My first race
- Ella Botting
- Apr 7
- 4 min read
Like all good running stories, my journey begins with a crisis of the self.
Let’s travel back in time. 13 years ago I crash landed in Leeds to continue my education with a BSc in psychology. In Dubai — where I had done most of my growing up — I was an overly confident, gregarious girl with an abundance of marvellous friends. I swam for my school, danced five times a week and was very active.
In Leeds, I found myself struggling to make connections. People didn’t like that I came from elsewhere (despite being painfully British) and they made that abundantly clear. This, and feeling very far away from my family and creature comforts shattered my ability and willingness, I suppose, to continue to face life head and shoulders held high. The little seed of anxiety I had been nurturing in my late teens, transformed into daily panic attacks. I was miserable, lonely and pretty scared. I lost trust in myself and in my body, my anxiety was (is) always physical. And thus ensued a pretty self destructive three years. I sort of told myself it was all fine because the point of uni was to be pissed 24/7 and to rely solely on chicken goujons and choccie for nutrition, no?!
Of course it wasn’t all bad. I graduated with a 2:1 after spending a lot of time in library during third year. I met two of the greatest people on planet earth and made them my best friends (hi Totter), developed my relationship with my now husband and had a boat load of belly laughs. I also cultivated the resilience you only really learn when you leave the safety net of your home town, or city. Though I may have begrudged it at the time.
Sometime before, during or after I started my master’s I went on a trip home and my little sister introduced me to the world of cross fit and I fell in love with weightlifting. I found a gym and a coach and I began regularly training. I had just about started to look after my physical self again. I soon found I was pretty strong and I started to feel maybe a tiny bit less anxious probably because I was moving my body. I also LOVED the stuff I was learning in my master’s and the folks I was studying with. Things felt different, but definitely not whole.
Fast forward five or so years and the pandemic hit. I was settled in London. And I, like many others, become a complete and total couch potato. I gained, I don’t know, say 20kg in a very short amount of time. Though despite missing my friends and family, I was pretty happy. It’s odd that me — a very energetic and social little thing quite enjoyed lockdown. I started therapy for the 3rd or 4th time and this time it was the oneeeeee. That therapist changed my life. Completely. My mindset changed, in soooooo many ways. I began going to the gym again, and I spent two years building my physical strength. I was still eating like crap, but that story is for another time.
In late 2023 I came across a post by Camilla Lorentzen where she spoke about running as slow as you physically possibly can. And something switched in my mind. And after a decade of refusing to run. A decade of thinking there’s no way I’ll ever be able to run again. I thought, I could go really really slow. I downloaded the couch to 5k app after hearing amazing things about it, which indeed turned out to be true — it is an amazing app. I now had a new tool in my toolbox. I soon realised I could run wherever I went, and for someone who travels a lot, this realisation completely changed the way I approached — sigh — wellness. I was able to maintain some continuity in my routine when I was away from home, and that really did make all the difference for me. This continuity forced me to address things that I had been avoiding for years. For example, I had to fix my back if I wanted to keep running. So I spoke to a physiotherapist and actually did the exercises they suggested and lo and behold my pain, pain I had been suffering with for nearly two decades, began to recede.
Running confronted me with my physical and conscious self more so than anything else I’d ever done. Pushing your max heart rate feels remarkably like having a panic attack. But my god, the runners high. The runners high! It feels so good. Oh! And it got me outside. After spending so much time inside during Covid and then working from home, getting outside more did me so much good. Though I absolutely treasure lifting heavy (and yoga and Pilates), there is no greater feeling than finishing a run. Dramatic I know, especially considering I’ve never ran further than 7km. My confidence in my physicality grew and I decided I wanted to challenge myself, so I signed up to a little race.
The race itself was sensational. I cried a good 50% of the way round. What is it about organised sport that makes me weep happy tears? It was fucking hard. Crystal Palace is very hilly and the sun was beating down on my little (big) ginger head. I think I may have gotten a little sunstroke (in early April— see painfully British!). I still managed to knock a minute or so off my personal best. Doing things you never believed you’d be able to do kinda makes you feel invincible. And I couldn’t recommend challenging yourself and your mental that way as much as you possibly can. And if all else fails, at least you’ll end up with some cute workout fits.
P.s I’ve not used chat gpt to help me write this, I just love —‘s
P.p.s Tom came THIRD overall how hilarious and iconic given he BARELY trained
P.p.p.s Thank you so MUCH to all my gorgeous friends and family who have inspired and cheered me on. Love you all
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