Tag: Achilles

2019 week four

Book Read
4. The Third Hotel – Laura van den Berg

Kilometres Ran
week four – 30.1

To Date: 158 KM

This was a case of seeing this cover on a whole bunch of best of lists or best selling lists or some such case of Baader-Meinhof phenomenon so I picked up a copy and read it and oh boy ghosts again? That or Van den Berg’s protagonist Clair had her own BMPh for her recently-deceased husband but then they do it. Like do it do it. Like what Amethyst Realm claims to have done 20-something times IRL before settling down with one lucky spook. Except Clair is monogamous and I don’t know why I seem to be fixated on spectral sex right now either because this is a pretty great novel. Although rather surreal and I think I got lost a couple times following Clair following her dead husband around Havana, Cuba. (And re-tickled my travel itch.) This book seems rather polarizing, with people either loving it or really not. One thing everyone seems to agree on is that it is a weird work, extremely well written. And I agree. I think that once some of the best-of sheen wears off a bit The Third Hotel is going to get a lot of positive, non-popular attention. So watch for it in your kid’s kid’s Lit class assuming universities still have Humanities then.

So to recap, at the beginning of this year I set a goal to run a race per month and then I hurt my achilles and went to my physiotherapist who said “no running farther than 5K,” which meant no Icebreaker 8K race, which meant no January race, which meant my 2019 goal was, well, what Amethyst Realm would call “ghosted.” Then, in what can only be described as my own case of the BMPh I stumbled across the Try Events Chilly Chase, which featured a 5K distances. Armed with this new information I went to physio and asked for permission, and permission was granted. Hurray! Another goal for 2019 is to run a sub-20 minute 5K and I thought that, although I’m injured and not in optimal shape and currently my nose runs faster than I do, with a good day I had a chance. The race left the community centre in Olympic Village and followed the Seawall around Science World to David Lam Park, and then back. The 5K left at about 9:15 a.m. following staggered starts for the Half Marathon, 15K and 10K distances. I had a great start but quickly caught up to the slower 10K-ers whom it seemed had never been told to please not run six abreast, let alone stay to the right. So there was a lot of pylon dodging for the first two and a half kilometres. (Coming back was better.) I turned on my watch to record the run and then didn’t look at it until I crossed the finish line and turned it off to see it display 5.04 in 20:13. I didn’t sub 20 but I ran a new personal best in 20:09 official time, good enough for fourth place overall, and my best finish yet.

I wonder if I would have had just a bit more to give over the last kilometre if I’d checked my watch and seen how close I was to 19:59 and I’ve spent a lot of today thinking about it and I really don’t know the answer. What I do know is that sub-20 is well within my reach when I get my next chance at the WestVanRun 5K in March. I’m excited already.

2019 week three

Book Read
3. How Does A Single Blade of Grass Thank the Sun? – Doretta Lau

Kilometres Ran
week three – 21.6

To date – 128 KM

I’ve written in the past my contemplations around whether you have to read every single short story in a short story collection in order to have “read the book” and I wonder if there’s a percentage, like at least 60 per cent or something but it doesn’t really matter because I read every single word of this Doretta Lau collection and loved it, which only made me wonder what the hell took me so long to get around to reading it. But then she drops a Landy / Bannister reference that if I’d read back in 2014 when the book came out I probably never would have gotten and it only made me love it more.

A taped up achilles to go with my first race bib of 2019.

Today was the first race of the year and the first race of my 2019 goal to run one race per month. I took it pretty easy this week, only running an 8 KM trial from the Stanley Park Seawall marker 0 KM to 8 KM (clever) with a few kilometres warm up and jog home. Then Friday morning I went to my physiotherapy appointment to check on my aggravated achilles and was told that racing today was not recommended, that I should stick to no farther than 5 KM and no hills but more frequently but I sort of stopped listening after no Icebreaker 8K race. I had been researching cycle trainers and thought that with the news Friday I might as well set up my bicycle to pedal to nowhere so I bought a gently use CycleOps Fluid2 off Craigslist for a deal and I still have a lot to learn because of course it didn’t include the adapter not that it matters since my Specialized Diverge has thru-axel mounts and not quick-release so I found an adapter online and ordered it and it might arrive by next Monday. No, not tomorrow, the other next Monday. The race that I care about, the First Half, runs three weeks from today. I’m not going to get much training on my feet but I’m hoping that if I mix in some time on the bike this year’s race won’t be as disappointing as last year’s. I’ve all but written off setting a new personal best – that would take a miracle (of which there’s no such thing). I only hope that I’ll get to race. It’s been a depressing couple days.

2019 week two

Book Read
2. Sodom Road Exit – Amber Dawn

Kilometres Ran
week two – 26.1

To Date – 106 KM

Named one the Globe and Mail 100 favourite books of 2018 (I’ll take their word for it; the article is behind the G&M paywall), Sodom Road Exit tells the story of Starla returning to her home town and is haunted by her past and also haunted by the town’s past. I picked up a copy last summer and it sat in my to-read pile and then towards the end of the year we went to the Real Vancouver Writer’s Series event and Dawn read the opening few pages and I was hooked though there’s nothing about ghosts in the first few pages so imagine my surprise when the novel took a turn towards parapsychology. Should I have known? Who cares? Starla is no ordinary character, which you learn quite quickly as she breaks just about every horror story rule and survives. I really liked this book.

The Nation Run 2019
The Nation Run 2019. Photo via Vancouver Running Co. Instagram.

Last week I wrote about not getting injured in 2019 and then I woke up Monday morning and went to the office and my achilles was ah-killing me and then in the afternoon with it still aching I pulled off my sock to apply some Voltaren and my ankle was a ballon so I called my physiotherapist. I don’t make resolutions but if I did my resolution to not see my physiotherapist in 2019 lasted seven days. Turns out I have developed tendinopathy in my achilles and I have no idea how or why but I took the rest of the week off and then went out Saturday for the third-annual The Nation Run hosted by Vancouver Running Co.

I figured that I’d see how things felt and decide on-the-run whether to do the 10 or 15 KM options and at 9 everything felt fine and then at about 11.5 I thought to myself, “Ah crap that was dumb.” The event was pretty great with a great weather and a big, friendly crowd. But now I’m spending Sunday evening alternating an icepack and hot-pack on my achilles and wondering about the Icebreaker 8K I’m registered to race in seven days.