My personal trainer....

I popped to the gym at the Shell club this week at lunch. I can normally get in a 20-30 min run on the rickety old treadmill and then a couple of quick goes round the gym before a luke-warm shower and back to the office within a hour. I am normally on my own, which frankly I like in a city of 19 million.

This week however I had a partner, people had told me about Captain Nour, an ex-army PT instructor who uses the gym and helps out a few of the egyptians and trains some of the local sports teams. He introduced himself and offered to help and show me some tricks of the trade using the gym equipment and a few new exercises. Soon, in true egyptian style, he had fully taken over and was helping out full time. Normally I would have not agreed but I had the sense, and from what I had been told, that Captain Nour knew what he is doing. And I actually enjoyed it, being pushed a little with good encouragement I got a good work out and mixed it up a little from my normal routine.

The remarkable thing is Captain Nour is 72 and looks as fit as a fiddle. Not many people have a 70+ year old personal trainer!