Well with all the best intentions in the world sometimes things just happen that prevent even the most Ultimate of Olympians in completing their quest for glory. Zola Budd tripping Mary Decker in LA, Daley Thompsons pole snapping in the decathlon pole vault in Seoul? The heat and illness getting to Paula in Athens The Oxford University Athletics Team turning up early for training......... At least one of these prevented the Ultimate Olympian, John McClure and I in our epic head to head 800m challenge Tuesday evening.

After a swift warm up consisting of walking to the track from thehospice I found myself surrounded by lycra clad bodies with buttocks you could grate cheese on, and that was just the blokes. Amongst this swarm of 'real' atghletes wandering around like they owned the place (err... they do!) I found Gareth, Ultimate Timekeeper for the evening, strangely he didn't seem too concerned by th eturn of events and seemed quite happy to be in the middle of a load of female students stretching and warming up. Then again he didn't put up too much of a struggle when we suggested we move along to a local hostelry to discuss and plan our next move. Turns out our next few moves were in the direction of the bar, and as this move seemed pretty foolproof we decided to continue planning for a few hours. Thorough planning is the key to success you see?

Anyway to cut a long session short we didn't run the 800 nor did we go 'over the fence' for a late night mano et mano just him and me, in the style of Rocky and Apollo at the end of Rocky III. Mostly due to the possibility of getting arrested, or at least chased off by an old bloke called stan who smokes woodbines and lives in a shed. That's my image of a nightwatchman, I quite like it. Anyway we will reconvene to complete this race in the near future but first I have a little matter of the Abingdon Marathon to contend with.