Putting my heart and Seoul into a momentous run

The torch I carried down a suburb of the small town of Chung-ju, about 40 miles south of the South Korean capital Seoul, in 1988 did, at first, feel as if it was no heavier than a petal from a snowdrop, even though it was filled with oil and belching flame.

You are overwhelmed at first by the notion of historical significance. It plays tricks with the senses. You can feel like you will be anointed with sweetly scented oils from the slopes of Mount Olympus and fed luscious grapes by dusky maidens in long white robes when you complete your task. History is no longer a sterile passage in a book. You are living it.

The awareness of this trust invested heavily in you begins to nag, though. It is about then, about half-way down the one-kilometre run, that the arm starts to tell you that reality is creeping in and that the increasing discomfort in the shoulder is not tendinitis but that the torch is getting heavier by the second. And that it was designed for Arnold Schwarzenegger to carry.

But I get ahead of myself. Firstly there is the highly political question of selection. If you are part of a corporate group , as I was within the BBC Olympic team, and that group is interested in being associated with the torch, you had better start thinking of the plotting and back-stabbing going on within the coalition over the NHS. It could become worse than that.

I happened to be chosen because I was nearest the editor at the time when the organisers asked him for a BBC person to run a stage. Others thought differently. When this news reached the ears of David Coleman and Des Lynam, the plotting began. It reached my ears that efforts were being made to rescind the editor’s decision and that one of those leading luminaries of broadcasting wanted this role.

I was told they were working furiously to arrange one of them to take over. Friends were offering their consolations to me. Whispering was intense. My Flodden at the hands of these English imperialist was beckoning. To his credit, the editor stood his ground and off I went.

Here you have to consider terrain and onlookers. Chung-ju was flat and heavily populated. Hilly terrain with only sheep in attendance might not offer the same inspirational background of the national mood of euphoria as these citizens represented. People accentuate your moment of fame. Glencoe? Hardly. So, if you can, go for where a full-throated roar will urge you on and help suspend reality that bit more.

The Olympic movement might appear bloated and over-indulgent; London may seem distant; and Scotland might feel nationally short-changed by the whole extravaganza. But down Scottish roads, I believe that the runners will live out Robert Louis Stevenson’s adage: “ . . . to travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive.”

For the feeling of having been in front of the global footlights does not last long. That flame you will carry might even be extinguished overnight by an unexpected draught in a but and ben near Ardlui! So what? Think Olympus!

My torch was lit by the oncoming runner and it was then I imagined that it would be mine forever, and although at the end of the run I walked with it innocently through the crowd to make my getaway I was seized upon by security people who grabbed it from my hands.

This happening to others caused a national uproar in the country. So at a ceremony held later, and after many protests, the runners were presented with their torches to keep for posterity. Being a lawyer or a shop steward might be helpful if this issue arises next year.

Whatever your background, you will find this an emotional experience. Up to a point. There were tears in my eyes after the run and my colleagues sympathised and even complimented me on my emotional breakdown.

I did not tell them that the tears streaming down my face was the result of smoke from the torch getting into my eyes as my arm succumbed to its weight.

Still, in the Olympics of Ben Johnson, it was not the greatest deception.