A Curious Milestone

Up at cockcrow this morning for my long run - this club athletics involvement is playing havoc with my diurnal rhythms. Anyhow, on with the Garmin and iPod and off down the river on a mizzly morning. And hey bridge-watchers - the Samuel Beckett has been swung across the river to the north bank and Spencer Dock. It seems to fit and it must be the first time the engineer that drew up the plans has slept peacefully in two or three years. What if had been half a metre short of reaching across? It is not scheduled to open until next year. Presumably they need to test it to make sure that the fecking thing doesn't collapse into the Liffey, taking all and sundry with it, on its first day of operation.

Plodding along I decided to carry on along Pigeon House Road - where I would normally turn up Sean Moore Road, to seek out the way to Poolbeg. Only to come up against a dead end at the end of the industrial estate there. But hanging a left down between a couple of industrial units brought me out onto Sandymount Beach. And once again I chose the sand to run along being in a very slow mode. On through the DART level crossing, through Booterstown and onto the end of Blackrock Park where I turned again for home. I'm running extremely conservatively at present, very much in base miles style as I seek to find some semblance of form. For me of course speed is very much secondary though, like anyone else, I am keen to record a respectable time when it comes to racing.

On the way home I stopped to examine a real, old-tyme milestone. I must have run past it fifty times without really noticing it. It must be pretty much near its original spot as it shows the figure 4 on one side (to Dublin) but the 3 on the other side had me puzzled. It is three miles from there to Dun Laoghaire but whatever the worn letters said it wasn't that town. It was only hours later that I realised it must be in fact Kingstown, the old, British name for the port of Dun Laoghaire. D'oh!

So there we were - 10.88 miles in a shade under two hours. 22.9 on the week. Maybe I need a Half later in the year to work towards to persuade me to up my game a bit. But at least I'm sorta enjoying my running again.