Variation on a theme

Capital Crescent for lunch again. Today I ran north instead of south
thinking I might have a downhill finish on the return leg. Turns out
the trail is downhill that way too. Guess I'm at the top if a hill
here in Bethesda. Nostalgic fall colors. Thinking I might try the
lunch thing a few times a week on a regular basis. Nice way to break
up the day. Plus the uphill bike ride to work doesn't seem so steep
when I haven't run out the legs. About 4 in 32.

Lunch Break

Snuck out of the office this afternoon for a quick trip down the Capital Crescent. I'm really getting to like this trail, although there's not much to it. Just a straight line through the woods all the way down to the Potomac. I haven't been timing or mapping my runs lately, but there are mile markers here and I'm guessing it was about 4.5. Trail runs downhill to the south, and I ended up moving at a decent clip until I turned around. Huffing and puffing on the way back up.

Just Coasting

Haven't been doing much blogging lately, which reflects a dearth of any serious running in the past few weeks. I've also been very busy, so that's an excuse for both shortcomings I suppose.

The title of this post was originally going to be "Coming to Terms," but that sounded too somber, which I don't really feel. What did I think I'm coming to terms with?

Well, for starters, the flare up I'd had in the arch of my right foot got worse before it got better, and it took almost a week of no running before I was willing to get back on the roads. Not sure what came first, but some minor heel pain has also developed, mostly in the mornings upon getting out of bed. All signs point to plantar fasciitis, which I guess I've had the good fortune to inherit from my dad (and his dad as well). Since then, it's been short and mostly slower runs while things calm down. Nightly soaks with epsom salt really seem to help loosen things up, and symptoms are improving, albeit slowly.

More serious though, is a recurrence of groin and low ab symptoms. By serious I don't mean that it's keeping me from running, but more that I've decided to take more aggressive measures in getting it treated. Next week I have a follow-up consultation with a surgeon I saw in February for the same issues. Back then he recommended surgery, but encouraged me to give physical therapy an honest try. I did, and things improved for a while, but now I'm back to feeling like I did 9 months ago. Chances are if I go to him complaining of ongoing problems, he'll advise similarly to when I first saw him. So I'm thinking I'll have this done sometime next month. It's supposedly a minor procedure as far as surgeries go, but it'll still keep me from doing any serious running for a good couple months.

This weekend was good as far as running goes though. I flew to Duluth on Friday night to visit my grandmother (who is very ill) and met the rest of my family at a local hotel. Yesterday morning, I ran on an oldschool treadmill next to my dad as he did the same. We haven't run together in years, mostly because of some foot and ankle issues he's got (can you tell we're related?). We both needed the stress relief. The run wasn't anything long or fast, but the company was well worth the effort.

Today, back on the east coast, I took off from my office along the Capital Crescent trail. I headed southeast into peach-colored clouds at sunset, and found myself running the return leg in the dark. This prompted me to pick the pace up slightly, and I got into a pretty good rhythm. My feet didn't protest too much, and they're feeling fine now.

So for now it looks like I'll keep up the easy stuff until I'm forced to stop after the operation next month. I'm hoping by maintaining some semblance of shape I can improve my chances of successful healing. Surgery's definitely not something I'm looking forward to, but I am looking forward to finally putting this behind me.

Weekend Relief

Glad it's the weekend, and glad I was able to get out this morning, however brief. There are plenty of roads better suited for running than Delaware Ave, but I enjoy the accessibility and familiarity of runs starting there. Made it down to Old City before breakfast time, which is really the only time I don't mind being there. 30 minutes, 3.4 miles.

Yesterday was an easy 4 something miles before work. The tightness in my right foot is improving, but yesterday I still had to stop and stretch it a few times. Today I had no problems.

Later this morning I had an appointment with my massage therapist, who is really more of a therapist than a masseuse. Money well spent in my opinion, and I recommend it to anyone needing some knots unbound, or just general stress relief. I've learned some pretty useful stuff about managing little aches and pains. The latest is epsom salt. Never even though about it before, but I think there's a salt bath in my near future.

No Urgency

The Cardozo Crawlers aren't doing their usual track session this morning (a few members are tapering for the Baltimore Marathon this weekend), and I don't think I'd be feeling it even if they were. So I'm sitting on my butt instead, having some tea. It's good for me.

Yesterday I grabbed a few easy miles, and while my mind was back in the game after an easy weekend, physically things still felt kind of forced. No urgency right now, so I'm resisting the natural tendency to push through it.

Transitions

It's been roughly two months now that I've been back at running consistently. Before that, during the month of July, I got out a few times a week and then took a two-week backpacking trip in the high mountains of Colorado. That's where I noticed some transitions taking place. All the symbolism of the trip aside (think post-graduation rite of passage), the break in routine seemed to jumpstart a healing and growing process that had eluded me for so long in the months prior. To summarize the purgatorial plight I'd found myself in for those months, a rash of injuries and subsequent visits to doctors and specialists had me convinced that I had something called a sports hernia. I shoudn't even be calling it that, because it's a terrible misnomer and it's really a much more complex injury to the pelvic musculature than a simple hernia. But that discussion doesn't belong on this website, so I'll cut to the chase. For insurance reasons I couldn't have the recommended surgery, and I thought I'd either be saving pennies until I could afford it out of pocket or that I'd wait until I could change my insurance.

In July the symptoms started to slowly decrease in both severity and frequency, even as I returned to being more active. Now it's a rarity that I have any of those symptoms. When they come, they're pretty minor, and it's usually after a long, hard day. Ironically, I now have a new insurance provider that will cover the procedure, but given the way things have been progressing I doubt I'll go that route.

August went off without a hitch, and I logged a run for almost every day in September.

Today, I'm at the tail end of what I'm writing off as my first bad week (running-wise) in two months. Everything in my life feels new right now, and I guess this newness finally started to wear on me.

An early work obligation on Wednesday kept me from getting out to meet the Cardozo Crawlers at the high school of the same name for our weekly track session. Last week we'd done something the group organizer, Sam, called the Haverford (after the college?) which consisted of 3x1600, 3x400, 3x200, all with 100m recoveries. I held back on the 1600s and they came in at about 6:12. Even better, I still had a lot left in my tank for the shorter reps.

Well, instead of the track routine on Wednesday, I managed to get in a quick run after work instead. But I ended up with a cramp in the arch of my right foot that lasted through the last mile.

I slept in yesterday, and chalked it up as rest. I decided today after work that things felt good enough to head back to the track. On the way out the door I decided I'd keep it simple and shoot for 3-4x1600.

The legs felt surprisingly springy, but after warming up with some strides I was already doubting my decision to do this today. I progressively lost steam through the first 1600, to the point that I miscounted and lapped after 1200 and began to slow down for my recovery. That this was enough to ruin the workout for me says something about the state of my mind today. And as I cursed myself for stopping, I drew an analogy to my mindset this week, in that I've just felt a little off kilter. I ended up with about 4 miles and some strides in 34:47.

This would-be workout, and the past week, are a reminder that I have a bit of fine tuning to do in terms of balancing my efforts with rest. This applies not just to running, but across the board. It certainly feels good to be out here again. While I feel some frustration that injury is still a major focus of my running and writing, I'm accepting that, for me at least, I guess it just comes with the territory. I'll probably take the weekend off and see how I feel on Monday.