Saturday, October 15, 2011

One Year On

On Monday it will be a year since my half Ironman. Quite a bit happened, much of it not good (athletic activity wise). Just after the race was over I developed plantar fasciitis. Never had it before but it hurt. I tried active release and massage but that didn't cut it, so I went to a podiatrist who gave me a cortisone shot (I was up all night afterwards - couldn't sleep at all). He also taped my foot. It did feel better after this so I had it taped for Bandera and decided I'd probably drop at the end of loop one (50K) but I'd see how I felt. The foot wasn't too bad but the rest of me was complaining so drop I did. I asked Joe if I could switch from 100 to 50 miles for Rocky Racoon, and he was cool with that. But 5 miles in I rolled my ankle really badly and had to stop. I spent a month in a boot and two more weeks in a soft brace. Then I started running again. Podiatrist said I should never run on trails and never further than a half Marathon :( So I went to physical therapy and they helped me a lot. I ran a couple 5k races in the blistering heat of August. Then I decided that what I had done training-wise for the last two years was not up to the task. I'd had several DNFs and was picking up injuries. So I decided to get a coach (Olga Varlamova). She has many 100 milers under her belt. So I'm 10 weeks in to her training program. It was unfortunate that last weekend I was supposed to race a half marathon on the road but it got cancelled becasue of the storms in the pre-race hours. So I'm signed up for Warda 25K as a substitute. Then ther will be some 50 ks and a couple 50 milers before the A-race in June: Old Dominion. I will post sporadically to let you know how I'm doing. I got an early birthday present from Andrew and Phoebe; a Garmin watch and heartrate monitor so now I can make my training sessions more effective.