I haven't been surrounded by so many women since I went to my single-sex primary school. It's slightly unnerving until we all have to take part in the world record attempt for biggest simultaneous stretch. Kat Brown, BA Hons (Dunelm), World Record Holder For Stretching - beats the crap out of my ungainly attempts at learning how to do handstands yesterday.

Gloria Hunniford gets wheeled out to beam benificence on the crowd. Barking mad aerobics instructors warm us up with routines so frantic it would take industrial quantities of Ritalin to bring it down to something folk can actually deal with.

Helen, quite sensibly, abandons all pretence of paying attention to the barking mad aerobics instructors. Then we all start to run like there are wolves after us: slow, fairly stupid wolves. People line the route and cheer which is quite nice, and makes up for the fact I really, really dislike running. Note for the future, all-female running races attract a surprisingly attractive male fanbase.