How I learned to stop worrying and love PE - Susan Morrison

This level of fitness slightly shocks me, and the fact that I actually work at maintaining that fitness genuinely astonishes me, because I went to incredible lengths to avoid PE at school.

Run Forrest, run! Time to get fit in a PE class

It was hardly surprising. Our PE teacher was Mrs Clarkson, a terrifying woman who lived in red tracksuits and constantly preached the benefits of exercise. She believed the only cure for period pains/mild nausea/Black Death was a nice cross-country run. In November.

I hated gym and schemed to avoid it. There was the feeble attempt at writing the parental excuse note, which I ruined by slipping up on the forgery of the maternal signature. I signed it ‘Susan’s Mum’. I heard the entire PE department screaming with laughter behind the staff room door.

Stung, the next week I reached new heights of imagination and chewed on a bar of soap, foamed at the mouth and claimed I had rabies. She didn’t believe that either and so I was forced to play netball while hiccuping bubbles.

And yet, here I am, the proud possessor of a well-used Edinburgh Leisure membership and something of a gym-rat. I can bench press and dead row and my clean and press is something to behold. My bestie and I go swimming regularly, although it is fair to say that it’s just as much blether as breaststroke. So? Swim ‘n’ chat uses twice the calories.

As I age I appreciate being able to move with the same ease and agility I had 20 years ago. Every moment in that gym pays off when I dart for a train and swing my bag up onto the overhead rack.

Can’t recommend it highly enough and if you fancy a bit of workout, Edinburgh Leisure have a shedload of membership options, including a good discount for the over 65s.

The only downside is realising that Mrs Clarkson was right after all.