Skip to main content

A Small Setback, But It's Early

So...I have a raging upper respiratory infection and ear infection. Causes absurd amounts of deep chest coughing and lots of "popped" ears. Also makes it really hard to breathe. And, you guessed it, you need to be able to breathe to run. So this is a setback, but I don't think it is major and it is still relatively early in training.

I don't think it's a tragedy because I have perspective...it's not like I am out to WIN the marathon, or even place in my age group...I am out to finish. I may finish last and I don't care because I will have finished a marathon. I am going to be slow anyway. Also, the doc knows I am a runner and said I could run as long as I used an inhaler right before I ran and then carried it with me for the next several weeks. Didn't even flinch at my first half being in 1.5 weeks. This is good. The reality is that until some of it clears up I am going to be walking.

I walked with the training program tonight and did the whole 7 miles (I did take the phone and allowed myself the potential to go back early if needed). I was able to maintain a 15:00 mile the whole time. While this isn't super amazing, it gives me hope because two years ago that was as well as I could do perfectly healthy...again, I have perspective.

So...tomorrow I will probably bike and not swim (ear infection probably needs a few days). Thursday and Friday I will probably stick to my mileage, just slower. Saturday's long run will be at a 15:00 pace for the whole 14 miles...it isn't worth pushing now and having this last longer than necessary. And Sunday I will rest (ok, we have bowling league but the way I bowl that doesn't count for much).

There are still plenty of long runs, short runs, tempo runs, intervals, and races before June. It's still early.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Iron Rose 2020

  Some race reports are easier to write than others. Some take a while to process everything that happened. On September 26 th  I set out to do my own full Ironman distance triathlon (2.4 miles swim, 112 mile bike, 26.2 mile run). When coach at I first started talking about it we talked about maybe as a one day effort (race format) or three days (like some of the virtual options have been). My last big training weekend (biking 100 on Saturday, running 20 on Sunday, and swimming 2.2 miles open water on Monday) confirmed that I needed to shoot for single day because I had come so close to the three day in training. So we were full steam ahead with the plan already in motion. I had planned routes, marked my bike course, secured volunteers for aid stations (amazing people all around), dropped off aid bags…finished training and tapered.   Race morning Trena arrived at my house early and we headed over to Andy’s for the swim. Trena and Jen were doing safety kayaking for me. And...
Post a Comment
Read more

Vision 2020

I'm a planner. And a dork. And I wrote a lot of Vision 2020 plans around 2000 so now that it is 2020 everything feels weird. Ok, that's out of my system. Let's talk about 2020. I've already done a self-assessment of last year and met with coach to plan 2020. Everything is focused on Ironman Wisconsin on September 13.The milestones have been set, but there will be some infill along the way. Milestone 1: Carmel Marathon - I did a spring marathon (also Carmel) in 2018 ahead of Louisville and it seemed like a good idea to do that again. So for the 10th Carmel Marathon I am running the full. Spring marathons feel undertrained compared to fall because the time between recovering from fall and getting ramped up to multiple 20 mile training runs is not there. I take the spring effort as a see what happens sort of race. Must finish to keep the streak alive, but I will see how everything else unfolds. Milestone 2: TourdeLou - not so much of a race as a supported event ride ...
3 comments
Read more

All but Official

Well, it is all but official that I won't be doing the full marathon at Monumental this November. I haven't made it official by "dropping down" to the half, but it will happen. My foot has healed from the stress fracture, but it will take time to build back mileage and it won't be able to happen in time for a fall marathon. I am back up to 2.5-3 miles but I would need to be at 6 miles by now in order to have a shot at a full in early November. It simply isn't worth re-injury. So I will focus on RAGBRAI later this month, an August full of triathlons, and half marathons in the fall. And as Brian Schuetter put it...this isn't the weather to try to recover in...it has been over/near 100 degrees for several days. Most of my activity has been in the gym since it is just really too hot outside. The down side of not being able to run as I usually do has been that I have gained about 5 pounds. On one hand I did train nearly every day even when I couldn...
Post a Comment
Read more