Mileage Reporting 47th Week of 2012

[Bare Lee]

3 mi.
Was just going to do three miles on my way to picking up the kids. I have a bit of a sore throat, and what with last weekend's knee strain, it seemed sensible to limit today's run. But after a bit I started feeling pretty good, so decided to extend the run to five miles or so. No matter, three miles was the natural limit. Some ITBS came on quickly on the outside of my left knee just before hitting the three-mile mark. So stretched it out and massaged the hammies and side enough to walk on it, but I wasn't sure I could still make the kids cut-off time at Discovery Club. I was still about two miles out and limping slightly. So I called my brother for help.

Once again, I got lackadaisical about stretching and massaging in between runs, and paid the price. Oh well, at least it's nothing serious, just a strain that rest and pulling back a bit should take care off. More wounded pride though.

 

[scedastic]

5 glorious bf miles, ~45degrees F, damp and cloudy but no rain. I ran around campus and the adjacent neighborhoods.
I was tired, fighting off a cold maybe, a bit wheezy this morning, maybe from allergies, so it took everything in me to force myself out of the office, but once I had about half a mile, life was sweet.
You all with the pretty sweet smooth sidewalks got it sooo good.

 

[rickwhitelaw]

Sunday: off
Monday: 5 miles easy. My hips have been a little sore from last week.
Tuesday: 9 miles. Started out with my new Altra Superiors (my first run in shoes, not counting sandals, in 9 months). No insoles, rock plates, or socks. 1.5 miles warm up in the shoes. 6 miles barefoot with a few faster intervals thrown in. It feels good to run fast. Loosened up my hips a little. 1.5 miles back in the Altras. Ended up with a small blister on one foot and sore ankles and arches. Why does it have to be so hard going back to shoes? My legs felt heavy and feet not as flexible with the shoes on. On the plus side, I could cruise on my graveled roads. Tomorrow I'll try them out on a rocky hill behind my house. As much as I want to stay barefoot, I need to break in these shoes a little.

 

[rickwhitelaw]

a bit wheezy this morning, maybe from allergies, so it took everything in me to force myself out of the office, but once I had about half a mile, life was sweet.

I deal with some hay fever and allergies (more so now that the pets are in the house because of the cold). Sometimes the first part of the run is a struggle, then everything clears out. It's so amazing. Beats medication and puffing on an inhaler all the time.

 

[happysongbird]

Monday - rode the spinning bike 60 minutes. I really wasn't feeling well.
Tuesday - was supposed to go on a last easy run before a T-day 5K fun run early AM on Thursday. Ended up going 4 miles, but it felt hard.
Wednesday - rest day before the race.
Thursday - We are also volunteering, so we'll be leaving the house at 5:15 AM! Race at 8 AM. I will have help cooking the dinner, so maybe I'll get a nap!

 

[scedastic]

I deal with some hay fever and allergies (more so now that the pets are in the house because of the cold). Sometimes the first part of the run is a struggle, then everything clears out. It's so amazing. Beats medication and puffing on an inhaler all the time.

Running/exercise doesn't ever seem to bother my asthma one way nor for the better (though I'm sure it does help long term), unless I get exposed to allergens during the run, which happens often.
For me, it's the smoke from chimneys and leaf burning at this time of the year; I catch a bit of it ,and I'll wheeze a few days, or worse, get an attack right then and there. We're out in the country, but the houses aren't all that spread out, and my neighbors looooove burning leaves on windy days.
I also have mold and dust mite allergies, but those have gotten way way better since I went through the allergy injections for several years. Trees and smoke from burning tree bits (wood/leaves/etc) linger.
We also have a wood stove as a primary source of heat. Love that country livin.
Running at night (most chimneys are cooled down and no one wakes up at 5am to burn leaves), and today, running in the college town where no one burns things left and right, prevent most of the bad issues.

 

[scedastic]

3 mi.
Was just going to do three miles on my way to picking up the kids. I have a bit of a sore throat, and what with last weekend's knee strain, it seemed sensible to limit today's run. But after a bit I started feeling pretty good, so decided to extend the run to five miles or so. No matter, three miles was the natural limit. Some ITBS came on quickly on the outside of my left knee just before hitting the three-mile mark. So stretched it out and massaged the hammies and side enough to walk on it, but I wasn't sure I could still make the kids cut-off time at Discovery Club. I was still about two miles out and limping slightly. So I called my brother for help.

Once again, I got lackadaisical about stretching and massaging in between runs, and paid the price. Oh well, at least it's nothing serious, just a strain that rest and pulling back a bit should take care off. More wounded pride though.

You were just looking for a reason to write lackadaisical.

 

[Bare Lee]

You were just looking for a reason to write lackadaisical.

Guilty as charged--it's one of my favorite words. But it's true; a little stretching and a lot of deep massaging and the leg feels fine. The really good news is that the interior spot, the MCL injury, has been fine for a couple of weeks now. So just have to be gentle with this ITBS, but I should be able to keep running shorter distances. My sore throat is getting a bit worse though. I'll try to sleep it off today, since I'll be with our toddler all day. He's got the stomach bug I had last week (he just threw up), and my wife has a full day of classes today. Probably will skip my strength training and save it for Turkey day. Good luck to all who are doing Turkey trots.

 

[NickW]

Guilty as charged-it's one of my favorite words. But it's true; a little stretching and a lot of deep massaging and the leg feels fine. The really good news is that the interior spot, the MCL injury, has been fine for a couple of weeks now. So just have to be gentle with this ITBS, but I should be able to keep running shorter distances. My sore throat is getting a bit worse though. I'll try to sleep it off today, since I'll be with our toddler all day. He's got the stomach bug I had last week (he just threw up), and my wife has a full day of classes today. Probably will skip my strength training and save it for Turkey day. Good luck to all who are doing Turkey trots.

Sucks to be you right now. I do not envy you to be home with a sick toddler. Hope he gets well soon.

 

[Abide]

A longer trail run this morning maybe an hour and a half. Have a good Thanksgiving everyone.

Lee how are those illicit drugs working?

 

[Bare Lee]

You mean the Hammer Tissue Rejuvenator/histological fountain of youth? I take one or two a day. Hard to say if they help, as I would get better anyway. Need some kind of control, which is not possible with n=1 sampling.

My MCL pain is all but gone though, not even noticeable while running. I just feel it a bit with lateral strain. So I've healed in about the same time frame that Jason gave for his owie last January.

I suppose I'll keep taking the Hammer capsules, now that I got a mild case of ITBS. One thing on yesterday's run though, is that I didn't wear my knee braces for the first time. I was using them mostly to keep the knee joints nice and warm, but it was nice out so I figured I didn't need them. But maybe they really do help support the joint. I'll try to use my ITB band thingy too. So far I've just been using it to hold the ice packs in place over the MCL. I really don't want to be one of those guys that has to run with braces all the time though. That would stink.

I've got a bit of a sore throat today, and feel run down cuz our toddler was sick through the night (but seems better now), so I didn't sleep much. So I'll use that as an excuse to shift my ST to tomorrow or the next day, which will give my left ITB another day or two to rest. Then I'll try another three-miler. I'll try to be more vigilante about rolling in the meantime. I think I'll try to keep mileage relatively low for the rest of this year, just focus on getting 100% healthy, and then start pushing it again in 2013. It sucks, cuz I have this tremendous urge to run farther and faster right now. I love the feeling of a good workout.

So, I guess to answer your question: I don't know if they work at all, and since I'm not much of a believer, they probably don't even have a placebo effect, but I'm taking them just in case.

If you were referring to other illicit pharmaceuticals, I feign ignorance.

 

[NickW]

5.5 miles in my new Pah Tempes. Greatest running sandal ever, that is if you don't like a strap in between your toes. I have two main critiques of this sandal though, which are relatively minor over all. The first is the excessive amount of sole. These could be trimmed up just a little bit so they aren't quite so long or wide. Relatively minor thing if you ask me as it did not cause me any problems other than when running through several flooded areas. It was fine in just an inch or two in water, but once you got into almost knee depth water all that excess sole acts as a paddle and resists the water making your legs tire out faster because they have to work harder to pull the sandal through the water.

The last minor problem I had was the extra strapping material used to tighten or loosen being on the inside of the foot. I have probably close to 4 inches or more of dangling strap there so occasionally as my leg was traveling forward the strap would whip the ankle or shin of the other leg. I tried securing that dangling bit under one of the other sections of strap but eventually it kept working it's way out. I'll either have to trim some of this or see if I can figure out a velcro securing system for this excess strap.

Other than those two things these were great through standing water, mud, rain, and hills. My feet felt very secure even through mud in these and my feet didn't slide around at all. I really like how they do not flop around on the foot and EVERY TIME the foot strikes the ground the sandal is in the same spot. This made it easy for me to adjust to the sandal and correct my form, learn how it feels to have a proper foot strike in this sandal.

 

[Spiderweb62]

Intervals this morning, 9x400m (1/4mi) @ about 4'25"/km, a bit faster than last week, but then last week was 800m. On tuesday I mentioned a pain in my ankle, this seems to have stabilised, I guess having a day off in between helps a lot with recovery !!

 

[PatrickGSR94]

Monday I tried going back to Week 2 of E25K and doing the running intervals at a faster pace, and the walking intervals at my normal slow running pace. Nope. Just couldn't do it. Not ready for that at all (my lungs that is). So I just did a slow run the whole time which worked out to 2.1 miles.

Tuesday I cycled my new winter training route near my office - an 8.6 mile loop. Last week I did it in 46 minutes, and then 45 minutes. Tuesday I did it in 39 minutes! There are 3 sizable hills on the route. Last Tuesday I had to stop on one of them. This Tuesday I didn't stop at all.

Today I'm off work thru Sunday, so I ran in my neighborhood for 30 minutes, 2.5 miles total workout.

So today marks 9 days in a row I have done some type of physical workout activity, either cycling or running. I've been running on M/W/F and cycling T/Th. Last weekend I cycled on Saturday and did some MTB trail riding on Sunday, part of a Trek factory demo event. Got to ride this $5K beast, and it was awesome:

 

[Sid]

I really don't want to be one of those guys that has to run with braces all the time though. That would stink.

Nah, get some KT. All the cool people are using it. It will shave hours off your time! This still counts as barefoot right, sort of?

 

[TheTechnobear]

Technobear, how do you measure your cadence ? I haven't found a decent app that does it well enough. I used iSmoothrun, but since moving to the iPhone5 it just does not record my cadence correctly

Ive got a garmin with a footpod which i fix to ankle with elastic.
Im surprised the iphones not working right though, as footpods work on the same tech as iphone has, perhaps its just a newness issue on iphone 5 that will get sorted with an app update.


Other news, i had to have minor surgery on tuesday (not runnng related) , and been told no runnnng till at least end of next week i suppose good for first few days for recovery time, and apart from that i'll do some stretching and feet exerises - perhaps a bit of barefoot walking too. (not allowed to raise HR/blood pressure)

Time off though, so think will be ordering some merrels (for the expected snow!) and a massage stick ...
Any recommendations - marathon stick, or the smaller one? (i'd like to roll calves and also I think tib anterior on the front)

 

[Bare Lee]

Any recommendations - marathon stick, or the smaller one? (i'd like to roll calves and also I think tib anterior on the front)

Bummer to hear about the time off. Hope the surgery was minor.
I got both the marathon and sprinter stick. The marathon stick is more flexible and a bit better for the calves. The sprinter stick is stiffer and I find works better on the shin muscles. If I were to get just one, I would get the sprinter stick. Or maybe try this one--it's small enough that you could take it along on runs. I just ordered one!

http://www.amazon.com/The-Stick-HD-1000-Little/dp/B001O0H436/ref=pd_sim_sg_2

​

The Stick Little Stick

by The Stick
4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (24 customer reviews) | Like (1)
List Price: $24.00
Price: $21.39

You Save: $2.61 (11%)

 

[NickW]

Bummer to hear about the time off. Hope the surgery was minor.
I got both the marathon and sprinter stick. The marathon stick is more flexible and a bit better for the calves. The sprinter stick is stiffer and I find works better on the shin muscles. If I were to get just one, I would get the sprinter stick. Or maybe try this one--it's small enough that you could take it along on runs. I just ordered one!

http://www.amazon.com/The-Stick-HD-1000-Little/dp/B001O0H436/ref=pd_sim_sg_2

​

The Stick Little Stick

by The Stick
4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (24 customer reviews) | Like (1)
List Price: $24.00
Price: $21.39

You Save: $2.61 (11%)

This is the one that I have. I really like it for both the shins and calves.

 

[Bare Lee]

This is the one that I have. I really like it for both the shins and calves.

Probably should've just gotten this one to begin with. Oh well. Now I have to find a good way to bring it along on my runs . . .

 

[happysongbird]

TD5K measures on Google Earth as 3 miles, so not quite a 5K. Still, had a good run with my Moc3's at an average 8:15 mm pace. Slow start with the masses. Managed to pass all the little kids I saw. And put in a good sprint at the end. I suppose now I know I can hold that pace comfortably for that far, I'm going to have to try for farther...