Weeks 4-9... I am such a bad blogger!

So, it's been a bit. Can I just say oops? Rather than post all my stats (which would take forever), I'll just use this update as more of a generalized update. Between January 30 (day after my last blogged run) and March 13 (today, even though my last run was March 11), I have run 18 times for a total of 98.67 miles. I should have 24 runs for a total of 149 miles. I missed a couple mid week runs because of my work schedule and my refusal to do anything over 3 miles on the treadmill now (there's something about my form on the treadmill that is no bueno!), one 12 mile run because of a stomach bug, and 3 runs this week because of an injury. The missed runs this week include today's 16 mile run.

I'm not exactly sure what is wrong with me. An old ankle injury started bothering me on my Friday run last week (March 4). I cut the run a little short to let it recover for my long run Sunday. It was doing OK until about mile 5 on my Sunday (March 6) run. I think I changed my gait to allow me to keep running with less ankle pain, which helped... for a bit. Then my heel/back of my foot/ankle started having serious pain around mile 10. I, like an idiot, was too stubborn to stop. I finished the run (14.5 miles) but after cooling down could hardly bear weight on it without severe, shooting pain. The pain continued into Monday as I hobbled around work all day. Fine, I though, I'll take a couple days off to let it heal. So I skipped the Tuesday and Thursday runs. It still hurt but was definitely feeling better so I thought, let's try the Friday run before heading out on my 16 mile run Sunday. I only ran 2 miles Friday because the pain became so horrible I knew I couldn't finish my planned 4 miles. I actually got out my crutches Saturday because I couldn't bear weight on it all without almost crying.

I have googled heel pain but none of the "regular" running injuries seem to have my symptoms. I am going to take a full week of running off (which as I said earlier, includes the 16 I was supposed to do today). Depending on how it's feeling as the week progresses, I may even suck it up and make a trip to the doctor to see if we can figure out what is going on. You can be damn sure that I will be running 26.2 miles on May 1, though! I'm just hoping I can do the half marathon I wanted to do next weekend, too. I promise to be a better blogger from now on and will keep you updated on my recovery and the rest of my training!

And Here's to Week 2!!

Well, week 2 of training has come and gone! I put in a total of 16.30 miles this week and I kept all of my average minute/mile times under 13:00 minutes! This is something that makes me happy because every little bit I take off of my average time gets me closer to my goal pace. Other than my left ankle feeling a bit sore today, I am feeling great!

Monday, January 17
Miles - 3.25
Total Time - 00:40:13
Average minute/mile - 12:22
Location - Ardmore Regional Park
Thoughts - A good run! It was a nice day. My time would have been better if I would have either paused the time at the stop light both ways OR not have been stuck at the light both ways for pretty much the entire light cycle. Oh, and an ant bit me while I was cooling down and stretching by my car... it freaking hurt!

Wednesday, January 19
Miles - 4.01
Total Time - 00:51:33
Average minute/mile - 12:51
Location - YMCA Treadmill
Thoughts - Went OK. Definitely my worst run of the week. I was crazy thirsty on this run. I didn't drink enough water and I had a salty lunch. I didn't pay attention to my note to self last week I guess! Lesson officially learned! I did keep my average time under 13 minutes though, so that's a plus. :)

Friday, January 21
Miles - 3.00
Total Time - 00:37:13
Average minute/mile - 12:24
Location - YMCA Treadmill
Thoughts - This was supposed to be a Thursday run but my schedule got screwed up and I didn't get to run on Thursday. I was a little worried about it being right before my "long" run of the week so I did take it a little easy. I was happy with this run.

Saturday, January 22
Miles - 6.04
Total Time - 01:15:53
Average minute/mile - 12:34
Location - Ardmore Regional Park
Thoughts - I was very happy with this run! I felt really good during and after and I kept my average minute/mile down! One negative to this run was that one of my shoelaces, which I always double knot, un-knotted and loosened (never actually completely untying). This caused my shoe to loosen and I managed to rub a blister on the bottom arch of my right foot. Silly me, I didn't stop because the "looseness" of the shoe wasn't obvious and since I didn't see shoelaces flopping around, I didn't stop to tie it. Another lesson learned, right?

At the beginning of the week, Saturday's run had me a bit nervous (actually every Saturday run has me nervous, haha) because last week wasn't great. This Saturday's run actually made me pretty excited, though. It helped me realize that this is only week 2! I still have 14 more weeks to get ready for this thing and I know I will keep getting better and stronger every week!

So, week 2 was a success! Here's to hoping week 3 is even better!