Weddingbee boards

I was actually in almost this exact situation with my dad while ttc.  I still ran, but trained for shorter or less intense events.  I told my dad a few 'excuses' over the timeframe....1- that I wanted to focus on getting my time down, so I wanted to run shorter races, and 2- that I was having some knee trouble, and needed to not push myself too hard (could add doctors orders here too).  Good luck!

I'll chime in on the "will running affect your ability to concieve" angle.  I'm unfortunately way too familiar with this topic, and the bottom line is that everyone is different.  Some women can get pregnant during intense training (and continue marathoning while pregnant), and some women won't and finally will conceieve if they reduce or stop training.  There are conditions affecting ttc (think pcos) that are helped by exercise, and there are conditions that are exacerbated by intense exercise (think low progesterone, and yes, delayed O).  Ultimately every woman has to decide for herself, and do some trial and error, if it's taking longer than expected to conceive. 

For me, I trained fairly hard the first maybe 4 months of ttc, and then gradually reduced my effort as ttc was taking longer and longer.  My logical bottom line was that I wanted to exercise to a level that maintained my health, but not that stressed my body.  I wanted my body to feel that it had all the resources necessary to create and sustain a healthy pregnancy.

I highly recommend browsing the Runner's World Women's Forums, as there are a lot of threads over there on such topics.  Good luck TTC!

@Running Elley:  When we started ttc, I was training for half marathons (around 9 mm pace, not fast, but not slow), running 3-6 miles or doing step classes most days, and doing long runs of about 10 mi on the weekends.  I really enjoyed it and was in probably the best shape of my life.  When it was taking longer, I stopped running longer distances, and kept it to 5-10k distances, and reducing my number of days, but still racing.  Once we started with the RE, the first thing she pinpointed was my low prog and immediately asked if I was a runner.  She just told me to keep it in moderation, as obviously it's not good to be a couch potato either.  But it kind of stuck with me, so I used it as motivation to alternate running and brisk walking, about 4 days per week.  When we moved on to IVF, I found studies that showed that limiting cardio increased success, so I completely stopped running, and just tried to go for a brisk walk almost every day.  It's a huge difference from where I started, and I gained a few pounds, but even now that I'm pregnant, my docs still comment that I must be a runner because of my low pulse and bp, so I think the benefits of my previous fitness haven't dissapeared (and I hope to get back to running eventually).

Why don't you just say "We are hoping to be pregnant by October and I don't want to commit to a race if I don't know if it will be a healthy thing to do." You don't have to say anything about sex haha. Short and sweet and he'll get over it. Most likely he'll be thrilled that you're trying and won't want to do anything to get in the way of your success. I know what you mean though, telling my dad I'm pregnant was hard, but he was happy. He knows what it's like to be young and starting a family so it's actually been nice to have him to talk about it with.