O.K. I've gotta admit it. Some days it's been damned tough to persuade my body to get out there and log double-digit Ks through the Mississauga tundra.

Ice-caked sidewalks, dark streets, and cruelly frigid winds that seems to lie in wait until I emerge from my warm nest -- they're all working me over, wearing me down, sapping my will.

Throw in sluggish legs that whine, complain and keep trying to turn my body towards home, and you've got a recipe for apathy.

And, yes, I haven't been 100 per cent lately. The right thigh's been moaning and the groin's been a-groanin' since December. In January, a 10K lunchtime trudge along Toronto's lakeshore left me whimpering on a stool outside my locker. It was like someone took a ping-pong paddle to my upper thigh every other step.

I pictured myself sitting on the shelf - long enough to keep me from courting Lady Boston again, come April.

Did some head scratching. Read a tealeaf or two. Devised a two-pronged plan.

Prong one: Headed back to my athletic therapist's table for another round of pounding, pummeling and acu-puncturing. Leaving my leg in the hands of a pro was a no-brainer.

Prong two, I was a little less comfortable with. Put it this way: if Don Cherry believed that some athletes don't wear skates and carry sticks, he'd still be ragging me for being a wimp. This Canadian boy decided to take much of his training indoors.

Over the past couple of years, I've run outdoors wearing shorts at least once in every month of the year. But this year - it's been like one of those winters from my days as a kid in Montreal. You know, when your lips freeze to the swing set.

It's taking more than a couple of generations to breed the Mediterranean out of this guy.

Even when the temperature has bordered on mild, winter has found ways of penetrating layers of clothing. And the groundhog's been no help, either.

I reluctantly took out a membership at the Mississauga YMCA. They've got this 200-metre track. Indoors. No wind, no ice, no slush, no drivers overcome with some inexplicable need to swerve at runners as they juggle cigarettes, coffee, doughnuts and cellphones.

Sure, it's a trade-off. A hundred laps of a 200-metre track can be mind-numbingly boring - unless there's an aerobics class in view. Like a colleague suggested, "Why not just nail your left foot to the floor and run in a circle?" The scenery doesn't really change much. How do you know you really ran 20K?

Take it outside, though, and 20K in Mississauga means you've run through two or three different eco-systems.

But a funny thing happened while I was circling that little indoor track. The ping-pong paddles left me alone. The sluggishness slipped from those leaden legs. Those kilometres were piling up at a more reasonable rate - all without the fear that I would lose my footing and aggravate that right leg.

It's amazing what a few days' rest, several treatments and a gradual return to normal training can do. No, I'm still not 100 per cent. But confidence is returning. I'm less concerned that those long - outdoor - Sunday runs are going slower than they were this time last year.

It's all part of a process. One on which Lady Boston may smile. At least that's what the inner wimp is saying.

I am from the Caribbean Islands too and, yes, that tropical weather decades later still hasn't flushed out of me. You are a brave man, I still can't get my backside out in the cold, and instead I honk at the men and women that jog in my neighborhood and smile with a thumbs-up. Some of them think I am some crazy driver but most others understand that it is a vote of confidence.

Peter, I think one thing most of take for granted is our health; we are too busy with work and the kids ... of course making excuses for why we can't do it. We don't realize until someone keels over with a heart attack and dies that we are only here for a short time, and that short time just gets shorter every day we don't exercise. We also don't realize how lucky we are to have health that allows us to do normal things like walking and running.

Peter keep it up, you got this wimp/ whiner getting out. I am probably 10 years younger but I do appreciate your article. It would be nice to see more of these articles to inspire Canadians to get out. Last week in Ottawa one of the writers from the Citizen went on the South Beach diet and lost 20 pounds in a month. This has inspired my wife and I to give it a try.

Maybe you can get some other high-profile anchors or writers to do the same. My apologies for the long email.

Frank Lawrence
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