Wondering - could it have been too much?

Just a little over six weeks ago I ran the LA marathon, which, has clearly been the worst race that I ran in the two and change years I have been running. To run a 1:47 front on the marathon, only to barely be able to cross the line in four hours (4:02 actually) was very disappointing to me. I felt so well on the first 16 or 17 miles, but by the time Deana came onto the course at 19 (in front of the Staples Center) I was so gone and pissed off that my body was giving out at that point. The wheels had fallen off, but Deana wouldn't take that as an excuse - she pushed me to keep going - all I had wanted to do when I saw her was walk off the course and call it a day.



March 2, 2008 put my running addiction into perspective - I had been way too hard on my body since last July when I started training for NY, but it woudn't be til just about a month later where I would find out just how much damage I really did. I spent the next 4 weeks waiting to get an appointment with Dr. Callahan, a doctor at Hospital for Special Surgery that KC, my RWP teammate had recommended to me. I toned back on my runs, although I did take the week off after the race while I was still on vacation. Tuesday and Thursday runs have kept my sanity all through the year, and to those people who have joined along, I am sure they enjoyed the regularity and especially my presence :-). The Tues/Thurs runs after LA showed me very toned back, I had spent most of the winter pushing my body harder and harder on these runs. I felt like I needed to give my body a little break, but not lose much fitness before I ran the NJ marathon on May 4. The rest of the month was great running-wise, I had set a PR in my 10K time by over 45 seconds a mile....I didn't think I'd ever be able to run a 10K at a 7:45 pace!!!!!



April 1 was the first visit with Dr. Callahan. Got X-rays, but it showed nothing too out of the norm, but she wanted to get an MRI just to rule out a stress fracture. I still wanted to run, even with knowing that there might be something wrong as I knew it would be a while if i was injured to return to the road. Call it the stupid moment in me, KC wanted to kill me during our run the next day when I told her that. That sunday was the Cherry Blossom 10 miler, and I reallly wanted to go to it, and be able to run it, especially that Josh and Christine were going. I spent the better part of the past 3 or so months complaining how my leg was sore to Josh, and he's had problems of his own, so having both of us on the course in one piece was a good thing. Friday, I had made my appointment for the MRI on that coming Monday at 7, and left for DC hoping that monday would be a breeze.



Had an amazing weekend down in DC with some great RWP people. Definitely not taking the Chinatown bus again though :-).



Went in for the MRI monday morning, and I knew a return call from Dr. Callahan's office at 10am to my office to come back that afternoon to visit again was not a good sign. When you walk into an exam room where there is an aircast and an Ultrasound "bone healing system" (See it at left) it isn't a good sign, but the nurse tried to play it off as if it was left in the room.

It was in the next 5 minutes that I found out that I'd be taking a 2 month vacation from running. I was in a little bit of a shock, but at the same time, I knew exactly what I had done to get this. I had beaten the living shit out of my legs for almost 9 months - so something had to give. It's a tibial stress fracture, about an inch above the tibial malleolus (ankle bone on the inside of the right leg). She had said i was on borrowed time if i kept running, that it might have actually compounded and fully broken in another 2 weeks to a month. Lehigh Valley Half - gone. Jersey Marathon - gone. NYRR races - gone.

My body is definitely thanking me for the time off, in the past 9 days since i've stopped running, I've biked twice (have to stay in the saddle) and the leg has felt good. Plus this ultrasound system supposedly speeds up the healing by something like 30% in clinical trials - it helps when she says she uses this on the professional athletes she sees. Although I hate the fact that I'm off the road for another 1.5 months or so, I've become content with giving my body a rest. Biking and swimming will become my best friends over the next 2 months, and get me back just in time for my first triathlon - Tupper Lake sprint on June 29th. It might be high hopes, but I'd like to be in the top of my age group, and I think if I could pick up on the swim and bike, I'd have a good chance at it.....time will tell.

Enough for now, I have other things to finish tonight, although I like this whole blog thing......

And for those 2 of you, you know who you are, thanks for making me put my running into perspective - the two of you know I want to run for the rest of my adult life, and at the rate I was going, I wasn't going to hit my 30th bday. At least one of you can coach me in my swimming now!!