I did this lovely road race on Monday. It’s a two-and-a-half lap closed road circuit around Tallaght village and the TUD campus. Nice and flat. I decided to have a go at a fast one and should have started nearer the front to avoid the traffic. But even with that, I finished in:
21:24
That’s my fastest 5k time in three years so I was very happy. Plus they had a great spread of sandwiches and cakes the for the runners after.
We stopped here for some dinner. I was expecting it to be quiet given it was winter in Wicklow. But no, it was rammed as what looked like a coachful of old people marched in. We ended up sitting in the doorway. It looks lovely and airy in the photos but I wouldn’t say this matched the decor in real life. The food was edible. Alas for them, their lamb dinner had to compete with the leg of lamb I was cooked Elina for her tea. My burger came in a bowl. The staff were friendly.
The graveyard was not a metaphor for getting older. Instead, it was a lovely walk around Glendalough. It was beautiful and, importantly, there wer much fewer biting insects than in June.
I wanted to push myself on distance, so I allocated last Sunday as my all-day long run. I was out for seven hours, of which six hours was moving time, and covered 53 km. I had some junk food for lunch, thinking real food would settle my stomach instead of just bars and gels but it just made me feel anxious. I kept going though and was happy with the job. I think this is the longest training run I’ve done that wasn’t an event.
For Elina’s birthday this year, we headed into town for some food followed by a trip to the archaeology museum. Once we were home, Venla helped me decorate the house. And of course, a caterpillar was sacrificed on the alter of cake.
It’s been an exciting time to be running Marlay recently. First, Paul Sinton-Hewitt (parkrun’s founder) made a guest appearance a few weeks ago. A got a five-high and a handshake. Then last weekend, they celebrated their 500th event. I wasn’t in photo and there wasn’t cake but that’s understandable given they would have had 688 runners plus volunteers to feed.
Last weekend, Trinity hosted the Neurodiversity Intervarsity Conference conference.
UCD are doing some great work with body doubling, which is where you pair up with someone to help you focus. There is some great work going on with inclusive design at TCD, as well. And a talk neurodivergent bodies looking at the way neurodivergent individuals interact with their environment. Adam Harris gave the keynote speech and it is always a pleasure to hear him talk.
Wouldn’t say it was the best year. The Eagles took care of The Chiefs easily so no historic three-in-a-row after all. Why couldn’t thir offensive line have collapsed last year when they were playing the 49ers?
Also, I really scaled down the amount of food I made and still ate too much.
It’s been five years since I completed my yoga teacher training and it has been a brilliant journey. While I have enjoyed teaching a lot of the asana classes we would be familiar with in the UK, a lot of my teaching has focused on pratyhata, dharana and dyhana and allowed me to bring in a lot of my mindfulness work and that has been fantastic.
In many cases, such as my Yoga for Resilience workshops, we’ve combined multiple aspects of yoga to produce a well-rounded course and I feel that this has been when I’ve done my most impactful teaching.
I’m excited to announce I now have sufficient teaching hours to reach the E-RYT designation, which stands for Experienced Registered Yoga Teacher.
Alongside this, Holbeck College is now a Yoga Alliance Continuing Education Provider. Later this year, we will be rolling out some Yoga Alliance certified CPD courses.
