Sole Hip

When MC was coaching me to my first sub-3 marathon, 5 years ago, at some stage during the base building phase I reached a point where running no longer felt like training. Even long runs of 20 miles passed by without much hassle and I ended every workout feeling "pleasantly tired" but never fatigued.

This time I managed to reach that point all on my own, and it feels great. I have been running rather high mileage the last few weeks and I can feel myself getting stronger almost on a daily basis, so the stubborn insistence on keeping running every day through a various amount of setbacks has definitely paid off.

It's not all plain sailing, of course. It never is. The last couple of weeks I had to deal with two troublesome issues: my right hip and my right foot.

The hip was hurting a little bit, which normally would not have been particularly alarming but it was the same area that bad been injured in July and I was therefore rather paranoid about it all. I could barely feel it when running but it was more pronounced later in the day. Thankfully it seems to have sorted itself out by now, without intervention, which is a great relief.

Happy 12th birthday, Cian!
Well done with the anti-gravity cake, Niamh!

The other bothersome spot, my right foot, was a bit more troublesome as well as a good bit more painful. Three weeks ago I had done a double run and on the second day the balls of my right foot really started hurting, which is the reason why I have not attempted another double day since. It felt like the sole of the shoe had worn all the way through and I suspiciously inspected the shoe after the run for a hole, but none was found. It would have been strange - it was the very same shoe that I had happily used during the Spartathlon for 153 miles and for them to be completely worn through only 200 miles later would have been highly unusual. Nevertheless, the foot kept hurting, and quite a bit at times. Even during office hours I noted a "scrunched-up sock" feeling that just would not go away. Googling seemed to indicate a neuroma but it was the fact that the foot kept hurting while wearing my office shoes while feeling much better when I wore slippers at home that eventually helped me to find a solution. I figured my foot might be hurting because it was too squashed inside the shoe. I replaced the insole with a different, thinner, one that I happened to have at home, which provided more room for the foot inside the shoe. The effect was amazing, within one single run I felt much better and the problem has mostly gone away, apart from a very slight tingly feeling when wearing office shoes but that doesn't bother me.

The miles keep on coming. I did 12 on Monday on slightly tired legs and the same again on Tuesday a little bit faster. The most achy body parts were both calves, which very much felt like DOMS, I'm pretty sure that was caused by running through knee-deep water during Sunday's long run and will go away all by itself. Since the roads don't tend to be flooded at all times I don't think that issue will re-occur any time soon. I did 15 miles on Wednesday morning, in time before the next weather front hit - doing the same run in the evening would have been a lot worse. What surprised me was how easy I found it all. I felt like I could have been running twice as far without any bother.

7 Dec

12 miles, 1:34:54, 7:54 pace, HR 143

8 Dec

12 miles, 1:32:51, 7:44 pace, HR 145

9 Dec

15 miles, 1:55:41, 7:43 pace, HR 145

Back In Black

The Cork marathon is in 2 weeks and since the original 3:15 pacers cried off with various excuses (like running 132 km over a few mountains), I got bumped up to the 3:15 slot for which, in theory, I would not even qualify (the original criteria was you needed a sub 2:56 time). It was worrying me sufficiently to get me back out onto the road. The runners in Cork are relying on me, and I can't let them down by being undertrained.

Ok, that's a lousy excuse, I admit. Fact is, after one week on no running I could not take the cabin fever any more, Niamh was about to kick me out and I wanted my fix more than I was prepared to play it safe. I have a pretty good injury history (as in NOT being injured, I mean), and as such am much more prepared to take a risk than someone who has lost months to injury in the past.

The idea is now to force myself through the marathon and then re-assess. The knee had not really gotten worse during the two weeks that I had run through it, but then it didn't get any better after a week of rest either. As I just found out, wearing a knee strap constantly, not just during a run, works wonders and I have hardly felt a twinge the last two days.

My latest theory is that the shoes might have something to do with the problem, after reading a remark by someone I know who had switched from Brooks Adrenalines to Saucony ProGrids, promptly got a pain in his knee that sounded exactly like mine and resolved it by switching back to Brooks again. As it happens, I started a new pair of ProGrid Ride a couple of weeks ago, which more or less coincided with my knee issues. It may be a red herring of course, but it's worth a try.

As it happens, I had a new pair of shoes in the cupboard anyway, a pair of Kinvaras. They may be from Saucony as well, but are an entirely different make of shoes. In general I am a bit sceptical about the barefoot and minimalist movement, but the Kinvaras are a transitional shoe with only 4mm heel drop rather than a minimal shoe, and they are not as ridiculously overpriced as, say, the Newtons either.

Well, what can I say, it was love at first stride. I just have to learn to keep my youthful enthusiasm in check and learn to run them a bit slower. The knee was fine (strapped in as it was that might not say much) and the shoes are so light they almost run on their own, but I'll run a bit more than 6 miles before converting entirely.

The Valentia triathlon was on yesterday and one look out of the window made me glad that I had skipped it this year. They re-paid last year's fantastic weather with significant interest and I'm sure the swim was, let's say, interesting, even after being changed to be within the marina. In normal years, half of the fun of that race is to swim from the Irish mainland to the island. It did remind me, however, that I'd still love to do an Ironman one day, but until I can figure out a way to incorporate swim training into my rather busy life, this will remain on hold.

20 May

6 miles, 44:53, 7:28 pace, HR 158

21 May

6.1 miles, 43:34, 7:08 pace, HR 162

22 May

10.1 miles, 1:15:35, 7:29 pace, HR 155

Obsession?

I guess I have to apologise to Niamh. I always used to think she was wasting most of our money on things we really didn’t need, like yet another pair of shoes. Then I heard on the radio today that the average woman in Ireland owns 30 pairs of shoes. Average, they said, not obsessed. Wow. Niamh has about 10, and apparently she’s incredibly restrained. And anyway, one look into our shoe rack would make you think I’m the one with the shoe obsession. It’s not as bad as it looks though; three of these pairs are actually worn out, I just can’t bring myself to throw them out after all we’ve been through together.

On the running front things are going well. I listened to the wise words of Mike and Mike, and didn’t try to run any more tempo efforts with an eye on Sunday’s race. Instead I inserted 8x100 strides into yesterdays run, which explains the rather high heart rate for what was not a particularly fast run. That, and the fact that two of those miles were against a rather strong headwind, which made the strides feel like hard work. I thought about doing a 50-50 mile, but decided against it. I’ve never attempted a workout like that before, and might leave it for the next 5k (possibly on New Year’s Day).

Today I just seemed to click, and running became a joy again. Maybe it was due to the improved weather with only a little bit of rain, and much-reduced wind speeds. For the first time since the marathon I attempted double figures, and while I knew that I would be able to handle it, I didn’t expect it to go so well. Getting up at 6 am was the only real hurdle, the run itself seemed effortless and I managed to zen out for most of it. I didn’t once look at my heart rate monitor or check my time, and was pleasantly surprised at both readings at the end. It went so well that I am tempted to put in another “long” run as soon as I can, but I won’t. I’ve only just started building my mileage, and I’m going to reach 50 this week, which is already 7 more than last week. All the books I’ve read warn against bigger increases, so I won’t. I’ll leave the big mileage jumps to other people (Funny, they're the ones who are running the fastest marathons).

28 Nov: 7 miles, 1:01, 8:42 pace, avg. HR 157, incl. 8x100 strides
29 Nov: 11 miles, 1:32, 8:21 pace, avg. HR 152

Consecutive days in the rain: 16