I really am not used to being sick. Usually my immune system takes care of anything natures throws at it; no matter what kind of bugs the kids bring home from school, it's not unusual for me to be the only one of the family to remain unaffected. As a result, I am a lousy patient when I finally do get struck down, like I did this week.
It started on Tuesday afternoon, and it came very quickly. In the morning I had run 8 miles, marvelling how well I was feeling and how little the marathon had taken out of me and a few hours later all of a sudden my energy levels plummeted towards zero and I got a splitting headache.
Not only did I not run on Wednesday, I took the day off work as well. I then tried to force the issue by telling myself that I was getting better and went to work on Thursday but very, very quickly realised how stupid that had been and went home again even before lunchtime. Friday was spent mostly in bed again, feeling utterly miserable and contemplating far too many things.
It was so bad that I seriously considered going to the doctor, and if you know me then you'd know that I must have felt really sick, because I do have some serious reservations regarding the "health" service, both in general and the substandard Irish one in particular.
However, as quickly as I had succumbed, just as quickly I seemed to recover. All of a sudden I started to feel much better on Friday evening and I knew I was on the mend. That's not to say that I have recovered. I am still somewhere between sick and healthy but feeling better every day. I will resume running tomorrow, though carefully and slowly, and with the proviso that I can turn back at any time. I won't have lost any real fitness after 5 days, in fact it might have helped with recovery from Killarney, at least from a muscular point of view.
I had plenty of time to ponder if that cold was a sign that I was overtraining, and while I will keep an open mind I honestly do not think so because none of the other symptoms apply to me, so I really put that one down to hanging around at the finish line in Killarney for too long and getting too cold.
Always try and turn and problem into an opportunity. The long hours at home enabled me to finally read the Maffetone book that had been lying on my shelf for far too long, and I think it is excellent. I was always sceptical about his approach and felt that his way of training was much more suited to very-long-endurance events like Ironmans or very long ultras, but last year I twigged that I was moving into that area myself and therefore his ideas might apply to me as well. Actually, I found the chapters about lifestyle and especially nutrition far more enlightening than his theories about training itself (plenty of which I had been implementing all along anyway), and I am trying to make some changes, which actually does have me quite excited. I have made some great progress in the last few years, much more than I would ever have dared to dream. Just get a tiny little bit faster and I'll be satisfied. *
* yeah, right ...
Great to see you back on the mend. Take it "Maffetone" easy this week!
ReplyDeleteGood to hear you enjoyed his book. Wish I had a dose of the Irish man-flu myself so I could finish it! Only 20% through, but savouring every page. You'll be testing it on the ultra level, but I'm expecting results down at 5k (as soon as I get rolling again).
ReplyDeleteWhat will your goals be for the 100 miler ultra - simply finish or aim for a time eg sub 20 hours. If it's the former you will be fine , aiming for a time will be a interesting challenge
ReplyDeleteThe primary goal in such a race can only ever be finishing, anything else is a bonus.
DeleteAs for time, when I ran the 24 hrs race last year I did the first 100 miles in about 18:40, and ideally I would like to improve on that because a) it's a shorter race and b) I now have some experience in long distance ultras. Having said that, just finishing was, is, and will remain the primary target.
Thomas, just looking at your marathon history and I see Loch Ness back in 2007 was a big improvement on your previous PB. Was that mainly down to your improved training or the downhill course or a mixture of both? Ever since it was mentioned on boards last week I've been pondering to do it...
ReplyDeleteHi John, that was in the middle of a massive spell of improvement, if you look at the previous marathon, Dublin 2006, there had been an even better improvement. The reasons why I managed to take another huge chunk out of my PB was that there had been almost a full year since the previous marathon, running the Connemara Ultra in the meantime had significantly improved my aerobic base, and I had significantly upped my mileage as I was experimenting with Lydiard training (I did 4 weeks of over 100 miles in a 5-week period - never again have I done such high mileage!). I don't think the downhill course had much impact - there is a massive hill between miles 16 and 18 and I don't regard Loch Ness as THAT fast a course. I'd still recommend it, I loved ever step of it (well, apart from miles 9 to 12 when I felt rather rough ...).
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