One more pacing gig and I am done for the spring/summer! While I can't wait to possibly do more in the fall, I think am going to have to re think how many I do, and especially how many I do post whatever marathon or 50K I do next spring. I think I need to remember I am 40, and while I am doing more cross training now, I am still not invincible, young, or resilient like a ton of my other running friends. I have very wonky bio mechanics that my Chiro and sports massage guy are trying to fix, but it is slow going and that fact will always affect my ability to recover correctly. Plus, my overall pie in the sky is still my hitting the goals of my main race of each training cycle, and while pacing is super fun and I love it, I need to keep in mind why I run. Honestly, I may need to re evaluate that thought process anyway and look at shorter distances/less races period. Whew, that is a lot of typing the word goal. Shall we begin?
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| A little bit of Buttons |
Monday: Memorial day, so day off of work, sort of. I started off the day with a nice long bike ride while talking with my mommy. Since I am not doing long commutes, we are not getting our talking time in like normally, so we have to get it at other times. When I got back, we headed to the shop to do some work, and then over to the pool for some pool time. Unfortunately, someone pood in the pool and we had to get out, but honestly, we had been there for hours and I was ready. We did some playing at the park before a trip to sonic for slushes and pretzels and more work. I could have gone to bed at like 8 pm, I was so exhausted! Andrew is so much more adventurous in the pool now, and while it is fun to be able to let him do his thing, he also wants to be in the deeper pool more and jumping off of the sides more and all of that fun. Lucky for me, Mel's two kiddos happened to be at the pool to and they took GREAT care of Andrew, which took some of the pressure off of me. I have a feeling we will be at the pool a lot this summer!
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| First day of Boys and girls club and we are a wee bit sunburnt |
Tuesday: I was suppose to give my injuries/niggles 8-10 days off and I wanted one run before my next chiro visit. I wanted a short run just to see how I felt, so I could go in and tell him exactly what felt like what. What I didn't want was half a mile run followed by lightening, followed by me sprinting home. I also didn't want the horrible morning nausea that is coming with my steroids, so I decided to use the mile as my warm up, eat something really quickly and get my stomach settled, and then head back out post dropping Andrew off. The dogs were pretty confused, but I don't play around with lightening, especially when it goes from 18 miles away to 3 miles away pretty darn quickly. We got in three more with some walk breaks and I am VERY happy to say that everything felt great! I am sad though because it is already pretty hot early in the morning so 4 am wake up calls are going to be back on the schedule so that the dogs can come with from now on.
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| Santa came early at the shop! A new welding table and a new to us forklift! |
Wednesday: The first day of sylvan mornings started and I slept in. The roids have been keeping me up at night, and for whatever reason, I actually got to sleep at a decent hour and stayed asleep. I can work anywhere for Coleman Electric, so I got up and did some computer work, and then headed to town for Andrew's tutoring. I envisioned my day to look quite nice, some time in Manhattan, some KSU time, errands, and then back to Wamego. Hopefully it was just the roids, but I felt like i was a ping pong ball going from one end of town to the other, and I did NOT like it. I hope the whole summer won't be this crazy as we settle into a routine, and I hope that a lot of this feeling all over the place is more the steroids. I am a control freak, I like a schedule and my summer is looking NUTSO.
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| FRECKLES! |
Now onto my chiro visit. A lot to unpack, so here goes nothing. Again, I am feeling very out of sorts these days thanks to the meds for poison ivy. One one hand, huge improvement, probably mostly due to the steroids, but also to my dedication to cross training/barre/rest. I am very honest when I say that I didn't realize how much pain I was in on the daily from my hip/foot till I had none. Wow. It's actually pretty amazing. I did need a break and I do recognize that, but I also like time lines and neat little schedules. What my chiro wants me to do doesn't follow any schedules, AND it may cost me a ton of money in co pays and out of pocket. My big WHAT IF right now is what if I scrap all of my summer/fall plans, work towards getting everything back in line and right, and then as soon as I start going back to training for say a spring race, it all goes to hell again because this is my body and this is how I am no matter what type of PT/massage/chiro I do? What if this is the best and I am just on a time line for destruction at some point? Right now we are talking about no biking, no running, no nothing except maybe pool running, till I can pass some functional tests. I can pool run Tues/Thurs/Friday and Sat at our local outdoor pool, but it just isn't the same, not even as much as biking. It could take a week or two or it could take months. I am not a fan. Plain and simple. I am willing to give up high mileage for low mileage, but i need some sort of mileage. I need to think this out and really talk about this in detail with my chiro as far as can we really even remotely fix me.
Thursday: Easy run. I needed to get out and test out the tape. I had emailed my pace leader to let him know about the steroids and how they were making me feel. I am truly worried about the way they make me feel + heat. He said that I could change with another slower pacer to see if going any slower might help, but my fear is that more time on hot pavement isn't going to help. My friend Lindsey has decided to hang out with my pace group and make sure I am okay, which is a huge load off of my shoulders, because I know if I pass out or start puking, she can take my stick and finish out my pace group for me, as well as get me to medical help. I tried a run walk method of 4 minutes of running and 1 minute of walking since i have pretty much no acclimation to the humidity at this point other than biking. I also got up early, ate, then headed out versus trying to go out fasted. I seemed okay, didn't have that need to puke or pass out this time, which gives me confidence for this weekend.
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| the sky looks painted |
The dogs were also super stoked about being out and about. Not getting to exercise them this summer is what scares me too if I can't run. They need the runs as much as I do!
Friday: Travel day! I worked half a day at the shop, did a million errands, and then headed out to KC to meet up with my pal Lindsey at LivingLovingRunner. I am so blessed that I have so many friends that have parents that live in KC that open their houses to me so I can stay for free.
We hit up the expo. Excuse the drunk face, but I was laughing so hard at Lindsey taking my picture pointing to my name on the name board. Also excuse the pred pudge. I think have gained almost 10 lbs just being on the roids at this point. The expo was pretty small and kind of disappointing compared to the first time I ran Hospital Hill. There were a few small running stores and a few races with booths, and that was about it. The crowd was also pretty small, probably because the 5K that they do on Friday evening got canceled due to high heat and horrible humidity, so none of those runners were there. Maybe that was why the vendors were so few and far between??? I volunteered at the Pacing booth, and talked to a few people about pacing, but mostly met and talked to some new pacers I had never run with. We headed home around 8 pm and got some grub around 9:30, and then set out our flat runners and hit the hay. Since I have been having major sleeping issues thanks to the roids, it was actually "early" for me to turn in:)
Saturday: Hospital Hill day! I will put everything in a race recap
here. The race actually turned out to be very nice weather wise, thanks to some storms rolling through right before the start of the race. Spoiler, my body felt GREAT and I had a GREAT time!
Sunday: Mud Run in Topeka! We did this run last year and while we had a ton of fun, Andrew refused to get into the mud obstacles. This year I am happy to report we got a little bit more muddy but he was still pretty hesitant to get down and dirty.
He did a few of the obstacles, sort of then dumped a ton of mud on me at the mud pie station which is fine, and then played in the hose. We had fun, mostly getting drenched by the fire department hose and with the snow cones, but he did try a second round of running this year, which I didn't figure he would even do a first round so there is that. It's a great cause for a great place and we will probably be back next year to get muddy again!
Not sure what next week is going to bring. I know it will be busy with me working both jobs in earnest. May just do low mileage, bike, and barre and see what happens or may just leave out running and bike and barre. Need to get to Manhattan and get a belt for pool running and get a pass, so I can actually go over the lunch hour. After HH my foot felt fine and also the day after was a little sore, but nothing horrible. I feel like we are on the mend, but I know that PF can be a long road so I am not holding my breath for a quick cure. On top of all of the other things I am doing, I am also going to go to my local running store and try on some Hokas as that was a common shoe to try for PF as recommended by the pacers at HH this year. I am also going to incorporate some muscle flossing and some micro flossing in and see if that helps as well. As always, have a great rest of your weekend and upcoming week! Check back for updates on the soap opera I call as the body falls apart :)
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