3 weeks down! Beginning to feel like its coming together a little bit. This week is supposed to be a down week, but I'm struggling to define what that means. When you run so little and so slowly, do you really NEED a significant down week? I'm feeling like my body can deal with the PT and the core strengthening a lot better now than when I started, which makes it feel like the load is less already.
On the other hand, there's been the unfortunate incident of the bottle falling squarely onto my bad toe. Its very disconcerting because there's a lot of bruised sore feeling in that area now, and I can't tell the pain from the blunt trauma apart from the pain from potentially having screwed up the original trouble spot again. So the current plan is, one "long run" and then a full week of the ~35 minute runs only, hopefully to let this heal and be in good shape to start the next training cycle.
Sunday 12/02: 44:59, Monterrey to second bridge loop. Nice and easy, felt like I've finally crossed over into a fitness level where I can run with a natural, smooth stride and still keep a low HR. vs. in last week's experiment, it felt like in order to keep the HR low, I had to change my stride to an uncomfortably glacial shuffle. Still really slow, but I realized on this run that I'm starting to feel a little bit of the joy of running again. It's gotten to the point where I don't have to concentrate so hard to keep my anti-foot hurting form, and running feels easy enough that my mind can wander into that transcendentally liberating brainspace where you can think about everything and nothing and for the time being you're outside of your life and all of its limitations.
Monday 12/03: Off. Diddly-squat.
Tuesday 12/04: 35:54, Monterrey to rock. Forgot to do PT yesterday, feet felt bad in the morning. Okay during the run though, boy is it nice to wear shoes that are not 3 years old. Starting to get this sore heel thing that often happens to me when my shoes start to accumulate miles... thought the whole trails only thing would extend the lifespan, but apparently not.
I think the meaning of this off week is that I'm logging some really truly low HR training, and I'm not going to stress about it being slow(er). I'm a bit worried about the toe/bottle situation and I'd really like all of the tweaks to be under control before I make an attempt on the elusive 4 training hours per week mark. Core strengthening in the PM.
Wednesday 12/05: 35:13, California to RB. Like 10 pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag. Some runs are just not enjoyable... Felt dehydrated in the morning, but was late, so didn't drink water. Uncomfortably sunny/warm, weird upper abdominal cramps made it hard to take deep breaths. Sharp pain in L ankle, but figured out halfway through what I was doing wrong that kept tweaking it... form gets sloppy when I feel crappy. A bad morning on many accounts... but fortunately the day did improve.
Thursday 12/06: 35:02, Monterrey to rock. A good run. Felt happy again, like a damn manic depressive. How well the run goes basically colors how I view my training future, my life, world politics, global warming... etc. Really need to get the emotions under control. A few little tweaks in the L ankle/achilles, a tiny bit concerned, but will just monitor for now. Core strengthening in the PM. Still more taxing than I would like, but it IS having a very pleasing effect on my progress towards the quest for the Butt Dimple!
Friday 12/07: 33:39, California to RB, a.k.a. the how far will you go to avoid that mud puddle?adventure. My answer: As far as necessary (without breaking stride). Wet shoes are among the top 5 catastrophes that typically happen on a run, so I make absolute sure to avoid this as much as possible. Felt really good and steady, despite it being a post-core strengthening day. Ran in the afternoon to avoid the rain, then holiday party with Peter at Dodger Stadium. Got screwed over for the batting cage, but ate some delicious mini red velvet cakes... yum!
Saturday 12/08: 34:46, Monterrey to rock. Still a lot of puddles, argh... but pleasant and sunny to round out a mostly positive down week. Felt a bit queasy from donuts and cashews eaten for breakfast... but a solid run anyways. Most of the aches and pains have resolved themselves, but the bad toe feels sore in a new way, which is a little bit consterning... will have to monitor that heading into next week. Felt like this week's training load was not taxing, which is encouraging because it was more minutes than I had expected.
Target Training: TBD - supposed to be a down week. Not sure how to define that.
Actual Training: 3:39:33
5 comments:
I think you should just feel focused on not being stressed or obligated to do anything this week. I like to think that down weeks are pretty relaxed psychologically, and that you should finish a down week feeling a little itchy.
can you eat non-hippy food now?
markkimarkkonnen, non hippy food is the only kind i can eat... since hippy foods probably have a high incidence of soy.
but yes, i'm off the super restricted diet. yay, breads, pastas and sugars, here i come.
k-way, not stressed is harder i think in the perpetual gimp state, cuz i just don't trust my body to hold up on any given day--its like every day is an adventure, bc its really unpredictable how things will turn out. i could have a great pain free run that's 45 minutes, or i could have a run that goes south after 25 minutes... and there's only so much cause and effect i can superimpose. plus fitness comes so slowly on 30-40 min/day so its like i'm still at that stage where sometimes i feel really good, and then i'll just feel crappy for no reason.
Megumi, I know exactly what you're talking about. It's sort of what I've been like ever since the injury. Even with running going well the last few months I guess, it's always been "well, I hope I can do a longer run on Sunday if my body holds up."
When I got my Newton Running shoes, well, when I ordered them, I thought "it's gonna be great to try if I'm not injured by then." As it so happened, my achilles sort of flared up, so the most I've run in them is about 50 meters.
I've been on the stationary the gym for about five days now. I'll give running a shot tomorrow.
Good luck on your down week. I know sometimes trying to not stress can sort of be stress inducing itself.
K-way, good luck with the run and update your blog!!!
Is it too cold to ride outside already? yikes... yeah the tendon things it really doesn't help for it to be cold.
Lets hope that some day it goes back to the state where re-injury isn't a daily stressor.
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