Christmas Eve 2008

Since tomorrow is Christmas, I suppose I should say something about that, and not just talk about running. Christmas really is one of my favorite holidays. Two of my daughters have recently started going to Fellowship Bible Church, and we are going to their candlelight service tonight. Afterward, we will come back home and open gifts and sing Christmas carols. I like Christmas carols. One of my favorite is Hark, the Herald Angels Sing. The whole idea of the everlasting Lord veiling himself in human flesh and dwelling with us to bring light and life and to reconcile us to him is truly amazing!

Veiled in flesh the Godhead see:
hail, the incarnate Deity,
pleased as man with man to dwell,
Jesus, our Emmanuel.

Three of my daughters are working tomorrow - two at hospitals, and one at the Laura Dester shelter. It is important work, but I will miss them on Christmas. Maybe Marilyn and Sarah and I will visit them during the day. I also have plans to get a run in during the day. I haven't decided yet, but I have at least two options. One is to run 10 miles with a group of guys from church at 5:30 in the morning. The other is to run with a group from RunnersWorld at 11:00. Maybe I will do both.

Since last week's blog post I have had three pretty good runs. Thursday was the Marvellite Run with the Tulsa Running Club. I had a lot of fun. Here is a picture of Patty and me. I'm the one with the Rudolph nose. If you saw it, you would even say it glowed - it blinked, actually. Then on Saturday, the RunnersWorld group did an eight mile run. Supposed to be slower than marathon pace, but we were trying to keep up with Hailey. Had we known that she was going to turn back early, maybe we would have let her go on ahead. Ended up running something like an 8:15 pace, and I think the pace was faster on the way back - thanks to Larry. Aaron did much better this week and ran really strong at the end.

Yesterday I ran four miles at noon. It apparently had rained earlier because the streets were damp, and it was really windy. Almost nobody was out on the streets in and around downtown. I had a good run. My left knee, which has been bothering me quite a bit lately, felt much better during this run. I ran what felt like an easy pace, and it turned out to be just under 8:30 per mile.

On Saturday the 29th, the RunnersWorld advanced marathon training group will be doing a 9 mile route. I hope to keep the pace at around 9 minutes per mile or perhaps a little slower.

By the way, in case some of you in the advanced group are wondering why we are doing 9 miles when the schedule says 8, here is the reason. We are pondering a change in the schedule that will give a three week taper instead of the two week taper that is in the current schedule. If we implement the change, this is what our long runs will be:

27-Dec: 9 miles
3-Jan: 10 miles
10-Jan: 12 miles
17-Jan: 10 miles
24-Jan: 14 miles
31-Jan: 9 miles
7-Feb: 16 miles
14-Feb: 10 miles
21-Feb: 18 miles
28-Feb: 11 miles
7-Mar: 20 miles
14-Mar: 11 miles
21-Mar: 22 miles
28-Mar: 12 miles
4-Apr: 24 miles
11-Apr: 12 miles
18-Apr: 8 miles