{"id":82,"date":"2008-05-15T07:59:03","date_gmt":"2008-05-15T07:59:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/?p=82"},"modified":"2008-06-27T11:13:42","modified_gmt":"2008-06-27T11:13:42","slug":"running-away-with-myself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/running-away-with-myself\/","title":{"rendered":"Running away with myself"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;ve just got back from my final training run before the <a href=\"http:\/\/gmr.realbuzz.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Great Manchester Run<\/a> on Sunday, which inspired me to write this post. Never a great fan of exercise, I started running in the New Year and am amazed to have finally found an activity that I not only enjoy but actually look forward to. However, when I consider running in relation to its gaming attributes it&#8217;s perhaps not all that surprising:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>There&#8217;s a clear goal (the 10k race) that is achievable but not too easy;<\/li>\n<li>There are measurable outcomes so that steady and ongoing improvement can be seen in a number of dimensions (speed, stamina, knackeredness);<\/li>\n<li>It takes place in an immersive environment &#8211; &#8216;actual reality&#8217; with real Manchester rain;<\/li>\n<li>I&#8217;m in control of where, when, how often and how far I run;<\/li>\n<li>I&#8217;ve several friends who are also taking part in the race and offer advice and support;<\/li>\n<li>Perhaps most crucially, thanks to a foolish bet I made last year (after one too many shandies) there is a serious competitive element that my innate dislike of losing won&#8217;t let me forget.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I&#8217;m a bit concerned that all my enthusiam will disappear once the race is over, but I suppose I&#8217;ll just have to sign up for another one quickly. A marathon perhaps. How hard can it be?<\/p>\n<p>This post wouldn&#8217;t be complete without mentioning the fact that I&#8217;m running for a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mariecurie.org.uk\/\" target=\"_blank\">good cause<\/a>, and any support would be very much welcomed. I can be sponsored <a href=\"http:\/\/www.justgiving.com\/pete-and-nic\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;ve just got back from my final training run before the Great Manchester Run on Sunday, which inspired me to write this post. Never a great fan of exercise, I started running in the New Year and am amazed to&#8230;<br \/><a class=\"read-more-button\" href=\"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/running-away-with-myself\/\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[47],"class_list":["post-82","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-thoughts","tag-sport"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p71sY0-1k","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playthinklearn.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}