Hi, my name is Jhon Cosgrove. I am a 29 plus 10 year old, handsome vegan man who bloody loves running. I started running properly in late 2016 and it has changed my whole life for the positive – hence ‘Posi Cozzy.’
I find it hard to write these ‘About Me’ sections, as I find it hard to take myself seriously and write about myself without self-deprecating (massive nose, stupid hair, ) but in a bid to value my existence more (characterful nose, gorgeous hair) I am going to attempt to. FYI – this blog is going to try and look at the positive side of all things running, mental health and my own existence on this weird planet. There’ll be more than a sprinkling of all things vegan, things that I have done and I hope to wrap it all up in a bit of humour.
Before I got into running, I spent too much time in my 20s playing in a 90s style pop-punk band called Mike TV (formerly Pickled Dick) and we toured all round the U.K, Europe and China (twice!), as well as releasing three albums and various other musical endeavours. I also tried stand up comedy, compered at local festivals, co-hosted a pilot for a music based TV show, played an idiot in an actual film, and co-hosted a radio show. Again, none of this brought any real notoriety until I got naked on the TV show – ‘Come Dine With Me.’ I followed this up by going on another channel 4 show called ‘Tattoo Fixers‘ and getting one of my cricket teammates tattooed on my leg.
After all this professional showing off, I started playing cricket again (I played in school) in 2010 for my local village club, Steep CC. I was initially there to make up the numbers and turn the kettle on but I soon got involved with coaching the kids, and I qualified as a Level 2 ECB cricket coach. This led to finding out about the amazing charity ‘Cricket Without Boundaries‘ and going on two projects to Rwanda and Uganda. As part of my fundraising, my fruity alter-ego ‘The Marmalade Pope‘ was born.
You can check out all my running exploits on Strava but my proudest moment so far was running the 2019 London Marathon in under 3 hours. 2:58:19 to be bloody exact. This was my favourite ever day. I am also a massive advocate for running to improve your mental health. I didn’t realise I had any mental health issues until 2015. I just thought it was normal to feel anxious / depressed all the time. I’ve since learnt that it helps me to speak about them to both friends and experts. I’ve also gone back to college to study counselling and work on myself, and I’m very keen of helping reduce any stigma around mental health. We all have it, the same as we have physical health.
In a bid for more charitable adventure, I joined in the inaugural Veganuary bike ride – cycling 250 miles across India in early 2019. In order to fundraise for this, I ran a marathon dressed as a broccoli around my home town on Boxing Day 2018. I did it for the lols BUT I won two local sports awards for it, which made me feel very uncomfortable but made my mum very proud.
I live in a really old cottage, in the small village of Steep just outside Petersfield in Hampshire. I live with a fucking annoying Spaniel called Frenzal who I love with all my heart and massive characterful nose. I work in the field of freelance Social Media which is actually based online and not in a field.
Comments are closed.