Sunday, February 12, 2006

Bad Start

The kids were an absolute nightmare in the morning. Lola woke at 5:30 and demanded a hot water bottle, because she was cold. Once that was delivered, Cian woke up, and demanded a bottle. He doesn’t usually get one in the morning, but I was in no mood to argue. When he finished it off, Shea wanted breakfast. Then Cian wanted breakfast. Then they wanted to watch telly. Then they argued about what to watch. Then Lola wanted breakfast. Then they argued some more. Then they broke a lamp. Then …. I can’t remember what else, but I was up and about until 9 am, when Niamh got up, and I went back to bed for some more much needed sleep, and dozed for another 2 hours.

After such a bad start to the day, I was tempted to call it an off day, but eventually gathered enough resolve to head out of the door. I had planned a 10 miles tempo run. Initially I felt really slow, and then tried to gradually up the pace until I was at or about 8 minutes per mile. After 5 miles I felt much better, but at 6 miles I felt a sharp pain just above my left knee. I decided to keep going, but turn back home if it re-occurred, but it didn’t trouble me any further. I finished the run at some good pace, and was quite happy with it. I’m a bit sore now, which I presume is because I have been running on 4 consecutive days, which I’m no longer used to after my cut-back due to injury. I’m sure I will recover sufficiently tomorrow to have a good go at Tuesday’s 17 miles, 14 of which should be at marathon pace. I’m still unsure about what pace I might be able to sustain for a whole marathon, but I guess Tuesday’s run will give some clues.

I did 49 miles this week, which means I’m back on schedule.

12 Feb: 10 miles, 1:18, 7:48 pace

7 comments:

  1. You ahd a great week in miles! Sorry, you kids are not understanding of your needs:) Joking. Luckily, I started running when mine were too old to ask me anything and lsept till I got back from a run! Hang in there, that too shall pass...

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  2. I don't have those problems with the kids in the morning, but I do have them while I am trying to do homework when my wife is at work. It is nearly impossible. Glad to hear you are back on schedule.

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  3. Thomas, I think your kids and my kids should get together and go bowling. They obviously would get along well since they have similar interests-thwarting our run schedules!

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  4. This makes me think about reconsidering my intentions of having more than one kid. Maybe I should be happy and content with having one happy and relatively easy child. Why tempt faith.

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  5. That is the reason why I only have 2 children!

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  6. This is where the teen years shine! They sleep as late as they possibly can (even till 3:00 in the afternoon, if you let them), they fix their own breakfast, and they're too busy for TV!

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  7. I couldn't possibly image 3 or 4 or 5 Ash's running around my house. One is enough to thwart my running (and the rest of my life...). Good job on getting the miles in anyway. Sometimes I think going out and running helps feel better anyway.

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