Thursday, July 25, 2013

Three Things Thursday: Mother runner approved

Once upon a time, I was a mother runner. I was a mother runner who tossed her kid in the jogging stroller, secured him (obviously) and logged whatever miles I had on the plan.

Once upon a time, I was a mother runner. I was a mother runner who planned her runs on a baby's schedule, hoping he'd wake up in time to do what we needed to do.

Once upon a time, I was a mother runner who grew stronger as her baby grew, pushing more and more weight around the neighborhood.

And then winter came.

It was too cold to run with a toddler in tow. The toddler was sleeping later, eating real food and taking longer to start the day. The toddler definitely wasn't sleeping in the stroller and had a reduced attention span.

So the stroller runs slowed until they stopped. For a long time. So long that I had to look in my log to see when I last pushed the BOB.

But I'm happy to report that in five days, Miles has been in that stroller three times and I've been behind the handlebars for two.

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1. Mark was camping, my in-laws vacationing and I was flying solo with Miles this past weekend. It's definitely not the ideal situation for a mother runner in the midst of marathon training but it was good. I hopped ahead in the plan and rescheduled workouts so that all I had to do on Sunday was a 3-miler. After breakfast, I filled a bottle with nuun, grabbed a cup of toddler trail mix (Goldfish, raisins and peanuts) and made sure Miles had his new friend, Tiggy. The run was nice -cooler weather and a decent pace - but I forgot just how hard it is to run with the stroller. I felt like I was sprinting a 5K rather than going for an easy run around the neighborhood.

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2. On double days, I normally ship Miles off to daycare and squeeze my run in before work. Yesterday, though, I realized we were all sort of hanging around, waiting for the clock to strike 9. And it was 8:35. It seemed like such a waste to sit around so I asked Mark if he was interested in joining me for 3 miles. The run was hard as I had 6 miles already in the books, and we were forced to extend it by a 0.5-mile because of tree removal. Thankfully, Mark was a gentleman and pushed little man the whole way.

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3. No matter the miles on tap, I've been getting up early to log them but after two successful stroller runs, I asked Mark whether he wanted to try it again since I had only 3 miles today. I pushed for half, answered repeated questions of "Where we going?" and stopped too many times for traffic, dog poop, lollipop retrieval and chats.

The stroller runs have been a nice change pace of this week but I'd be lying if I wasn't looking forward to some quiet time on Saturday morning. Seriously, you can only answer the same question 139 times before wanting to go find a binky.

What are your three things for Thursday?

5 comments:

  1. I pushed a friend's 1-year-old for the second half of a run the other day. I swear that stroller was drunk. She laughed as I tried to go in a straight line, and explained hers didn't lock the front wheel... but the kiddo loved the excitement. Props to you and all moms who push those things every run. But the cup holders were phenomenal! If it wouldn't look strange, I'd push an empty stroller for long runs just to hold all my food and water and nuun!

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  2. 1. The weather here (MN) feels like September! I actually wore a jacket this morning biking in. Love it.
    2. I did squats, lunges, and box (bench) jumps Thursday morning at the park. Then I couldn't find a step for calf raises so I climbed a (low branched) tree and did them standing on a limb. Got some funny looks from the early morning dogwalkers.
    3. Going to run the 15.5 mile loop at our local state park tomorrow morning. It's always a big run! (It's the course I volunteered at a couple weeks ago and wrote about here http://tinyurl.com/mb72t63 and here http://tinyurl.com/kqdepht).

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  3. I'm impressed with all your doubles and teaching. You're an animal!

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  4. I think the hardest part about running with a BOB is that you don't know how your companion is going to be that day - sometimes she's chill and into it. other days, all i do if pick up strewn items and reassure her that it's almost over. id say i'm pretty lucky with a toddler who likes to "run with mommy" and she's also crazy little so the weight isn't an issue. but i definitely look forward to my solo runs!

    btw, miles is adorable in there ;) and rock on for being a BAMR (bad ass mother runner :))

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  5. Woohoo! Way to get back with the stroller. Dave has taken Leo a few times this week and yeah... I love stroller running with Leo but I also don't miss the stroller and having solo runs!

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