Spring Running Thread

[OakLeaf]

Ugh, RnR. I don't do well with pills on a less-than-full stomach either. Running, even racing after that? Yikes. Your crossing the finish line though reminded me of the fourth of July five-miler year before last. The finish line volunteer asked me my age twice as I'm trying not to puke, and I finally flashed a full hand twice, for "5-5"

So, update from the ankle adventures: the LMT released some stuff in the tibialis anterior, the chiropractor released some stuff in the big toe flexors. I kept a brace on it to ride to the farmers' market yesterday, did a little yoga and took the rest of the day off. I forgot to ask the chiropractor what kind of taping he'd recommend, and I honestly had a hard time deciding whether it was better to tape to inhibit muscles or to activate them. In the end I taped the tibialis anterior with my foot in hard dorsiflexion and the tape wrapped around the bottom of my foot to the lateral side, with shorter pieces of tape in an "X" pattern directly over the swelling (which there was still a little this morning). I did 12 miles easy pace and bailed when it started feeling a little loose (not painful). If I'd been healthy it would've been my second 20-miler of the cycle - still, in his training plans, Jack Daniels recommends not going over 2-1/2 hours no matter how slow you are, so from that point of view I would've only been doing 15 miles today. Some alternating heat/cold and then some electrical stimulation afterward, and it feels pretty much okay. Fingers crossed.

[Catrin]

Hope things continue to feel better Oakleaf & RnR!

While I am decidedly not in the running world, I'm always interested and amazed to read of your adventures here. Even before my fall and eventual knee surgery running didn't come easy to me - though I was easing my way into trail running. I'm just plain amazed at the very idea of "only" running 15 miles, let alone more!

[rocknrollgirl]

Hey Oak, we all have our fingers crossed for you. I hope your ankle is improving daily.

I am still battling an angry belly. I think it is from my spring allergies. I get this at some point every spring, nausea and upset stomach from post nasal drip. So gross. The upset stomach boarders on being debilitating. It makes for very unpleasant running. Heck it makes for very unpleasant everything. All I want to do is eat crackers and drink tea, Yuk.

[OakLeaf]

I'd known for a while that nausea outside of my workouts is often a sign of not enough sodium leading to dehydration. But I've just recently read that GI distress *during* a workout can more often than not be because of dehydration, and it makes perfect sense - if I'm only marginally hydrated going into a workout, then I'm only going to get more dehydrated as it goes on, especially when it's hotter and/or tougher. Might be an issue for you too with the weather getting warmer. Ever since my bout with dehydration over the winter, I've been careful to slam a full water bottle with an electrolyte tablet before any hard workout, and it's really helped.

So, last week the small college pool where I deep-water run was closed for spring break, but I got in there Monday and Tuesday, did a partial land workout Wednesday and felt pretty much okay. The ankle is still a little puffy but not painful, the other Achilles is worrisome but improving as I really focus on getting my glutes to fire. Haven't decided yet whether to drive back up to the pool again today or try a lap of the bridges. Day by day.

[rocknrollgirl]

Oak,
How much longer until the race? Three weeks or so? When would you normally start your taper?

We drove north today to get some bigger hills. We have not made the trip since Dec, right before the great hamstring debacle of 2016. I was a bit worried given my barfy status last w/e and the state of my quads this week post race, so I took an extra recovery day.

There really is no easy way to start your trail run at this park, it is either up and to the right, or up and to the left. So we opted today to start at a neighboring park and run those trails and then a short road stretch and then into our intended destination. That way we had a bit more of a warm up and some extra mileage.

We got in 11 miles total, and about 1200 feet of climbing, so mission accomplished. My goal today was to just run easy, walk the big climbs and pace myself. At about 2 miles in my legs said, no thanks, we do not want to do this today and my stomach felt gross. So I kept it to a trudge. About 1/2 way through my stomach settled. No help for the quads, they hurt on all the downhills and made my knees barky. But I blocked it all out and got through. And here is the crazy thing. I walked all the big hills and felt awful for 9 of 11 miles and my pace was the same as the last time I ran there, when we only ran 8 miles, I felt great and ran all of the hills.

Go figure. There is something to be said for trudging. So I will draw on this day when things get tough at North Face, cuz it was not fun today. Today put the work in workout. But I did meet lots of nice folks out with their canine friends and saw some mt bike folks that I know, so that was fun.

[OakLeaf]

Yep, three weeks from today. Lots of non-running stuff has to happen between now and then too ... Your race is the end of the month?

Mine was pretty much of a trudge yesterday too, but I got it done without aggravating anything. Besides the injuries it was super hot and humid, which it seems like I've been complaining about all winter, but it hasn't been consistent, so I'm still not even close to acclimated to 80° and 80% humidity. I only did four miles at goal pace (which honestly, my time goal is pretty much out the window at this point), even took a couple of walk breaks, but got all 17 miles done. The ankle was kind of twingey, especially going around corners - that's one good thing about Boston being a more or less straight line point-to-point course - but it doesn't feel any worse this morning. The other Achilles I'm just trying to be as careful with as I can. Day by day.

[rocknrollgirl]

Two hours of trail running today, in the rain. I had a tough time convincing my husband on the way to the park that it was going to be AWESOME! But, once you are soaking wet, you can't get any wetter.

Actually on the way over we reminisced about all of the mountain bike races we have done in pouring rain/sleet/snow/hub deep mud. The last one of those was the last time. we had over 500 dollars in repairs to our bikes! Today, I just had wet gear.