Mountain Run

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Finally a 10 mile run (negative splits)

It has been a long while since I’ve run 10 miles.  In fact, just to be honest, I haven’t run over 7 or 8 miles but twice in the past year.  Once was two weeks before my half marathon and once was my half marathon (RnR Nashville).

Why?

Well running up and down my mountain got me to about 8 miles and I considered that to be worth about 13.  That may not be true, but it really was much more then an 8 mile workout.  Then summer hit and I entered survival mode.  I decided I would set a goal of 4 miles a day and try not to miss more then 2 days a week.  That got me about 20 miles a week, just enough to keep me going.

Sunday it was cold here.  I know that it is cold it is up North, but for us, waking up to 36 degrees was a bit of a shock.  So I just stayed in bed.  In fact I stayed in bed later then I have in years.  I finally got up and decided I needed to get my run in anyway and man up under the cold.  By the time I got to our state park, it was a cool 50 degrees and almost perfect for running.  I will say it was too warm for a jacket during a run and too cold to go without.  In the end, I ran 2 miles with a jacket and then did the rest without.

I knew I could do the 10 miler, but also knew the temptation to tell myself that I could quit early, so after I ran the 2 miles and put up my jacket, I ran 4 miles in one direction and 4 back.  To be honest, it was hard.  My body isn’t used that long mileage anymore and the road back was mostly uphill.

The run was very rewarding.  I needed to get back to longer runs and figured 10 miles was a good start.  I am much stronger then I was during my marathon, which is good news.  All the hill runs paid off.  Also I mostly had negative splits, even with the last several miles being uphill most of the way.

So that run is in the bag.  I hope to keep the 10+ mile runs going each weekend for the long term.  I have the hill runs down, and adding the long runs will add to my strength.  I hope to run a half marathon at the end of December (Jacksonville) then another half in February (Birmingham) and finish with a marathon in Va. Beach in March.  Time will tell how this will go.  I got hurt a lot going into my last marathon, but I know now that I didn’t have the leg strength to do it.  I don’t know how I completed it, let alone ran it in 4:15.

Tom

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Walking down a mountain

I finally ran 6 days in a row last week.  Other then my long day, I only ran about 4 miles a day.  I figure until I can be consistent with running 4 miles a day, why go farther.  So I ended up with 28 miles for the week.

Then, Friday happened.  I was running well, but it was hot and I was tired from the week.  I was about 1/10 mile from home and my knee got a shooting pain that made me immediately stop running.  It was on the inside of my left knee.  I’ve had that pain twice before in the past couple of years and it has never been long term.

Sunday, I went to the mountain with RS to do my weekly run.  It was my first mountain run in my new shoes and I was excited to see how they’d do.  As we parted ways to begin separate runs, I handed RS the clicker to the car and I took the key.  He then asked me, “What if you get hurt, how will I get you”.  I just smiled and said that wouldn’t happen.

Hmmm.

I got to the top of the mountain and felt fine.  I had a good run and took my time.  No issues.  As I began my decent, all was well and then, after about a half mile, that pain came back.  I limped to a stop and let out a cry of pain.  I texted RS and told him I was walking back and then I tried to run again.  I know that was stupid and I new it at the time, but I didn’t want to walk 3 miles back to the car.  So I started and stopped about 3 times.  Each time I ran okay, but then the pain hit and I couldn’t continue.  Finally I resigned myself to walk down the mountain and give up my run.

About a mile after I began my walk, I spotted RS coming toward me.  He ran up the mountain to meet me.  He offered to go get the van, but I declined. We walked back and had a good talk.  Thanks RS!

Now I’m off running for a bit.  Back to ice and heat and stretching.  I don’t know if it was my shoes or just fate, but it is frustrating (although running always seems to be frustrating).

Maybe I should start biking.

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A Fathers Day run and busy weekend!

It was a good Fathers Day weekend overall.  The one exception was a migraine yesterday, but at least I got to run.

Saturday was busy with errands to run and things to do.

Yesterday, though, I got to run the mountain with TJ.   First we eat breakfast (his treat) and then headed to our state park to run.

It was humid and I was soaked by the time we finished, but it was a lot of fun.  We ran the same route as last week, but without stopping (except for the ports-potty).  We finished yesterday’s run in the exact same time as last weeks, which was pretty interesting.

The mountain was quiet.  I didn’t see any other joggers and only a few cars.  AND, after the run, I had no pain in my hip or back.  That was the most amazing part.  I guess this seat cushion has really helped.

After the run and Church, we “ran” a few more errands and that was when my migraine started.  To be honest, some of my kids and my Lovely Wife suffer with headaches a lot, but I almost never have one; so when I get one, it shuts me down.  I did make it to TJ’s for burgers, but that was about it.  I came home and went to bed.  I fell asleep pretty quickly, but woke up with my head raging about 10:00 last night.  Fortunately I woke this morning feeling pretty good, so I got up and headed out to work.

All in all, it was a good weekend.  Lots of food (too much food).  Funny, I weighed in at 184 today and felt badly that I weighed that much. 🙂  A few months ago, I’d have been trilled to weigh that little.

I hope everyone had a good weekend and an awesome week.  I hope to begin running everyday again now that I’m feeling better –

Tom

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Mother’s Day consequences

I got up today and could barely walk…

“Hmmm,” I thought to myself, “what did I do?”

I ran my mountain on Saturday.  That was a good run, but much easier then last week.  I purposely tried not to run hard or fast as I am still feeling the pains from my half marathon and don’t want to get hurt.  I also ran the short route, so it was 6.5 miles rather then 8.

“No, that was long enough ago that I shouldn’t be this sore.  It must be something else.”

I didn’t run Sunday or Friday.  Once again, I am trying to err on the side of caution and not get hurt.  I know, I should be recovered by now and I might be okay, but I still have left over hip issues and I’d rather run some and slower then a lot and get hurt.

“So if it wasn’t related to running then why am I so sore?”

This was my conversation with myself this morning. Then I figured it out.  My soreness had nothing to do with running.  It was cleaning.  Yes, for Mother’s Day I cleaned out a storage room for my Lovely Wife yesterday morning (thus the reason I couldn’t run – I didn’t have time).  All that bending and sitting and moving worked areas of my body that are not used to being worked.

Goodness, if you can run a half marathon in 1:43, you shouldn’t be down and out from cleaning.

I guess I’m not in the shape I thought I was in or maybe I shouldn’t clean anymore. 🙂

JK. Happy Mother’s Day LW!

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Mountain Run PR!

I’m guess people could be getting tired of hearing about my mountain running, but it has been such a transformational thing to me and my running, I want to pass it along my experience along.

Yesterday was my first mountain run in 3 weeks and my first since last weekend’s half marathon.  I had taken last week off of running (okay, I ran 6 miles) to make sure I don’t get injured in my post race workouts as I have in the past.

I began at an easy pace as I warmed up.  By the time I got to the foot of the mountain, I was running too fast.  I knew I was running too fast for a mountain run, but being that I hadn’t run much in 7 days, I guess I got carried away.

About half way up the steepest part of the mountain road (one of the first hills) I had to walk.  That was okay.  I walked about 30 seconds and then started slower and kept a good pace.

By the time I got to the top I was getting tired.  I could tell I hadn’t run this road much in three weeks.  My legs were tried and I was breathing hard.  At the top of the mountain, there is about a half mile of fairly level running before I turn around.  I got to the turn around point, paused long enough to take and post a picture and headed back down.

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This was my only real scare.  Right after I posted the picture above on my previous post, I began to run again and felt a “pull” in my left heel.  Oh no!  It had been a good run and beyond that, I didn’t want to get injured again.  So I relaxed and kept my run going.  I just paid close attention to how I was feeling and my form.  Honestly, I don’t think I hurt myself, but my past experience tells me that sometimes injuries don’t show up right away.

As I got to the bottom of the mountain, I had 1.5 miles to get back to the car.  I know my run was in record mountain running time, as I know I was running well.  So I pushed a bit going up and down the hills leading back to my car.  I passed a guy walking the opposite direction who said, “Does it feel as bad as you thought it would?” I had to ask him to repeat his question.  He was being nice, knowing I was breathing hard and really pushing.  I just yelled back, “Nah, this is easy”!  He just laughed and we continued in our separate directions.

I got up the last hill and could see my car.  I finally looked at my time.  8:45 pace.  Seriously?!?  I ran hard down the last hill.  My pace dropped to 8:42 for the run.  My total time was 1:09:47 for the 8 miles.  My best time before this was a run with TJ several months ago that was at an 8:50 pace.

Mountain run PR

Mountain run PR

My heel is better today and I am still being careful.

My hip isn’t doing great, but is much better then last week.  I wear a sciatica belt on my mountain runs to help with the support and that makes a lot of difference.

So a half marathon PR last week and a mountain run PR this week.  All in all, I’m pretty happy.

I’ve been trying to catch up on other people’s blogs by the way.  I got way behind the past week or two, but I am getting there slowly.  🙂

Have an awesome week.

Tom