The Gradual Return

Don't Overdo it

My leg still doesn't feel perfect, but after describing the symptoms to my Doctor he gave me the green light to start doing some shorter runs.  I'm pretty sure its either going to get worse or get better, lets hope it does the later.  If it does get worse, he can do some additional diagnostics on me to figure out whats going on down there.

So what does easing back into it entail?  The first few runs were very short (only around 2 miles), and were actually alternating between walking and running.  I did a couple runs this weekend of around 3.5 miles of continuous running.  Monday will be rest from running (spinning class), Tuesday I'll go for around 4 miles, Wednesday rest again, and then Thursday I plan to check out my old fun run group for a 5 mile run.  That leaves Friday for rest, and another middle distance run Saturday.

I have heard countless stories of people who basically took out their pent up frustration out on themselves, going out and hammering 10 miles once they were cleared to run again, only to aggravate the injury (or start a new one?).  This is not my plan.  My plan is to come back slowly (but surely) for a successful winter training session.

The Next Few Months

My very general plan going forward is really just a month to month approach:

• November: Start doing some short runs, run/walk combos.  Continue to cross train and spin.  Try to work up to a 7-8 mile "long" run.
• December: Base building   Keep up the easy effort miles, but increase to 14-16 mile long runs.  Get my weekly mileage back up to around 40 Miles Per Week (MPW).  Keep cross training.
• January:   Speed training.  Keep up the 40-50 MPW, hit the track workouts Wednesday nights, and try to get a tempo in at race pace run in Sundays (race pace of either 10k for short runs < 5 miles or about a half-marathon race pace for runs under 10 miles).
• February, March: Ultra training.  Start increasing the long trail runs to greater than marathon distance (and time), do some back-to-back weekends, cap the mileage around 85 MPW.  Keep up a track workout or tempo run once a week to maintain speed.  Continue to spin/ crosstrain mondays and rest fridays (as usual).
• April, May: Race Time!

I then have have a Marathon in March, Boston Marathon in April (both run as training runs), and my goal race, the Northface Challenge 50 Miler on June 2nd.  I think there is also a 50k in there somewhere, as well as a 10k in Februay (a PR would be nice), a possible 10 miler later in February to get the most out of all that 10k speed, and a couple low key 5k races.

Clown Shoes

Or space boots, or snowboarding boots, or [insert funny shoe term here].

I started running in Hoka One One's, a ridiculous looking shoe that could be the answer to combat all that pavement pounding that seems to result in injury on me.  See below:

The Hoka One One "Bondi B" - road running model (though I heard
they work on trails too).

The sole has like 25% greater surface area than my other trainers!

Yes, they look like space boots; Yes they are huge (especially for my size shoe); but surprisingly "No" they don't weigh more than comparable running shoes.  In fact they are on the light side.  I plan on making them my everyday long mileage (on pavement) shoe.  So far so good - they feel light, nice and squishy, firm where you need it, and facilitate a mid-foot strike. Onward and upward.