On Monday I posted that I was feeling my Sunday's long effort and I may need an additional day of recovery before heading into more up pace efforts. I did that. I knew I would thank myself and give my legs another 24 to reap the benefits of easy aerobic exercise in the form of soft, snow-covered trails in Hartley. I headed that way Tuesday morning and proceeded to do one complete loop along with some other short loops and a short section in Rock Hill. That felt great.
On Wednesday I woke up plenty early to hit my 90-100 minutes with some steady state running in the middle. The weather was rather warm at 25F and the roads/paths I chose were very clear of any debris. After my usual 3 mile warm up I started to work into the steady state miles. At first it was a bit more difficult than I wanted the pace to be. I ran this pace so easily last week and this week it was actually beginning to feel like work. I decided to stop looking at my gps and really focus on body effort and breathing. Coincidentally that was about the time I started to feel better. To ensure I would have a decent run I took my Powergel in hopes to make the last half hour of this SS period go smoothly. Not long after my "good" mile I started to feel my right hamstring tighten and get that "heavy" feeling. I did few short and long strider-style moves in effort to relax the bombing muscle. No luck. At the end of the next mile I was stopped and stretched over a guardrail at the Lester River some 5 miles from my warm house. I had to walk for a few minutes and then slowly worked into a very subtle shuffle in hopes to keep me from freezing and get home. My leg allowed this shuffle until the hills of Tischer Creek. I walked up to the streets and then ran the rest of the way home.
The next two days and today I have been focusing on keeping my low back, piriformis and hamstrings loose and it seems to be working. I have a Chiropractor appointment on Tuesday and I hope to keep some form of respectable running until then. My hope is that this is just a minor bump in the road and a reminder to vary my running terrain. I have been putting in quite a lot of miles on the single track this January and I think my back finally said, "enough". Once things loosen up I may return to the awesomeness of those trails but by then they might be a big pile of mud.
Here are Tuesday and Wednesday's running:
Tuesday:
Another easy, recovery style run in the wonderful single track trails of Hartley Park. No complaints and many more miles to do there. Legs did appreciate another easy day and I hope all systems go for tomorrow.
1:16:13 8.1 miles (trails)
Wednesday:
Out to Lakeside on the bike paths for some up tempo running. I did close to a 3 mile warm up then worked into my steady state. The plan was to run 50 minutes at 600-605 pace. As I started the session I felt a bit flat and soon ran on effort and didn't look at my gps for pacing. I then started to feel better and took a gel soon after only to have my right upper hamstring tighten up on me and force me to a walk. A slow hobble home and I had self-prescribed a couple days off of running. Lot's of stretching and strength work for the low back and hips.
Total: 1:33:45 12.4 miles
*6:09,6:14,6:13,6:06,6:04,6:55.....
Thursday and Friday:
off, no running. just stretching and strength work.
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