Restart

The good news is, my left foot feels much better!  It turns out Douglas was just what I needed to get things sorted out a bit.  The bad new is, my plantar facciitis in the right foot is acting up.  I'm still recovering from my week long binge in Denver.  I gained a solid 4 pounds during that week.  Damn vacations; so necessary, but so tough to be good.  So this week is crazy with work which means late nights and early mornings.  Next week I am going to start the training schedule again.  I'm going to take it a lot slower this time.  I am going to start with the 5k schedule and try to knock out a couple of those and then move on to a 10k and then the half marathon.  Wish me luck!  I'll try to get back on track with updates on a weekly basis as well.  Thanks for keeping up!

Run Coach

First of all: a HUGE congratulations to Paula L. for her strong return to the world of Marathons today!  I'm very proud of you and very grateful for all your support while I have been trying to make a 1/2 marathon a reality.  Welcome Back!!

A couple weeks ago was the Iron Girl 1/2 Marathon that I had signed up for.  I went to the race and worked as a volunteer.  I picked up a a few tips a long the way and a lot of motivation.  The participants were very appreciative which was great.  Hopefully I'll be out there next year.

What a great week in Denver and I am not even a little bit excited about going back to work and checking about 400 emails and actually earning a paycheck.  The last 9 days were filled with great dinners, time with Jared & Heather, a top-notch Derby party, great friends, and incredible views.  I even squeezed in a few workouts.

Jared asked it I wanted to do a yoga class with him & Heather while I was there.  I hadn't been to one in a while so I thought it would be good.  Well, it was hot yoga and I hadn't been to one of those since I lived in North Liberty.  To say I was out of my element would be the understatement of the century.  Heather is awesome at yoga so I should have known better than to go to the same class as her.  Especially as hot class.  I have a tough time breathing when I'm in Colorado so of course I struggled even more than normal.  Oh and to top it off, when I was walking out of the class I slipped in a puddle of someone else's sweat and fell on my butt.  Gross.

I met with a running coach, Douglas Wisoff, while in the area.  As I have mentioned before, my brother has worked with him for quite a while and has seen great results.  I am very grateful I was able to work with him.  He was also working with a runner that had traveled all the way from London for his guidance.  He's good.  

I learned a lot over a couple hours.  It turns out I am not good at walking.  I have never thought so much about walking before in the last 30+ years.  I roll onto the outside of my feet when I stand, walk, and run.  I knew I did this, but didn't realize just how much.  Douglas disagreed with my diagnosis of tendonitis, but thinks it is more likely that my foot is badly bruised.  He didn't feel there was any reason to delay returning to my cardio routine any longer. He feels that with the exercises and modifications he taught me, as well as a slow return to jogging things should come together much more easily.  Over the last week I have been practicing what he taught me and the pain in my foot has decreased by more than half.  I went to the gym to day and was on the treadmill for an hour with minimal irritation and very little swelling.  I am going to hold off on jogging for a while yet since the walking still requires a good deal of awareness and correction.  I'm back to square one.  I'm going to shoot for a 5k by the end of the summer, a 10k by the end of the year, and hopefully by next spring I will be able to tackle a 1/2 marathon.  Slow and steady and hopefully no more injuries now that I know a little more about how I should be doing this.  Stay tuned!