Well, I am feeling much better but I am still not fully recovered yet…and it is killin’ me. It is so hard to go from 40 miles per week to zero, then trying to ease back into it. At times I think it would not be as hard if I were actually injured, but I am fine. Or perhaps this actually does qualify as an injury? You tell me, does letting your body heal after a marathon or ultra-marathon actually qualify as recovering from an injury? I think the big difference is a mental one. In my mind I am perfectly healthy and therefore should be able to run normally. However, my knee joints and calves do not agree. I guess this is what I get for running two marathons and a 50 mile ultra all within 8 weeks. (With the second marathon and ultra being a mere two weeks apart.)
Last week I did manage to get in a 6 miler on the weekend, but it pretty much left me icing my knees for the rest of the day. A couple of days later I did do 4 miles and it felt good. Today I am planning on another 3 mile run, and may once again try to do a semi-long run this weekend. I sure hope I am to the point where I can start training again. (At least slowly and short miles.) I think my muscles seem fine, but my heart rates seems higher than it was when training regularly. While I am sure I will get it back quickly, it is nagging me a little.
I am planning on running the San Francisco marathon in the end of July, so it would be nice to get the training under way. Luckily the race is 22 weeks away, so this little inconvenience should not affect the overall training schedule. This break is also kind of like a blessing in disguise because my plantar faciitis has also healed a bit. I can still feel a little pain in the mornings when I wake and take my first steps, but overall I think it is much better than before.
One response to “Taking it easy is killin’ me!”
Okay, take this comment with a grain of salt since I don’t practice it but I DO preach it!! You do not need to rack back up the miles quite yet and you will reap the rewards if you give your body time to heal properly. I used to work with two Olympic Marathon Trials runners and BOTH told me it takes a full day of recovery for every mile you raced. That’s 50 days, in case you couldn’t count :). We don’t NEED to take that much time off, but that’s how long it take the body to full heal. You didn’t race all 50 miles so therefore you don’t need 50 days but you put your body thought some serious strain and it’s screaming at you to take a rest. You have a lot of time before S.F. and if ya wanna BQ, then go at it the right way…not the Jill way :). The last thing you need right now is a long run. Do several shorter runs, the longer one is just going to stress the body right now and that’s not what we want. In a couple weeks, start building up the base up and then start cranking in speedwork. 🙂