Forty is the New Eighty

It may have been 40 that I turned last week, but I'm hobbling around like an 80 year old today.

The marathon was actually fantastic. We went out faster than planned, buoyed by the crowd of runners, the excitement of the event, and the freshness of our well-rested legs. We held the pace well through about 30 km and at that point a sub 3:50 seemed possible. But the legs tired and I just couldn't get them to turn over quickly over the final 12km. So we lost a little time off that optimistic pace, but still finished in 3:52, well under our goal time of 4 hours. I won't be bounding up and down stairs for a few days, and I think my left shin is requesting a couple of weeks off, but otherwise I'm feeling excited about the whole experience. Not quite as excited as Kate, who spent last night trying to decide which fall marathon "we" should aim for next. And tonight studying how much more training we need to do in order to drop our time significantly. So much for my one-off, turning-40 resolution. I, of all people, should have known better than to feed the beast that is my wife's obsession-craving personality.

Kudos to my parents for taking the three monsters/monkeys in their hotel room the night before the marathon, and then keeping them busy and happy at the finish line despite the abysmal weather (cold, rainy and windy). I couldn't have had a better birthday weekend (although the next time I turn 40 I think I'll run the marathon before the big day so I'll be free to consume a few beers to celebrate). Our weekend in Toronto included a visit to the Botanical Gardens with Joanna and Benjamin, watching Sean follow in his mother's footsteps with an amazing series of performances at his swim meet, a party at the Wedge's, lunch with my whole family plus Greg and Benjamin, a pre-race night with my sweetheart spent romantically discussing fuelling and pacing strategies, and a great marathon.

We're hosting a birthday party here on Thursday evening - some extraordinary number of adults and kids are expected, so we're really hoping the weather warms up by then. Since our return home last night, the waves have not stopped crashing, soaking 4 or 5 feet of our lawn with every wave. Not exactly outdoor bbq weather. The twins won't put up with much more celebrating of my birthday anyway. They're ready to start with theirs, which doesn't actually occur for another six weeks.