A Missed Run, and Swimming Up

Last night I had planned on a nice easy 3k recovery sort of run, but things kind of forced that to not happen. It was Owen's swim-up ceremony from Beavers to Cubs, and the whole process is quite involved and lengthy. The boys had a great time, though, which is the most important thing. Even though Malks is too young to even be a Beaver he got involved in the ceremony and a couple of the games afterwards. It was very cute watching him run around trying to keep up with the big kids, and Owen did a fantastic job of watching out for his little brother the whole time. I'm so proud of both of them! Here's Owen after his swim-up, his Beaver uniform now off, and waiting to get his Cubs woggle for his scarf, awesome hat head and all:


Since I didn't run last night I really didn't want to miss my swim this afternoon. Even though I felt very lethargic I forced myself to go and in the end had a good swim. I managed 1500m in 22:21 and it felt pretty easy. I have to keep up this swimming a couple of times per week since I think this has already paid off in my cardio and in letting my legs rest between runs. On top of that, as long as this plantar fasciitis continues to stay like an unwelcome guest I have to manage my running very conservatively. I'm not sure how much I will swim throughout the summer, but that's still a month or so away when my membership expires and I have to make the decision.

Later in the evening, as I watched Roy Halladay manhandle AJ Burnett and the Yankees like A-Rod manhandles a syringe (not to mention blonde ladies of the night), I also did some chin ups (3X9), sit ups (3X50), and push ups (3X35). I have to get back on the upper body stuff for it looks like that's the thing that falls off first when I get busy. Jays are now 23-12 on the season. The Yankees? NOT! And thanks to the Phillies beating the Dodgers as well this makes Toronto the first team to reach 23 wins on the season. Hope they can keep it up!

A Belated Birthday Party

Yes, Owen turned 7 a month ago, but it wasn't until yesterday that we managed to have his party with his friends. We are loser parents, but the excuse is that his birthday falls the day before Halloween and parents are usually overpartied around that time, so we typically wait a couple of weeks for his party. This year it went a couple of extra weeks, but the kids had a great time bowling and our ears are still hurting from all the screaming and yelling...


Later in the evening, after coming down from the sugar high of the birthday cake, of which I had too many pieces, I attempted another set of chin/pull ups. At the beginning I felt really weak and I was really doubting my ability to do anywhere near as many chin ups as last time. However, I surprised myself a bit and did 9-9-9 overhand wide grip and 9-9-9-8 underhand narrow grip, for a total of 62. At this point I think the 100 push up challenge looks much more feasible than the 20 chin up challenge since I seem to be stuck at 9. The lats and shoulders give out, that's true, but more than anything my forearms are weak! I start losing grip at about the 7th or 8th chin up and have to readjust while hanging down, wasting precious energy. I have to start doing some hand and forearm strengthening on the off days I think.

The foot is still hurting a bit, so it's status quo on that front. Today is a day devoted to working on my final paper, and I am hoping to have the first draft finished by this evening so I'd better get to it.

Owen's Turkey Trot Debut

Turkey Trot was a blast! This morning we headed out to Cumberland Village Heritage Museum so that Owen could pick up his timing chip and get ready for the 1k race. The weather was perfect, very sunny, not too cold. We set off at 8:15am for a 9:30 start, and by the time we arrived a little before nine the stream of cars getting into the main parking lot was very long. I couldn't believe the number of people coming to this event, and the fact that the marathon course was right along the main road with the pylons sitting about halfway into our lane. It was a bit harrowing driving half on the other side of the road as cars were speeding towards us, that's for sure.

We parked in the alternate parking lot (accross the road in somebody's field) since we figured that we'd be the first out, and it wasn't a very long walk to the starting line and tents anyway. After this, we picked up Owen's timing chip and made our way to the starting line for the Turkey Trot. I snapped a picture of Owen in front of the banner, with a new friend he made in the background:


Although a little apprehensive at first, Owen managed to find the courage to pat the horse and was very pleased to have done so. He spent the next half hour feeding it grass and hay:


Then it was time to line up at the start. The 10-12 kids went first, with the younger ones starting two minutes afterwards. There was some tension and confusion among the kids and parents, but everything was pretty cool. Here's Owen getting ready to run and listening to the instructions:


And they're off!!!


I ran across the field to catch Owen coming around the loop and to cheer him on (that's my shadow on the left, once again demonstrating that my camera skills are amateur at best):


And then I ran back across to the finishing area to do the same. Here's Owen running past me to the finish line:


And here's the little guy with his medal at the end:

I am very proud of him having run his first real "bibbed" race and all, and hope that he remembers this as a positive experience for the rest of his life. He's already confirmed that he wants to participate in this next year, and maybe his Dad will do one of the other distances too.

Update: I just checked the sportstats.ca website to see if Owen's results had been posted, and they finally made it on there! Now I am even more impressed with my little guy!!! (If that's possible.) His time for the 1k was 4:48!!! And he finished 22nd out of 108 boy participants and 30th overall out of 223! As far as 7 year-old boys go, and the way they were categorizing the kids in this race you just had to turn seven by the end of the year to be in that age group, Owen finished 3rd! He'll be 7 at the end of this month, so in my mind he's still 6... Amazing.