Baby on Board

Henry is 12 weeks old this week, and I am home with him on winter break leading up to the Three Bridges Marathon on Sunday. I'd planned to not really run this week after the race last Sunday, but the winter weather has extended my "season" an additional seven days.

So he and I have started running together. On Wednesday, we made our debut with the BOB running stroller that we got from my mom and grandmother as a baby present. I'd planned to go earlier in the day, but being home with him for the whole day is new to me and it took me a lot longer to get out the door than I'd planned. So I ended up waiting until KC got home and the three of us went down to Riverview together. KC started running first and when we caught up to her, she was working very hard to keep up with us. I suppose being away from him all day made it very hard for her to watch me  literally run away with him in front of her.

Not wanting to deprive a mother of her child, I slowed down and stayed with her. We ran together for a mile and a half before she turned around and I continued on to the end of the trail. It was colder than I thought it would be, so I had to stop and put on a long-sleeve top that I had in his stroller. We finished in the dark and I wasn't able to see his face, but he was silent and I assumed he'd fallen asleep. It was a good first run together.

Running with the stroller is definitely a different experience. One of the things that I think is supposed to be great about the BOB is the front wheel can be fixed or not. I'm told that you're supposed to run with it fixed, but on the flat, curvy trail at Riverview, it would be impossible to run with the wheel fixed. There are too many turns. So I ran with it not fixed. Hopefully all the running mothers that read this post don't join up in public outcry about me doing something unsafe with my child.

Thursday it was definitely too cold all day for him, so I ran in the evening with Charlie.

Friday, we tried again. I sent out an email to RMR about joining me and had two people say they would come. Only one showed up when we met at Riverview at 11:30. So Melissa and I went running for 5 miles with Henry and the stroller. He was fussy when I got to Riverview, but once we started running he was good to go. It was definitely warmer than Wednesday night, and I was happy that I could see him this time the whole time.  It was also nice to get out of the house during the day with him and see another adult human being.

Below are the splits for my two runs with him. I went considerably faster on Friday, but still not very fast at all. Not that I was trying to run fast. It will be interesting to see what it's like when I'm actually trying to put forth an effort and move quickly with him. And it will only get harder as he gets heavier.

Wednesday: 4 miles, 39:08. 10:41, 10:28, 9:04, 8:51. Average 9:46.
Friday: 5 miles, 41:50. 8:58, 8:25, 8:12, 8:08, 8:03. Average 8:22.

I have a long way to go before I'm breaking world records with the baby stroller...