Tuesday, January 3, 2012

Well, every run can't be great...


...and this morning's run certainly wasn't. 

It isn't that anything terrible happened. 

  • I wasn't attacked either physically or verbally by man, woman, child, or beast. 
  • I didn't injure myself in a new and exciting way (or even an old and/or dull one). 
  • The wind was mild, and the temperature was brisk but not all that bad (35 degrees). 
  • And my normal 20 minute pre-run warm-up on my elliptical even felt OK (not great, and I WAS wishing it to be over already about 10 minutes in, but I've had worse on it).

Maybe it was the fact that this was to be my first day back to work since the Friday before Christmas, which meant that the 3:50 a.m. alarm was required.

Maybe it was because the inside of my left knee is still a little sore from my long run last Thursday, and I was a bit worried that it would keep me from running this morning since it sent me a couple of rather jolting reminders that it didn't feel well during my first few steps on the elliptical. I started yesterday's run VERY easy and slow, but my pace still settled to something "normal" for me now (10:09 - 9:23 - 9:19 - 9:19 - 8:51 for a 4.17 mile run).

Whatever it was, I most definitely did NOT resemble this during this morning's run



No sir. 

I started slow like I did yesterday, and the tenderness in the knee eased after about an 1/8 of a mile or so, but the whole thing felt like a slog, and every quarter mile was an effort. I came a lot closer to resembling this...




Only just between you and me, he seems a bit happier about his outing than I was feeling in the dark this morning. It still wasn't all that bad (10:37 - 10:10 - 9:59 - 10:03 - 10:08 for a 4.05 mile run)....but it just wasn't one of those "in the zone and loving it" runs like my friend at Impossible Is Nothing wrote about on Monday.

Oh well, to be honest I very rarely feel like a thoroughbred galloping on the beach on my runs anyway, and probably all too often look like my relaxed-faced basset hound friend above regardless of how I feel. At least I was healthy enough to run, and tomorrow is another day. I'm still less than a week out from my 26+ mile long run, so perhaps my hopes are a bit high on the recovery timing. 

I'll take the slow ones over the days when I'm just not physically capable anyway, and I do want to give my old body time to recover...sort of ease into it gently. Maybe I need to be a bit MORE gentle for a day or so.

I hope everyone's day has been super (or at least acceptable) today (first day back to work for quite a few of us), and that your running is enjoyable.

No matter how you might look while you're doing it.  :-)

6 comments:

  1. Hey Mike,

    First off, thanks for the "shout out".....this blogging thing is COOL!

    That said, you and I both know that not every run is going to be a great one. In fact, I would argue that most of them are "run of the mill"...which makes the really good ones stand out so!

    Your long run is most definitely still having an impact on your activities, and I think you've figured out that you need to go a bit easier (or have lower expectations for a while) until you've fully recovered. Certainly, it's giving you a good idea of what it's going to be like after your marathon.

    Trust me....it's a rare day when I look like a thoroughbred......'cause even at my best, I'm decidedly (and proudly!) a Clydesdale!

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  2. I usually have some less-than-great runs after a marathon. Recovery is key, so be easy on yourself. I am still so impressed that you went out and ran 26.2 on your own, not as part of a race, on an unsupported course.

    I used the recovery tips you shared with me, and I was finally able to run again last night. THANK YOU.

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  3. You just ran a marathon-distance training run, don't worry about it! Like you said, not every run is going to be great and that's how we improve. If everything was great and easy it would get boring, wouldn't it?

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  4. I love this. I often FEEL like the horse, but I'm pretty sure I still look like the hound. :)

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  5. The dog... I can hardly breathe... hilarious...

    How do I stop from... "Turtling"? I'm big into technical term thingys, I will be "borrowing" this one. I didn't have a problem with falling forward. I wear the floatation belt LOW on my waist. The lower it is, the easier holding "run" position seems to be...

    I do interval/brick workouts that look like this:
    300m swim
    20 min "slog" - 5 min moderate, 10 min intervals, 5 min moderate.
    400m swim
    15 min "slog" - 10 min intervals, 5 min moderate
    300m swim (cool down).

    Sometimes I reverse it so the slog precedes the swim. The longest I've gone was 1 hour "long run", but I will NEVER do that again. BORING. Way better to interval/brick.

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  6. I have a lot of those not so good run days, but having had to take off for a freaking decade (it seems. 18 months in reality), I am grateful to be out there running now, injury-free! Keep being strong...the good days are out there waiting for ya!

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