Summer's Last Hurrah

Today is very July-like here in Baltimore. It's hot and humid with temps in th elow 90s and the heat index around 100. It was in the 80's this morning when I woke up to head out on my second "rehab run". I scrapped running for a few reasons:

1. I was not interested in running in a tropical environment this morning. Sorry, it's September and those days should be over now.

2. The main purpose of my run was to assess the status of my leg injury, not to deal with absurd heat and humidity.

3. The heat is supposed to break later tonight. Tomorrow is supposed to be in the mid 80's and drier. The rest of the week is going to be in the mid 70's and more seasonable. So, I'll just run tomorrow instead and save myself the hassle of dealing with the weather today.

4. I have about 40 other things to do today (packing some boxes, studying, watching the Redskins game, getting ready for work tomorrow, etc), all of which are more important than struggling through 6 miles in 75 degree dew point air.

5. Another day of rest for my leg can't hurt and indeed it feels great today with very little residual pain. In fact, while I can feel the weakness in the muscle, it's not hurting and appears to be well on the road to recovery. Tomorrow's run should be no problem.

With that, it's back to the Redskins game and then some packing and studying to round out my Sunday afternoon.

Steady Improvement

After almost a full week away from running, my groin/thigh is feeling almost normal. Even though taking these days off has been frustrating, I think it was the smart thing to do. I got up this morning and headed out for a short 3 miler to try out the injured muscle and see where I stood on the recovery timeline.

The good news is that I had very little pain during running and nothing quite as sharp as last week when I actually injured it. After giving it some serious thought, I think my injury actually stemmed from two things: not stretching properly and stopping too abruptly at cross walks. At some point in the first 4 miles of my run last week I must have stopped too suddenly and put too much stress on my groin.

Anyway, more good news is that I've been diligently icing it and pampering it this afternoon and have just a tad of residual soreness when I sit down, but nothing sharp or debilitating, which is a change from last week.

The bad news is that the strain is still there and I can feel it when I run. Once the muscle gets warm, it's fine. However, when I stopped today mid-run to navigate around the Red Bull Dragon Boat Races that were going on in the Inner Harbor (totally random event, by the way), it tightened up nicely and was tender when I restarted to run. So, I'm going to have to monitor that.

But in all, I'm pleased with the short run today. Tomorrow I want to head out again and maybe go 5-6 miles at a gentle pace to test it again. I think it should be OK if I take precautions before and after my run to manage my pain and soreness. I would anticipate this injury being with me at least another week, maybe longer since I'm determined to get back to training this week, albeit at a slower pace as my leg allows.

In the future, I now know that I need to allot enough time before my run to stretch out my legs properly and I need about 15 minutes afterwards to ice and control any muscle fatigue. But, live and learn.

I'll be ready for the half in four weeks.

Injury Update

My groin pull is feeling better every day, but this has been a lost week in terms of training. I haven't run since Sunday, which is intensely frustrating since the half marathon is but 4 week away! I'm going to have to do away with any tapering, which is OK, as the half marathon doesn't require a taper, necessarily.

Also, this Thursday was the Run to Remember 5K, which I had signed up for and was hoping to run. I got up and dressed with the plan of doing some jogging to see how my leg felt, as I haven't done anything active since Sunday in an attempt to let it heal faster. Unlike Tuesday, I was able to run yesterday, although there was still some pain involved. It wasn't unbearable, but I still had several concerns:

1. Was it worth running a 5K at the possible expense of my half marathon? Definitely not.
2. Is the pain low enough that I could run and bear it? Yes. It takes a fair amount of actual physical pain to dissuade me.
3. Does the lingering pain mean that running would make it worse or would gentle running actually help in recovery at this point? I don't know.

Really, it was #3 that was the real question. While I was looking forward to the 5K, being able to complete the half marathon is my ultimate goal before the wedding. While losing a week of running when I have already been crappy at training for this half marathon sucks, making this lingering injury worse by running too hard at a 5K that was only supposed to be tune-up race anyway would be worse. As it stands, I have three long runs left and my distance sits at around 9 miles now. I could definitely do 10 without any trouble, as I made it through 9 last week without any endurance problems. Really I'll only have two solid long runs left because there's no way I'm running far this weekend with my leg still tender. Sucks.

So, I'm going to see how things feel tomorrow morning and try to get some really easy miles done. I also need to incorporate some stretching and continue with the icing regimen I've been on lately to treat the muscle after I run for the next few weeks up until the half marathon.

Regardless, it is appearing that the Baltimore Half might not be an improvement over my time at the National Half back in March. It'll be a good race and I fully plan on being ready. But I know I won't be as ready as I should be, which is frustrating because I have only myself to blame. I'm already thinking about what comes after Baltimore and how I need to get my ass in gear. Thankfully, it'll be after the wedding as well, which has taken a toll on my energy levels. In fact, with the end of October, my life will become a little less stressful as we'll have moved to our new apartment (that happens next week, actually) and the wedding/honeymoon will be over. That will only leave training and the CFA before the holidays, both of which will require my full focus and attention.

However, I may not be able to run the Richmond Half on my birthday if Annie's performance falls on that date. We'll see but it would be tough to run the race, drive back to Baltimore and then drive up to PA for the performance. That's a very long day and it would be easier to just find another half marathon to run this season and let Richmond go. I would imagine I will have another opportunity to run a half marathon on or near my birthday in the future.

Injury! Oh the humanity!

Sunday was my long run day and I decided to go ahead and do 9 miles rather than my originally decided 8. I've got 5 weeks until the Baltimore half marathon and I'd like to get my distance up to 10 miles or more prior to that. So, I chose to go 9 instead of 8. This was actually not a bad decision as I made it all 9 miles. The distance didn't cause my injury, but certainly running that distance wasn't good for it.

So I was about 4 miles into my run when I stopped at Federal Hill park for a water break. I rehydrated and then started running again. It was at that point that I had a fair amount of pain in my right inner thigh. It faded as I kept running, but was always there each time my right foot hit the pavement, it hurt. It never got excruciating or even bad enough that I had to stop early or slow down. So, somewhere in the early miles of my run I strained my right groin muscle. By the time I got back to the apartment, it had tightened up nicely and made going up and down stairs uncomfortable. I showered and iced it for about 15-20 minutes before tkaing some ibuprofen. That seemed to help it calm down, but yesterday morning it was so stiff I had trouble walking up and down the stairs at the office. I was limping down them! Yesterday was a rest day anyway, so no worries there. I took it easy and tried not to burden the muscle throughout the day.

This morning I woke up early to head out for my run. I didn't feel any stiffness or soreness so decided to go ahead and try running to see how it felt. As I walked down the stairs to the street, however, I could feel some twinges in the muscle. And when I started to run, I got about two blocks before I realized it wasn't going to happen. Granted I didn't stretch it out at all, and tha might have made it stiffer than usual. But each step I took sent a new zing of pain up my hip. So, rather than push my luck and risk making it worse than it is, I turned around and came back home. I showered and then got back into bed with my ice bag resting on my leg and slept for another 45 minutes before getting up for work.

So, on the good side, I can walk comfortably today (yesterday I was walking gingerly but fine) and stairs are no longer painful so the strain was minor and my body is healing as best it can. Another day off should help it heal up nicely. I'm hoping that by tomorrow morning I'll be able to run again because I have the Run to Remember 5K on Thursday morning and it would suck to have to not run until then. Even so, I don't anticipate being fully recovered for a week or so, and will incorporate some stretches into my routine to keep it loose and prevent aggravation. I just wish I could have my ice bag here at work to use during the day!

I Fail!

Didn't get up this morning to get my run in so I suck. But I was just so damn tired! I need to get to sleep earlier OR find a way to force myself out of bed in the morning.

However, tomorrow I have to be up early to take Annie to the bus station so she can get to New York for an audition so I will come back and head out for a run. Tropical Storm/Hurricane Hanna is supposed to be here tomorrow afternoon so it should be an interesting run tomorrow morning. Probably just rainy with a light breeze. I don't plan on running in the afternoon when the rain is supposed to really pick up and the winds kick up to about 30 mph!

Hopefully, the weather will clear up enough by Sunday morning to allow a 9 mile run in the morning as well.

Finding a Balance

This morning I got back to my training schedule for the Baltimore Half Marathon. I was briefly concerned yesterday to find out that the half had sold out. I thought that maybe my entry form had not made it in time, which would have sucked. But thankfully, I checked my confirmation online and indeed I am registered to run on October 11th FOR FREE! I think this year they're expecting something like 17,000 runners for all the various races, which is awesome! The running festival was one of my favorite weekends of the entire year last year and I think it'll be even better this year since I'm running the half.

I did 4 easy miles at about a 9:15 pace. Not too bad considering it was humid and warmer out this morning than it has been. Tomorrow I will do another 4-5 miles at an easy pace before taking Saturday off to do some cross training. Tropical Storm Hannah is supposed to make its way up the coast and be here by Saturday morning. However, by that time, it will probably be just a big mess of rain and wind that will make the day gloomy. With any luck it'll be gone by Sunday morning for my planned "long" run of 9 miles.

This morning, as I laid in bed trying to will myself to get up and go run, I had the thought that maybe I could actually get up later (around 6 AM rather than 5) and still get my runs in without being late to work or rushing through my shower, etc. I tried that this morning and ended up being 10 minutes late to work and rushed! So, I have settled the months-long debate about whether getting up earlier would give me more time and actually be worth the pain. While getting up at 5 is awful and too early, 6 AM is too late. I think that if I got up at 5:30, I'd have enough time to get 4-5 miles in each morning and be back at the apartment in time to get ready for work.

This is also going to be true when we move north about a mile and a half because my walk will be about 15 minutes longer than it is now, which means leaving 15 minutes earlier for the office. So, that extra 30 minutes will help make my morning a little less hectic.

Now I just need to work on a new route from our new apartment for my morning runs!

Back from the Queen City

After 5 days of intense wedding planning, I've returned from Cincinnati tired but feeling good about the wedding status. We got a lot accomplished each day and stayed on schedule (Annie made an itinerary for our trip) which was good. She stayed in Cincinnati to get some more things done since I had to get back to the office, and will return home on Thursday evening. In the meantime, I have my own laundry list of things to get done. All of them center around preparing for our move on the 20th.

We're moving out of my small studio apartment in the high rise in downtown to a ground level, 1 bedroom apartment in Mt. Vernon. Of course we need more space now that she's back in Baltimore after the summer, but we also wanted to live in a real neighborhood and we both grew tired of our building. For example, none of the three elevators were working this morning when I left for work. I live on the 29th floor so it was a long walk down. I pray they're working when I leave the office in about an hour. But it's absurd that in a building with 30 floors that all three elevators should stop working at the same time. Especially for the rent that we pay. So, we're anxious to be rid fo our managed property.

To get ready, I've put the apartment on Craigslist Baltimore so I can transfer the lease and avoid paying the rest of the year's rent. I've had 6 or 7 responses and three people are viewing the apartment tomorrow. Hopefully one of them will apply and take the apartment off my hands.

In addition to this big project, I'm waiting for our new property management company to receive our security deposit so we can get that lease signed. Our target move date is September 20th, so we have some time left. But I have U-Haul reservations to make, all my stuff to pack, an apartment to clean (Annie is heading up this effort, thankfully), some nicks and scratches to repair, etc. So there's lots to do before we even move any boxes onto the truck!

In running news, Annie and I both ran the Cheetah Run 5K at the Cincinnati Zoo on Sunday and had a great time. I'll write a separate post for the race report, but since the whole race wasn't chip timed and I forgot my Garmin in Baltimore, I don't have an accurate time to present. But it was tough to run all out due to the narrowness of the course and the number of runners. More details to come on that.

This week, I will get back to training for Baltimore tomorrow morning with an easy run. I've mapped out September's training as well, so I have a plan to stick to. Next race is the Run to Remember 5K on September 11th. It's a relatively small race (1,000) through downtown Baltimore (i.e. pretty flat) so I'm going to try for a PR at that race.