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When training doesn't go as planned

Yesterday was my planned long run, 22km on the Guelph Radial trail and the connecting roads. I was really looking forward to my run and I headed out from the house around 9:30 am. I was feeling bgood, reminding myself to keep the run easy and my heart rate in zone 3. It had been a while since I had run the third line to hwy 25 section of the radial trail and I was enjoying the changes that fall s brought. This is a pretty hilly section and I like to use these hills to work on my power hiking which helps keep the run nice and easy. My run went off the rails about 400 metres from where the trail turns and heads out through a field to the highway. Out of nowhere my hear began racing and jumped from zone 2 to zone 6. I immediately stopped running and started walking hoping to slow my pounding racing heart. I have experienced this before, I am never sure if the cause is a panic attack or something related to the electrical signal in my heart. The last couple of weeks have not been easy, I h...
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Some Days are Hard

Thursday was a hard day, Mark and I had the final meeting with Isaac's neuropsychologist to receive the results of Isaac's testing. We have been concerned about Isaac's progress in school since he was in JK, he struggled to attain fundamental skills related to literacy and numeracy despite his efforts. By grade 2 he was significantly behind his peers academically.  Learning disabilities are common diagnoses for kiddos with DMD, the dystrophin that is missing in his muscle cells also plays a role in the brain. We learned during our appointment that Isaac has a learning disability and likely also an expressive language disorder. He has ideas and is capable of being successful in school but because of the learning disability and language disorder he can't express his understanding and knowledge. We see the effects of both of these challenges not only in Isaac's academic progress but also in his frustration level. Imagine not being able to communicate you thoughts and i...
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The Four I Trek For

  My children are a major influence in my running, I run both to model for them a healthy lifestyle that includes being physically active and taking time to care for yourself.  I also run because being a parent is hard and running is an opportunity to escape some of that stress and take time for myself to renew.  I thought I would share a little about each of my children in the next couple of posts (with their permission).  My oldest is Luke, he is 11 and in grade 6, he is my serious child, from a young age he was asking big questions and thinking deeply about the world around him.  At home Luke is quiet and thoughtful, at school he is a bit of a class clown.  Luke's passion is soccer and he has worked hard to play for one of our local rep soccer teams, Norval Croatia.   Luke is a wonderful big brother and excitedly welcomed each of his siblings, when we were expecting our youngest Evelyn Anne, he told his Nana that he loved her already even thoug...
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The Training Plan

My 110 Km FKT attempt is not my first ultramarathon, but it is my farthest, I have found in the past since a running coach is way out of my budget that there are some good free plans on the web. My personal go to site is irunfar.com, I find the training plans feel do able and the site also has lots of great articles related to ultra and trail running. For this run I am using a version of irunfar.com's 100km training plan, but I have adjusted it to reflect all of the other commitments I have and in some cases reduced the mileage required. I find when I struggle to follow a training plan O can get really negative and I am hoping that by building the plan around my life instead bid trying to fit my life into the plan I will have more success. One of the challenges I know I will have because of the timing of the run is the winter running and the likelihood I will be spending time running on the treadmill. I know that both running in the cold and snow and running on the treadmill will b...
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Day 1.... The start of my Big Trek for Isaac

  Today is day one of training for my Fastest Known Time (FKT) on the Thames Valley Trail, in 25 weeks I will be heading out on the 110 km trail with the goal to finish it in under 12 hours ( actually I would really like to finish it in 11 hrs and 30 mins but that feels scary to say out loud). Why am I starting on this very long training cycle to run a pretty long distance? There are several reasons, the one that is most important to me is to do something big in honour of my son Isaac and his trek with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy.  This run and the journey to it, is my opportunity to share the experience and impact of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD).   DMD is a neuromuscular disease that causes all types of muscle cells to be weak and breakdown when used because their cell membrane is missing an important structural protein dystrophin. Over time the muscle is destroyed and cannot be repaired, it is replaced by fat cells and water.  DMD primarily affects boys a...
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