. After being poked, prodded, mocked and electrocuted (painlessly), I learned the following. I have the flexibility of an I-Beam, I have the physical range of someone 20 years older than me, and I'm not as fat as Tom Coyne. As I waited for the sad news I'd paid $50 for, Bob asked if I'd like to come back for a mid point and post marathon evaluation. I detected that my hearing had also failed, in the same way that my hamstrings had earlier. When Bob invited the team to use the training facilities at Riddle for free, I suspected that my hearing wasn't playing tricks. Despite questioning his medical opinion, sanity and medical qualifications, Bob told me that I had the green light to start training.

Without a 'Get out of Jail Free' card and the starting pistol officially fired, the finish line is now exactly that. 8 months and 26.2 miles away. Despite laughing and joking about the escapade, I'm actually very nervous about pushing myself physically beyond any point I have in the past. I'm concerned about months of aches and pains. Now that my exit strategy was nixxed, I'm nervous about not being able to do it. I'm encouraged at news from Dubai about Cristin running into a beige horizon; Joe in Chicago who has managed to find a way to train and play Fifa 2009 at the same time (genius); Jeannie from the Collar usually seen sitting on the front row of seats in Left field, or at the bar, already into a training plan that has her flying down Kelly Drive with other athletes; and by a girlfriend who I suspect will be carrying me across the aforementioned finish line.