Running For Trevor

Slept in really late this morning and didn't even get going until around 11am.  Took the pup to the track and walked a mile.  I felt okay and decided it may be beneficial to jog for a bit.  I was only planning a mile but ended up with 3 in barely under 30 minutes.  I feel really good and not necessarily any better or worse than I felt after UVM.  The quads are sore of course but nothing abnormal which is good.  The key now will be recovering slowly and being smart. 

The rest of the day may qualify in  my top 10 laziest days ever.  I literally sat around the house and watched movies on TV while icing, napping, and eating.  A true day of rest!

3 miles, 8:58 pace.  I actually feel pretty good which only means I need to practice better self control this week and not do anything stupid!

More marathon thoughts:  I didn't want to make my race report any longer than it already was so I saved some crap for today.

• Nutrition/Hydration:  I'm sure nobody really cares about this but I like to have record for myself.  It is good to look back and see what I did when things work correctly.  Breakfast was a bagel, banana, and 20 ounces of gatorade.  At least 55 grams of carbs.  I took 3.5 gels throughout the race at miles 9, 15, 20, and half a gel at 24.  I drank plenty of fluids....maybe even too much for the cooler temps.  But knowing my high sweat rate and history of dehyration I would rather be safe than sorry.  Having my family on the course with water bottles the last 8 miles of the race really helped and made hydrating feel easy.  Between the gatorade and gels I'd estimate that I took in about 700 calories throughout the run. 
• Now that I have officially set a PR in every single distance including PR'ing in the marathon 3 times I think I can (maybe) officially retire the "PR outfit"?  I am the most superstitious person ever and have drawers of cute running clothes but just haven't been able to stray from the PR outfit!
• While I'm on the topic of clothing I'd like to blame my marathon brain on the fact that I ran with one arm sleeve up and one down for the last 16 miles of the marathon.  Seriously hilarious...wow!  And for those that have asked the arm sleeves are $1.00 socks that I cut off...to make into arm warmers.  I had full intentions of ditching them after the first few miles.
• My garmin measured 26.5 miles which clearly the course is certified and is only 26.2 and if I'm really that stupid and ran my tangents that badly than I'm just an idiot.  The more likely explanation is that the satelite reception in the canyon was off.  Anyway the point is I need to learn how to auto lap on my watch because being that far off of the course markings really messed with my head towards the end.  The main reason I am upset about this is since I measure .5 instead of .2 it shows that I only mustered up a wussy 6:28 pace for my final kick.  I'm pretty sure I was going faster than that for the actual .2 and I'd really like to know my split!
• My half splits I think (garmin was off and my chip did not register at the halfway mark)were 1:27:38/1:31:07.  A positive split was inevitable on this course but I have to wonder how much the feet pain through miles 15-23 slowed me down.  I guess I'll never know and will just have to run it again next year to find out.
• My feet are fine now and it is frustrating that this happens when running hills/distance.  I'd like to get it figured out before I attempt another marathon.  I need someone to watch or video tape me running hills and try to pinpoint what it is I'm doing wrong.  I might not be able to change my form but I'd like to try to figure out if that is possible.  I've also heard that the Newton brand shoes offer more support in the forefront so maybe I'll experiment with trying some different shoes as well.
• I did not give any credit in my report yesterday to the amazing organization of the event.  TOU truly has it all figured out and if it weren't for the Moose on the road I may have strayed off course towards the end.  "Just follow the moose", and "Common you can make it to the next green Moose" may have gone through my head more than once...
• I had created dedication miles before the race for miles 18-26 and as cheesy as it is I think it really helped.  18-20 were ran for my training partner in crime JulieC!  She always makes me go fast at the end of a LR and I just pictured her by my side and us running fast together just like in training.  This is also when the feet pain was intense and I know Julie is constantly running through pain so it helped me to focus.  21-23 were for my friend Julia who was running a 50 mile trail race in Wisconsin at the same time I was running a marathon.  23-25 were for my family and ironically this is were I saw my family the most so that helped.  25 was for Sam and 26 of course for Trevor.

Okay enough crap for now.  Tomorrow I will bore you with my post marathon recovery rules.  I do not have an Andrea at my house so you all will have to hold me accountable! ;)

4.5 miles farm town loop, 8:53 pace.  So cold on the run I probably gained weight!

If I want to be more competitive with my running I probably need to learn to be more serious and quit hamming it up for the camera.....I've looked through everyones pictures and apparently I'm the only one that feels the urge to throw my hands in the air whenever I see a photographer. :)

PM:  15 minute walk with the pups while my nephew is asleep (am I a terrible babysitter?)  After several hours of day time soaps I was going crazy and the dogs were driving me crazy!

 Reverse Taper Rules:

Week 1:  No jogging longer than 40 minutes (except maybe sat?) & nothing faster than 8:30 pace.

Week 2:  Nothing longer than 60 minutes & nothing faster than 8 pace.

Post paces on FRB to stay accountable, have fun, get lots of sleep, find new friends to jog with, and eat plenty of good food! Anything I should add?

What a morning....lets just say there was enough walking involved in the 4 miles to make me late for work!  Random pain in my upper right calf/outside of the knee area.  Very, very odd and almost just feels like a big giant knot but it was painful enough to have me doing the walk of shame by 2.5 mi into the run.  I'm not jumping to any conclusions quite yet but this was definitely more than just fatigued post marathon legs.

50 min on the elliptical at the club house.  The radio at the club house is broken and I couldn't find my ipod so I spent the entire time contemplating a plan to come up with enough money to buy an Elliptigo.  I didn't come up with anything but it was a good distraction.

Short walk with the pup.  I jogged for 10 seconds (Izzy really wanted to chase a bird) and the massive knot seems to have moved to directly behind my knee and it feels like my lower leg may detach from my upper leg if I keep going.  I foam rolled again trying to work it out but I think I need to buy a tennis ball because the foam roller just isn't getting deep enough.

60 min on the elliptical.  Much more tolerable today because I had my new People magazine to read and my ipod. :)  Sure is hard spinning around endlessly on that thing when the weather is perfect outside though...

Short walk with the Pup and 20 min weights at home.

The leg is not any better and I have a bad gut feeling that this is more than just a minor setback.  I have a really high pain tolerance and when jogging or walking downstairs the pain is pretty high!  It's really hard to know though and in some ways it just feels like something needs to be popped back into place and everything would be okay.  Either way the silver lining is that walking and cross training do not seem to iritate it.  Looking back at my training in 2012 this is only the 3rd day I have taken completely off of running so I really have no room to complain.  I also have no races coming up so a short break might actually be a good thing.  I am not saying any of this is good but I'm really trying to be optimitic and celebrate the fact that I've had a great year and some time off (granted it's nothing major) is okay and maybe even necessary.  I'm going to get a bike from my parents house this weekend so hopefully that will help with the cross training.

I also talked to Jorge and he agreed with Bonnie & Bam that I should not foam roll or try to work things out on my own.  Initially I thought the pain was all in the upper calf but now that it is more apparent in the lower outside of the knee I need to be smart and not make it worse.  Thanks for listenning to my ramblings! :)

Yay I have internet at my house again.  Oh happy day!  It is slower than tar but man that was a rough 10 days without internet.  Now to explain the 6 miles.

AM #1: I got in my car this morning to drive to the gym and just couldn't bring myself to do it.  It was such a beautiful morning and I didn't care if I just had to walk for an hour I wasn't going to be stuck in a nasty gym on a Saturday morning.   After massaging out my upper calf with the techniques that Allie and Bam both suggested I thought just maybe I had worked something out and wanted to experiment. So I went with the Andrea Gallo technique and walked a half a mile and then gradually added jogging.  I have to admit that it still ached pretty bad for the first half mile of jogging but after a half mile the pain seemed to turn into just a dull stiff niggle in my upper calf.  I continued with the walk-jog technique for 3 miles and then just jogged the last 3.  I don't think I'm completely in the clear by any means but I do think that whatever is going on is in the calf and not the knee but the knee is the area most effected.  I also think it is just a knot and although I worked most of it out there is still a nagging niggle! 6 miles in exactly 60 minutes not including the first half mile that I walked.

AM #2:  Took Izzy out to a trail in Salem afterwards and walked 2-3 more miles.  I'm pretty sure my entire 8.5 mi today took me almost as long as the marathon last week.  But I did enjoy it!  Perfect weather today and I'm antsy to get back outside and go for a hike or something. 

I'm planning to get a deep tissue sports massage tomorrow and hopeful that it will work out the knot that seems to be causing all this pain.  Even if it does I'm taking it easy for 2-3 maybe more weeks.  It was so dang nice to just sleep in this morning and feel like I had a real Saturday!  It's been awhile since I haven't either raced or been way focused on training and I really enjoyed it.

PM:  Went for a hike up Payson canyon with the pup. Wow, wow, wow it is absolutely gorgeous up Payson Canyon right now.