Fallback

Well this week was more of a fallback than I had in mind. 

Here are the numbers:

Running: 4 miles (on a plan of 32)

Cycling: 20+ miles (on a plan of 0)

Injuries: 1 (on a plan of 0)

Last Tuesday I headed down to the lake from here on a gentle 5 miler. The first 2 miles went by quickly, a nice run downhill. The next mile I looped around a tree a 1/2 mile around the lake and then headed back towards home. I passed one of the marathon training LMJS guys headed the other way and said Hi. Heading back home, initially, my left foot felt a little funny. Like the tongue of my shoe had moved to an annoying location. Kind of a pressure in the outside of my foot. 

I passed a woman who noted how much energy I looked like I had. In fact, I felt good. I was thinking about how well the run was going after the 17.5 mile trail run just a few days before. It was exactly 300 miles since we began training for this marathon. Pretty good!

Then my foot started to ache. Hmmm. I ran a little further. It hurt some more. I stopped and started to walk. I was a mile out from home. By the time I got home I couldn't put my foot on the ground. Nice.

I took the rest of the day off work. I didn't really know how I was going to get in there anyway. I iced. I Advil'ed (verb). I elevated. I compressed. I hoped around.

Things didn't really get too much better for a few days. I posed to Hal Higdon's message board. He said it wasn't a good sign. I might have to taper. My doctor told me to rest it. It was probably a stain. Since there was no sore spot to touch it probably wasn't a stress fracture. 

So, I've taken the whole week off, my second last build up week. I didn't go to work (they let me work from home), and concentrated on my resting and icing. By Saturday I could walk around. Kelly and I went out to Moraga to crew Patty on her 14 miler. That was fun, but I wished I was out running of course.

The cause of my injury is anyone's guess, but the suspects are:

1. The 18 miler did the damage, something I didn't feel at the time finished it off.
   
2. I was trying to break in new shoes and instead they broke me.
   
3. I walked around the lake the day before wearing a pair of sandles.
   
4. I only had 300 miles in me.
   

Who knows?!  

Bike

The good news, since I'd like to reflect on the good parts of my marathon jeopardizing week, is that I finally got a mountain bike. It's not a very expensive model, but I like it. In fact Patty had to warn my that it wasn't coming to bed with us.

On Sunday I did two rides. One out on a rail trail we run on (I mean I used to run on, when I was, you know, a runner), and in the evening I did I trail ride in the area of our trail half marathon. Both were a lot of fun.