Recurring Side Stitch

Hey ladies! I am doing an olympic triathlon this weekend and aside from this eentsy beentsy problem, I am really excited!

Basically I have been running 8-10 times since my cross country bike ride finished in early august. At first, I found running to be really easy-- it took me no time at all to build up to the mileage for the tri. One day I ran 5 miles and I got a side stitch on my right side almost immediately, but I decided to power through it, running all 5 miles with that stitch. The next time I ran, I got the same stitch and decided to chill out. Then I managed to get sick for a week so I stopped running all together.

Today I got back on my feet again and got that same right side stitch. I don't know what the deal is! I don't think I'm doing anything differently than I was before. I try to breathe through it and relax the stitch, but I'm having difficulty doing that. I was well-hydrated and hadn't eaten recently

I am wondering if it could possibly be my shoes. I only ever had problems with side stitches before if I had eaten too recently. And these shoes are still really new to me. I didn't used to have problems with this when I ran on my Pearl Izumi Float II

Thoughts?

My weird and completely unscientific theory on side stitches that occur when you first start running (not like beginning of an individual run, but early in getting into the habit of running) have something to do with the fact that the tissue that holds all of your organs in place isn't initially strong enough to deal with all of the bouncing. No idea if that's really possible or true, but I have LOTS of side stitches every time I re-learn how to run and they diminish over time, though they occur more often running downhill.

Belly breathing is supposed to help and can at least reduce it enough that I can keep going. Slowing down and smoothing out my stride helps a little, too. But I don't know how to make them go away entirely - they've always just sort of done that on their own as running becomes more regular and my body adapts to it.

deep rhythmic breathing really helps me when these occur. On the tandem I used to just copy my husband's breathing and it just went away.

Oh, belly breathing! I forgot about that.

You could be on to something Jess with the beginning running again thing... although it wasn't happening until I really upped the mileage. Now it just seems kind of immediate. This morning it set in after a mile (less immediate)