september was pathetic. I run a total of 72 miles spread in only 9 runs! dublin was getting closer and I was getting lazier. I didn't want to give up the idea of doing dublin, 'cause this might be my last year in this city and I wanted to do this mara once. I love the idea of a race around the place where I live. so I thought: "I'll do dublin as a walk but THERE IS NO WAY I'm doing florence...."
but last weekend something happened. I went to rome for a "running weekend" with some of the people I met on my italian blog. we are now a community of 60 bloggers who leave comments in each others' blogs and we've decided to form a group (a bit like fetch, but smaller). we are the BLOGTROTTERS. the meeting coincided with a 10k that we all run with the same t-shirts.
it was a lovely weeekend. 3 days of eating, drinking wine, chatting and running. what was great about my race was the fact that one of the faster guy, once he finished his race, came back to find me and push me through the last 2 ks which ended up being the fastest ones. even though my time wasn't good (1:00:13) I seem to have found my lost mojo.
Not only have I been out twice this week I have also entered florence marathon. So now the idea is to use dublin as a long run and try to do florence in a decent time. there will be many fetchies in dublin and many blogtrotters in florence, so it's going to be a nice party too!!
BRING IT ON!!
It's now time for another half-marathon. the adidas race series which included a 5 and a 10 miler ends on Saturday with the half. as a celebration I have finally officially entered the DUBLIN MARATHON. so now, there's no escaping it!! my training has been quite random.... some week I have gone out only once for a 5 miler; some other weeks I have gone out once and then attempted (and succeeded) a long run. two sundays ago I managed a 15,73 miler and last sunday a 18,63 one. I still don't know how that was possible. my legs feel fine really but tuesdays have become tough: I feel tired and HUNGRY! does that happen to me only? are the tuesdays after your LSRs tough?? the new academic year has started already and we are now in week 2! after spending the summer months working on my research in the peace and quiet of my flat, starting term with hundreds of students and colleagues trying to talk to me was a shock to the system. I love being surrounded by people and I love my students. it's just hard to adjust to the sudden change; I feel overwhelmed but I know it will get easier and easier. this is going to be my last year at dublin university since my contract expires in august 2009. ideally I'd like to either stay here or move back to england but the situation is gloom. languages are not popular with the university power-that-be (probably none of the subjects belonging to the humanities area are). so the idea is now to apply somewhere else, and after ignoring the states for all my working life it's time for me to acknowledge the fact that I might have a chance to find a permanent job over there. it would be such a huge change for me and it will be difficult to explain this choice to my parents: england and ireland do not seem too far any more, but the states are. well...it might come to nothing, but the filling-the-application-form process has now started....scary!! BUT let's focus on what's happening at the moment and let's hope that the half marathon goes well. I'll meet up with the irish fetchies and I am sure it'll be fun!
yes, I am still alive but I guess my posting goes with my training and when I am not doing much I don't post much.
in the last few weeks my mojo has been coming and going; then it was time to hit the road with some italian friends of mine and go to Longford. They did the marathon and I did the half. my pb is 1:58 but I knew that I wasn't fit enough to beat that. as soon as we started it began to pour down (as you can see from the pic) and it wasn't pleasant. when the rain stopped I was drenched and tired.
I stopped for the first time at mile 3 and then I walked at every drink station. half way through I realised that I wasn't going to finish under 2hs so I took it easy ending up doing a LSR rather than a race. I finished in 2:06' and I was pleased with it anyway.
the race was on august 24th and since then I managed to run only once. I must have caught something on race day and I have been ill with a silly flu since then. I had to skip my LSR last sunday. dublin is getting closer and I am not ready yet. I haven't run longer than 13 miles. hopefully this week will be better.
my press up challenge suffered too last week, but I keeping at it. I am now on W3 D1 and it's getting really tough. but I can see improvements in my upper body strength and I am loving it!!
this is not my bycicle, but this is how my bycicle looked when I went downstairs this morning. I just can't believe it. I live in a court, you know, a complex with a couple of blocks of flats and terraced houses and lots of security. the bike was locked but the wheels weren't. after all the bike should be safe here. the main gate of the complex has been broken for a while now and surely some twat came in and did the job. I am pi$$ed off! it will cost me more than a 100 euros to put new wheels so I am now trying to buy a second hand one and I need to find it before term starts. my bike is the only way to go to uni in a reasonable time and without having to take 2 buses. grrrr
JB will be pleased though...one less cyclist on the roads ;)
what can I say about paula? I watched the marathon live last night, chatting away with a friend on skype and with my fetchie peeps. it was nice to comment on the race and have a virtual laugh. but the laughters lasted up to the 35 k marker. at that point I saw her stop and strecth. she looked in real pain. I thought that she was going to pull out. she didn't. she got into the stadium. she crossed that finish line. great!! but I was very upset for her. I couldn't help crying when she hugged liz yelling and when she talked to the BBC. I can just imagine the pain she felt when her legs stopped working and she had to push herself .... I can only imagine her disappointment.
but today I am even more upset by some comments made on the papers by journalists and random people alike who criticize her for having taken part in the games being injured, for having taken away somebody else's chance of victory (!!) bla bla bla. I have realised for the first time how despised she is by many in UK and I just can't get my head around this. to me she is the greatest marathon runner ever and her inabilty to win a gold medal at the games doesn't change how I feel about her. I am not going to add much. I just hope that she'll recover soon from her injury and that she gets back into racing and winning soon.
as for my race yesterday, that went much better than I thought. I have been feeling out of sorts in the last few weeks. I did the same race last year, same course. It took me 1:36:49. I thought this time anything under 1:45 it's fine really. but I PBd!! by only one minute....but who cares? I finished the 10 miles in 1:35:29 and I am well pleased with that.
COME ON PAULA!!
she'll be running at 0.35 saturday night/sunday morning if you didn't know that. I'll be watching the race live....I am sooooooooooooooooooooooooo excited!!!
