from Diary of a “Rubbish Marathon Runner” I guess it was only a matter of time. About a week ago I noticed that Maia and me were the only healthy members in the household. Over the weekend, Maia joined to other side and on Wednesday it was finally my turn. I did notice a sore throat on Tuesday evening, “uh-oh”, and the suspicions were realised during a rather bad night. Now I know why Maia was screaming hysterically, though I managed to keep my self in somewhat better control. Niamh tried to talk me out of running in the morning which was a completely wasted effort because running was the last thing on my mind. I stayed home from work, and I fact slept almost the entire morning, and still rested some more in the afternoon. On Thursday I WOULD have stayed at home had this been a normal working day, but it was the second day of a 3 day-seminar (each day a week apart) which I really did not want to miss. I got through it by taking a couple of ibuprofen every few hours, something I usually abhor. It was the same every time, the pills would take about an hour to really kick in, then I would feel almost ok for 2 or three hours, and then the downfall came until the next dose kicked in.
Today I’m just staying home again, recuperating. So far I haven’t run for 3 days and I’m pretty sure my lay-off will be longer than that. The mere fact that I really do NOT want to go running at the moment speaks volumes about how I feel. I will see how long I’m out of commission for, and then re-evaluate the rest of my training.
On the plus side I much rather have this happen to me now than in April. A few days off now won’t have much effect, and maybe the enforced rest will be good for my legs. I’m a bit worried about the duration of this illness, because all the kids were still coughing for quite some time after the first outbreak. Out of curiosity, I measured my resting HR this morning. My lowest ever reading was 38, before the Dublin marathon. Around Christmas it was 41, and the last two weeks it was 43 (probably a sign that I was already fighting off some infection). Today it was 69 – quite some jump, don’t you think? Not that I needed the number to confirm my decision to rest, I was merely curious.
One more plus, I finally found the time to cobble together some bits of Maia videos that have been on my hard drive for a bit. Don’t expect a masterpiece, but I like it anyway.
