Kicking Ass At Sea Level, With A Cold

Sung to the tune of Bachman-Turner Overdrive’s Taking Care of Business

I slept until noon today. I was tired from the week and have had a head cold since Wednesday. I’ve been hanging around with people who keep saying things like “I’ve got a cold I can’t shake, but I’m not contagious.” Bullshit – one of you was contagious. But it doesn’t matter – as long as it’s a head cold and not in my chest I can run.

I’m in Boston for two weeks (with a few days in New York in the middle). I lived here for a dozen years between 1983 and 1995 and ran hundreds of bridge loops. One of my favorite places in the world to run is around the Charles River. So that’s where I went today on day 1 of a double long run weekend (two long runs that are exactly the same – one on Saturday and one on Sunday).

I totally kicked ass. RunKeeper crapped out after about 5.5 miles so I had to manually enter the course. I’m going to guess that 10 miles is right – my Fitbit shows 9.51 and other than walking across the street for a cup of coffee and some oatmeal I’ve been sitting in my room at my desk since I woke up.

I used an 8:2 run:walk pattern, which means I walked for two minutes every 10 minutes. This makes the 10 minute miles even more significant as I was probably averaging a 9 minute pace as I was running. I felt great, other than the steady stream of snot dripping out of my nose.

I’m going out to dinner with friends and then going to bed early. We’ll give it another shot tomorrow – exactly the same course – and see how I do. In the mean time, I’ve very pleased with myself right now.