What is it for? Jogging means being in a hurry to get nowhere in particular as fast as possible. And it qualifies as certifiable behaviour. The madman can see the purpose of his actions but the sane man can’t.
City-dwellers are more prone to this mental abnormality than rural folk, who prefer not to go loping through fields of wheat or scampering over the muddied divots of an open moor. In cities, the lunatics are -everywhere, which makes it tricky for the authorities to detain them under the Mental Health Act. Some joggers know that chasing around their neighbourhood like a hamster on a wheel is a little crazy. Hence ‘jogger’s face’, the anguished expression worn by many of the semi-athletes as they galumph along the streets. ‘Why am I doing this?’ they cry inwardly.
I appreciate those ones – the angry joggers. They haven’t lost touch with reality. It’s the smilers that worry me. The ones who beam with an air of angelic fulfilment as they whirl past in a mighty rush to meet a nonexistent deadline. When they reach a busy intersection, they jog on the spot until the lights change. Why? To prove that they live at a faster pace and achieve more than the dawdling rabble. Smiling joggers should never be given power. If you can smile while scourging yourself, you’re capable of inflicting untold pain on others.
Jogging is a form of striptease. For men, it’s a chance to show off a rippling collection of chest muscles or to display a new golden eagle tattoo across their shoulders. Women like to gather their lustrous hair into a thick ponytail that swishes and bounces as they trot. To get more attention, they wear lime-green headbands and pink trainers with yellow laces. But don’t stare. That’s sexist.
Hedge-fund joggers are common in the East End. Slim young men in beards who talk business as they run, speaking in normal, relaxed voices to prove to each other that they’re not short of breath. Sometimes they discuss further jogging opportunities. ‘I do “Morning Miles” twice a week. A couple of circuits of Canary Wharf. Blows the cobwebs away.’
Another common sight is the walking-pace jogger. He shouldn’t be out at all, and he knows it. Bald patch. Spindly limbs. Wobbly tummy. Filthy old tennis shoes from the Pete Sampras era. Even the mobility scooters overtake him as he heaves towards a bench where he stops for a break. Then he calls an Uber.
The lovebird joggers appear on Saturdays. They’re a new couple, trotting in step and exchanging chitchat. They both regret putting ‘fun runs’ in their dating profiles. He’d rather be in the pub with his mates. She wishes she was back in bed, alone, enjoying the full spread of the mattress.
And there’s the invisible jogger, also known as the pounding menace. His dinosaur tread is audible before he wheezes past you with his belly swaying and his knees half-buckling under the strain.
My personal favourites are the sourdough joggers, a husband-and-wife team who enjoy a brisk two-mile run beside the canal twice a week. He’s slogging along just behind her with the water bottles and the energy biscuits in his rainbow knapsack. She’s thrusting ahead, hands gripping the buggy, making cooing noises at Baby Sebastian in his Free Palestine sun hat as he dribbles over a sugar-crammed health bar. And she’s expecting a new addition to the family. Not that she’ll let a small thing like pregnancy slow her down. She maintains a steady rhythm as she surges along the towpath with her fitness bracelet tracking every calorie she burns. She’s also wearing a helmet, kneepads and a lifejacket in case she falls into the canal.
Smiling joggers should never be given power. If you can smile while scourging yourself, you’re capable of untold pain
The attractions of jogging are hard to fathom. Wine and food give us instant but transient pleasures. Art is enjoyable because it confers social status and boasting rights. Travel delivers countless sensory treats while creating an archive of happy memories that stimulate the desire for future journeys.
But jogging doesn’t fit into this hedonology. It’s not fun while you do it. It’s not fun recalling when you did it before. And it’s surely not fun looking forward to the horrors of next week’s half-marathon. The pleasure of jogging is concentrated in a single moment: the conclusion. It’s nice when it ends. So it’s nothing like wine, food, art or travel. It’s more like a punishment beating or an amputation.
Some joggers jog themselves to death. Jim Fixx, the American health freak, suffered a fatal heart attack in 1984 during his morning run. People joked that he died doing what he loved. But he didn’t die jogging. He lay on the path for a few moments, still conscious, and sensing the delicious afterglow that floods the nerves as the physical ordeal finishes and the recovery begins.
This minor detail matters to me, because my local park is infested with members of the treadmill community and I need a plan in case one of them collapses in front of me. My intention is to stroll over and slap the patient gently across the cheek and make him aware that his keep-fit session is over. He’s free. Then I’ll saunter away and leave him to croak on his own. That way he can pass blissfully into the afterlife having achieved a happy death. He died not jogging.
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