A teeny tiny bit of news...

So there's a little something I've been holding back from you all for...well, for about three months now. I know a certain few of you have held strong suspicions, and I'm now free to admit - you were right.

I've been waiting, and waiting, and waiting, and Waiting, and waiting, and WAITING for my mum to get here for her annual visit so I could tell her first in person, and then spread the news to the rest of the world. Yup, my 8-week and 13-week sonogram images on the right may have given the game away by now...I'm pregnant.

We found out just before Christmas and we've been ridiculously happy ever since. We've been very lucky, getting pregnant shortly after starting to try, and - save for a few nauseous and headachy moments - I've felt fantastic the whole time. The giving-up of the booze and the caffeine proved a little challenging for the first two weeks - but since then it's been a breeze. I found myself an AWESOME obgyn clinic, and that's helped a lot.

I think pregnancy and motherhood is going to suit me. Whereas last year, my job was the painful, excrutiating bain of my exisitance, now I just float through my days in the office, not letting anything wind me up. What's the point? It's all so trivial and irrelevant! I'm usually the biggest worrywart I know, but since learning of my pregnancy I've developed this sense of extreme calm and contentment. Not sure if it will last...but one can only hope.

Now, I know what you're all thinking. You're thinking, my god...those two don't half rush into things. They've barely had 13 years as a couple, and already they are creating another human being together. Why they haven't given themselves the time to get to know each other in their mere 9+ years of marriage, before introducing a baby into the relationship. Well I say, what the heck! What's wrong with a bit of spontaneity? It's time to throw caution to wind, time to take a risk. I think we'll be okay ;)

Needless to say I've done a lot of reading already about pregnancy (what did expecting mothers do before the Internet?). It's all good. It's all fascinating, and reassuring and remarkably educational (for example, who knew that the fact I'm an rH- and Matt is rH+ blood type could be life threatening for me and any future children??!)

I have been - predictably - paying particularly attention to any literature about exercise and pregnancy, and I'm now bummed and a little angry about just one thing specifically. The first few things I read about the topic were overly cautious in nature. "Run no more than 2 miles a day" was the general consensus. What a load of crrrrrrrrrrrrrrap. If there's one thing I've already learned about pregnancy, is that it is, or should be - like everything else in life - an individual experience. "Run no more than 2 miles a day" may be a decent guideline for your average woman, but as someone who ran 3 marathons in the year prior to conception, I don't think it's boastful of me to say that when it comes to fitness, I'm not an average woman. I have since read and been told that I could have kept my mileage up to my previous 30 or 40 miles a week, so long as I try to keep my heart rate below 140 (i.e. no racing.) I have certainly had the energy and desire to have done so over the past 3 months. Instead, I followed the paranoid route, and dropped right down to 15 mpw or less. Of course, my ongoing (and worsening) knee problems have been putting the stoppers on the running anyway lately, so in a way it's all worked out ok. I did however pick my swimming up to 2 or 3 miles a week - but hey - we runners know that that's just not the same thing. Of course, swimming will be my saving grace in one or two months' time, when my belly may start to make running uncomfortable. I fully intend to step up the pool work to 4 or 5 miles a week. I want to hit that delivery room as fit as possible. Apparently it's going to be quite hard work in there...

So, this blog is inevitably going to turn into a bit of maternity log. I aplogize for this in advance, but, as this is kinda, obviously, the most-important-by-far thing to ever happen to me in my thirty two years on this planet, there's not much I can do about that. I'll try my best to keep it interesting. But if I lose some readers, I entirely understand. By the way - if anyone out there knows of a running/exercising -while-pregnant websites, or blog communities - I'd be most appreciative of the details.

If you read this recent post of mine, you may wonder now what I was going on about. Well, if you'll notice, I didn't say which year I intend to run New York. I am going to sign up for this November's marathon, but will of course, cancel, so gaining automatic entry into 2007's race. The reason being, it's obviously going to be difficult for me to compete in 9 races this year to gain entry into next year's, and next year it's going to be logistally and financially hard for me to run an out-of-town marathon. Those are all the real reasons I want to run New York as my next big goal. And believe me, I intend to come back strong. Hopefully stronger than ever.

Incidentally, I won this (see left) when I was pregnant. Ok, so I was only one week pregnant, but still. The important thing is, this child was, at that rather early stage, infused with the running - and winning - spirit. Right?! At least that makes the naming of our first child pretty easy. If it's a girl, it will be Paula, and a boy - Paul*. Or is it wrong for me to dream that our unborn child will be grow up to be a world record holding distance runner? ;)


*As in Radcliffe and Tergat...see what I did there?

Fun Packed Weekend

The Cherry Tree 10 Miler on Saturday morning was a lot of fun. Verrrrrrry COLD, but a lot of fun nonetheless. I ran it as a 3-person relay with Andre and Tony, taking the easier option of just 3.3 miles and once around hilly-ish Prospect Park, while my mum, stepdad and a bunch of club mates ran the full 10 miles - three times around.

In spite of the fact that mum approached the race as a relaxed training run, and both my mum and stepdad got off to a delayed start (due the registration point being more than a mile from the starting line!), mum still managed to win her age group by almost 14 minutes and Scott came in a very impressive second place in his age group.

I've never taken part in a relay before. It certainly adds a whole new dimension to racing that I think I like a lot. It was amusing watching the other teams hand off the 'baton' as if they were running an Olympic 1600m relay. Our team, on the other hand, took a more leisurely approach to the whole thing. I definitely want to run a marathon relay-style some time - possibly Philadelphia. I imagine that knowing the others are relying on me would give me extra motivation. And talking about relays, my family and I are heading up to the Track and Field Center at the Armory in northern Manhattan to cheer on an HRR team in their 10,000m relay this Thursday. Should be exciting!

Last night was Hellgate's annual awards night, which, like last year, I found to be the most enjoyable of winter events. It was very fortuitous timing that my family were able to come along too this year, and enjoy an evening of speeches and dancing and running-talk.

Big congrats to all Hellgaters who were recognized for their running and athletic acheivements in 2005 - particularly my buddies Janine who won the 'special athlete' award, and Suzanne who won the absolutely 100% deserved 'Runner of the Year.'

Great Toy

Have you used this tool yet? This definitely qualifies as the coolest website I've seen in a long time. You could waste many an hour playing with this at work. And if you go to Tools-Measure, you will find a running route tool that is infinitely better than Gmaps.

Decisions, Decisions

So I finally decided upon my next 'big goal.' Last October I completed the 12-month hat trick of New York, Boston and Chicago, so I guess it was fair of me to take a little time to regroup and refocus. Well that's my excuse for slacking off on the running and blogging lately, and I'm sticking to it.

New York will be my next marathon. Who knows, that may be the spark off the same three again, in the same order. I really do want to run London at some point, but I suppose I've got my whole life to do that and it will be much more feasible after we've moved back across the pond.

If I am ever to bring that 3:30pr down by a serious number of minutes, I believe strongly that Chicago is the place for me to do it (or else somewhere equally flat with almost guaranteed cool conditions). But that's going to have to wait for a bit. Even though New York is a rough course, I'm looking forward to experiencing the excitement of my home turf again. And there are many other advantages to running New York once more - in order of priority:

• No travel/hotel costs and no travel time involved
• Automatic entry through completing 9 NYRR races last year
• Having dozens and dozens of friends, colleagues and club mates cheering me along the whole length of the route
• Having 20 or 30 Hellgaters - as well as other friends - running the race with me, and enjoying the club's party afterwards
• The local team privilege of a start almost at the very front of the masses
• Being able to train on (virtually) every inch of the course beforehand
• The gob-smackingly gorgeous and thrilling course start on the upper level of the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge.
• The second-worst hill on the course is Queensborough Bridge which lies less than one mile from my apartment. Since I run it in training about 3 or 4 times a week, it doesn't (didn't last time) feel like a hill at all to me.

Yup, I believe I may have just experienced my first (very early) flurry of butterflies just thinking about it.

In other exciting news, my Mum and step dad are coming for their 4th (?) stateside visit next week. Can't WAIT! As luck would have it, I had a number of local races to choose from while they're here, but I've settled on the Cherry Tree 10-Miler. This will give me a chance to show off pretty Prospect Park to them, and to show off my hyper-fit and athletically talented relatives to the PPTC and the natives of Brooklyn. This is a cocky thing to say, but previous results suggest it's more than likely they will be returning to Scotland with yet more New York racing hardware in their suitcase =)

What gives with my knee?

It's time to address the fact that there's something going on with my left knee. It ain't good, but it ain't necessarily all bad either. For a good 3 months now, it has been getting progressively worse. The strange thing is, the lower my weekly mileage has dipped, the sorer it has become.

It's sensitive to the touch. I limp when I go up and down stairs; compensating for the discomfort by transferring most of my weight to my right leg. It's virtually impossible for me to kneel or crawl* without pain.

I feel it acutely when I swim breaststroke in the pool, but not with the crawl or backstroke. When starting out on a run I limp markedly for the first quarter-mile or so, but then - and here's the reason I haven't done a thing about it yet - the discomfort vanishes and never returns. The further I run, the better it feels.

That makes it the total opposite of the ITBS-related left knee problems that have plagued me in the past. My knee would feel fine for a mile or so, then I would be struck down with a crippling shooting pain.

What gives? It doesn't fit the Runner's Knee descriptions I've read, and I know from experience it's not ITBS, so what the heck is it?

I find it kind of amusing that I have not been motivated to do anything about it since it has not impeded my running, even though it has been quite seriously interfering with daily life (I feel like an old lady limping my way up and down hundreds of subway stairs every day for example).

Anyone out there got any ideas? Treatment solutions? You're going to tell me to break out the old ice packs and foam roller aren't you?
Yawn...

*It's surprising how much crawling I need to do in a day

Welcome to the World

Turns out it's not just Rabbie Burns birthday that we will be celebrating on January 25th from now on. The latest addition to our family arrived last Wednesday - our nephew. He even has the middle name of Robert!