I'm trying to figure out a problem. Before I moved to Texas I had already decided to run the Dallas Marathon in December. My training went pretty well, and my taper was almost perfect... then, there was an ice storm, the whole city shut down and my marathon was cancelled.
I took a week off and decided to set my focus on the Big D marathon in April. Instead of just riding the wave of my previous training, I decided to start over- from scratch. This time, however, I was a lot more formal, adding a slow-building of one-day-a-week speed work outs (starting small and working up) and one-day-a-week tempo runs (designed to train me how to run at my goal pace). In addition, I started my distance runs, simply enough, with 8 milers, then 10, 12, 14, and 16. I went so slow with this build up that I did 2 weeks of 12, two of 14 and two of 16.
Then.
My first attempt at 18 was a disaster. My right heel was in such pain that I had to stop after nine miles, the last few of those miles were sluggish. My second attempt, the next week, ended with the same result. I rested throughout the next week- rolling my foot, my calf, my legs- stretching, doing yoga, etc. Then I attempted it again. Same result... and one more for good measure the next week, you guessed it.
Well, needless to say, I'm glad I didn't pay and register for the race. I took a couple weeks off and everything started to feel better. After a few good suggestions from some good friends, I decided that maybe it was time for new shoes. Got em- my favorites and mostly successful brands, makes and models were even on sale- win!
I ran a few times successfully, then thought that maybe the half-marathon would be a better fit this time, so I tried running 13 miles this past weekend just to be sure. As I approached 7 miles, I realized that I hadn't run more than once a week and no longer than 6 miles for about 4 weeks... 13 may be a bad idea, so I stopped at 10.
When I analyzed my split times, I noticed the same thing across the board. For the first 3-4 miles I ran rather consistently, but after that I slowed down significantly. A month + ago I was running record half-marathon, 5K, and 10K times, but now I'm barely able to perform on short runs. Frankly, I'm at a loss.
The muscle issues are either in my right heal, my right calf, my right hamstring, or my right glute. I stretch, I roll them. I don't know. I've gotten new shoes, I pay extremely close attention to my stride and breathing pattern. To be honest, it's frustrating.
Probably no one out there can help, but it's important to know that no matter how much work we put in and no matter how much we do it right- something can always go wrong. It's hard to say this, but sometimes, we need to accept that injury, pain and hurt happen while we try to improve. The reasons for this are numerous, but the one thing we cannot do is give up.
I'll do some yoga tomorrow and play it by ear for Thursday. I'll take Friday off as I normally do, then if I can run 13 miles on Saturday, I'll register and run the Big D half-marathon the next week. My best guess is that I won't PR, but at this point I'm not even sure I'm running the race... and that needs to be OK. Sometimes we don't run the race; but we heal, rest and recover, then come out fighting the next time around.
These are always hard decisions, but ones that only we can make. I encourage you to not only consider what you can do that pushes you to your limits, but what will it take to go beyond those limits. I also encourage you to consider your ego as you go... sometimes, you just need to heal.
God bless,
Paul
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