Shuffles

I've graduated from "Hobbles" to "Shuffles". Today I had my first real run since The Injury of '13. What a great feeling that was!

This is how I felt. It may not have been how I looked.

I started off slow, as per my trademark. When I say slow, I'm talking S-L-O-W. It didn't take long for the group to leave me in the dust. On the warm-up!
The plan was to do 5x 200m sprints followed by a 3k time trial. Ha!
That was other people's plan. My plan was to walk/jog as many 200m sprints as I could before my ankle started to ache, and then shuffle back to the car and put my foot on ice.
Initially I thought I could focus on superb form since I was stuck running so slow anyway. But after two steps it was very clear that a shuffle was the best I could do. And since it felt silly to use the shuffle-style of running for my right leg and the cycle-style for my left leg, I stuck with shuffle-style all around.
After 3 reps of 200m shuffles (with a 200m walking recovery) I was feeling okay. The 4th one was definitely at my limit. My body wanted to limp but I sternly told it to go slower than the 8min/km I had been doing to prevent any limpage from occurring. I have learned the wrong way that limping should be avoided at all costs if one wants a speedy recovery without any complications.

I'd like to think I'm of the category of "Runner stops running until injury goes away" because that seems like the smartest category. But I look at myself - at the runners around me - and notice how we all get up before 5am multiple times a week to run before work, and I don't know that I can classify any of us in the "smartest" category.

I called it a day after my 4th 200m rep that and shuffled back to the car. On the way I had the blessing of introducing myself to one of the most cheerful men you will ever meet at 6am. Every early morning walker & runner knows this cheerful bloke who greets you every day with a big smile and a jovial "good morning! It's a very beautiful morning today!" But as I am always running, I don't really have the time to stop and chat. Until today! I'll let you insert your own thoughts about training hard & fast vs stopping to say hello. I certainly have my thoughts.
So after I chatted with my new friend for a bit I continued to shuffle back to the car. All up, I only walk/ran about 3k. I iced my foot as my kind but stern running pals all told me to do, but I think it was alright. I hadn't pushed myself hard and - while a part of me is wondering if I could have pushed a bit more - I'm satisfied with this first run back post-injury.
So far I've been seeing almost daily improvements in my ankle. Let's hope it keeps happening in this fashion!

Water Running

I have returned to running! Okay, not really. It's actually running in the water, but that's pretty close, right?
I haven't done water running for years, and last time I did it I could actually touch bottom because the pool was so shallow.
To help me with my rehab, a friend lent me a flotation belt to use for water running, which I fastened to my waist and set up right underneath the starting block.
On your marks...get set...don't go!
Man, was I slow. I went with a friend, which was great as I might not have dragged myself out to the pool without her encouragement. And as she lapped me again and again, I ever so slowly "ran" through the water. Geez, I thought I was slow at that land running stuff. I had it easy, running above the water mark.
After two laps of painfully slow "running" I gave up and went to kicking rather than running. Easier, but a few laps later my ankle started to ache a bit.
So I went to 'arms only' front crawl with the floatie belt on my feet. Geez, that's hard. I have always struggled with the highly sophisticated breathing/head turning pattern required for the front crawl. So as I result I would breathe in water and then be too flustered to breathe out at the right time, only to breathe out when I was supposed to breathe in and...well...let's just say I finished off the 100m of that as fast as I could and decided to return to water running. Slow, but preferable.
I'm hoping to be back on the roads shortly. I'm happy to report that I am still seeing improvements every day and I'm looking forward to getting back out there.

Update: Return of the Ankle

Wow, I didn't expect to garner as much sympathy and concern as I did with my last blog entry. Thanks everyone for being awesome! I loved the advice and sympathy and kind thoughts and offers for help. 

Okay, so a non-running update on my foot. At first my physio told me it was an itty bitty Grade 1 sprain. While I was mucho grateful that it was the mildest sprain possible (which means the quickest recovery!!!) I was a little bit sheepish about making such a big deal about it.

But sadly it's not healing as fast as it should be for an itty bitty Grade 1 sprain, so it's been downgraded to  possibly a Grade 2 sprain. Or it could be an itty bitty fracture that didn't show up on the first x-ray.

Fear not, faithful readers! Trust me that it's feeling heaps better and the swelling and bruising have gone down fantastically. I'm pretty confident it's not a fracture. 

And since I can see the progress of my foot much easier than anyone else, I thought I'd put everyone's minds at ease by posting the pics from today comparing the range of motion of my two ankles. Notably - I have an ankle again! My faithful ankle has reappeared. 

I've been doing the typical physio exercises of strengthening with a band and increasing range of motion by pretending to write the alphabet with my foot. Today I even succeeded at some lateral movement. I don't think I'll be writing any recognizable alphabet letters with my toes any time soon, but at least my "O"s don't turn out like "I"s.

I hope to be back to running soon (this isn't a blog site about injuries, thank goodness!). But as a wise person told me, "worry about walking first", so hopefully I will be back to walking extra soon. I like walking. Walking is good.

 

 Left! Left! Left right left! Left!

 Not up to ballerina toe-point juuuuust yet.

Sidelined

When I was younger I grew like a weed. Seriously. I'm talking over 12cm in the course of 1 year. So as joints moved around, I was bound to sprain something. As it turned out, it was my left ankle in the school's long jump sand pit.
Because I didn't know about things like "physiotherapy", it never really healed properly and I sprained it another two years in a row in basketball.
The end of my basketball career was when I stopped spraining my left ankle and broke an ankle instead. My right ankle.
But I stopped growing, joint strength improved, and I have been ankle sprain-free for a beautiful 11 years.
Until last week.
Yep, I have been sidelined with an ankle injury. After all my twisting of feet on trail runs, I sprain it with a personal trainer doing step-ups. I told people it was a bench to give them better imagery, but I was actually doing step-ups onto a big truck tire (the same height as a bench). My left foot was on the tire and I was tapping up and down with my right foot as fast as possible. As I fatigued my left foot wobbled ever so slightly on the tire, causing me to lose my balance just a little.
That just-a-little loss of balance caused me to step down awkwardly, and over my ankle went. Instant pain!
My PT was not just any PT - he was an awesome PT. As it turns out, he had a spare pair of crutches in his house (hmm, I wonder if this happens a lot?) which I am still using a week later. He then drove me home in my own car so I didn't have to worry about trying to pick it up the next week.
An x-ray the next day revealed no broken bones. Just a "lateral ligament sprain". I felt a bit lame about the whole affair (har har).
I was on a trip to Uluru with a friend and I managed to do it all on crutches - nothing is impossible! I'm off to the physio today to hear the rehab plan and I'll keep you posted. But for now, I guess it means I'm sidelined for running.
For your entertainment, pictures of the injured site! See if you can figure out which foot is swollen. (Hint: It's the one with the weird stripes on it from the compression sock I was wearing.)

 Where'd the ankle go?

I don't remember hitting the tire when I collapsed, but the bruise on my shin tells me I must have.

Wynnum Twilight 10k Race: Ending with a Bang

I lined up at the start, but sadly not with my friend Jill. The gun went off and I shuffled forward with the mob towards the start line.
Less than 50m into the race, I felt a stitch coming on. Yet another reason I don't like running in the evening! I'm more prone to stitches for whatever reason. Maybe it's psychological.
But analysing why I was getting the stitch wasn't going to help me...well, one stitch. So I did what I always do when I get a running stitch. Exhale really loudly & forcefully as I run. I got more than a few odd looks and I know just what the other runners were thinking, 50m in and you're already tired? Seriously?! Either that or, oh my gosh, you're one of those obnoxiously loud breathers. I hope you don't run at my pace! That's what I would've been thinking.
The stitch never went into a full-blown painful stitch, but it stayed by my side from about 0-4k, and then again from 5-7k.

Goal split times:
5k marker (Lap 1): 5.20min/km pace for a total lap time of 26min40sec
10k marker (Lap 2): 5.15min/km pace for a total lap time of 26min15sec
Grand total goal time: 52.50min

Actual split times:
5k marker: 27min25 (5.29min/km). 9sec/km slower than goal pace.
10k marker: 28min52sec (5.46min/km). Almost 30sec/km slower than goal pace.

At the 8k marker my gps lost satellite reception, for some bizarre and unknown reason. In other words, it died. While I didn't understand it, I could certainly relate because at 8k I was ready to throw in the towel as well. It was annoying, but not life-ending.
I had a great sprint finish which was the best part of the second half.
Of course I was just a bit disappointed. I don't feel I ran my hardest and I wonder how much faster I could've been if I pushed myself rather than sitting on my heels (figuratively speaking) through the second half of the race.

Hanging out post-race with Jill & family.

The Twilight race wraps up the end of the official "race season". There are always races around...such as the 500k relay, Park Run, and various club race events. But Twilight is really the last race race in Brisbane for the year. So it was rather fitting that the evening ended with a fireworks display. The display wasn't until nearly 2hrs after I'd finished my race, but despite the freezing cold wind, lack of proper warm attire and drying sweat leaving me chilled, I was determined to stay for the show.
And it was well worth it! I don't have any pictures, but imagine a deep yellow nearly full moon rising over the ocean with fireworks going off in front of it.

Wynnum 10k Twilight Race: Pre-Race Jumble

I don't like racing in the evening. When I race in the morning I'm on auto-pilot. I have breakfast and go through my running routine without hitch. I don't over-analyse, I don't over-think. I gear up for the race and go for it.

When I race in the evening, it's a whole new ball game. Important life-or-death questions like what should I eat for lunch/afternoon snack? And do I feel fatigued because my body's fatigued or simply because I'm lying here on the couch wondering if I feel fatigued before the race?

So it's the waiting game. 

I parked my car in the usual far-away-from-start-line spot and got to the racer's village with 75min to spare. 75min to pick up my registration number, use the loo, drop off my race bag at the bag drop since I sadly didn't have any awesome friends coming along this time, and go for a warm-up jog.

But then things de-simplified. I debated using the loo right when I got there as the line-up was relatively short) or waiting to closer to the race. As I've developed a definite cough (whhhyyyyyy????) and have been guzzling water, I opted for going closer to race start time. 

Registration first, then! The line-up was long but it was smooth. I brought my photo id. Rejected! They didn't have my rego. So I pulled out my handy smart phone to show them the email, but the file was corrupt and I couldn't open it.

Dejected, I went to the "trouble table" and reluctantly signed up for a last minute number. No timing chip, but I'd get the t-shirt at least. Reluctantly (and a bit grumpy!) I agreed. I walked back to the loo line, which had grown exponentially since the last time I was there. I was a bit nervous about making it to the end on time, so I checked on my race briefing to see if there was a map pointing me in the direction of other (hopefully less popular) outhouses.

And behold! Inconspicuously inked onto the race briefing was my rego number! I decided it was worth it to go back, so I returned to the rego table and got my actual number. The reason it hadn't worked? My last name according to the rego was spelled "Thomson" instead of "Thompson".

And that got me thinking. After over 20 years of knowing how to spell my last name, did I actually get it wrong? Someone suggested a typo, but I've never done a typo on my name before!

This was not a good start. I dropped off my bag at the race tent keeping my water bottle safely in my hand for last-minute sippage. I figured if I ran out of time, I could leave it somewhere beside the course and chances were high it would still be there when I got back.

With 30min to spare, I thought that something of my pre-race routine might need to be cut. The question, what? Washroom break, or warm-up?

As if that's even a question! I've made the mistake of racing when I had to pee, and it is Not Fun.*

So I got into the loo line with 30min to spare. I began to stress. Loo + warm-up + start line positioning in 30min? Fingers crossed!

But a ray of hope came across the field in the form of my friend Jill. I run with Jill on Thursday mornings and we had planned to start the race together. She came over and asked to join me in the loo line. Jill's start time was only 15min away, as she was first doing the 1k kids dash with her son before rejoining the 10k start line 15min after that. 

So we decided that Jill would "hold my place" in the loo line while I did a warm-up jog. Symbiotic relationship at its best! I rejoined the line 5min later and we were out of there with 1min to spare for Jill & son, 16min to spare for me. Off to the race start with a comfortable buffer of time. Phew!

At least my spelling skills - or lack thereof - completely wreck up my pre-race routine. But good thing I didn't leave the house any later!

*That is another story entirely!

Bad Date

I got up with every intention of going for a run. But then bad dreams woke me up early and I felt a tickle in my throat. Ick.

On Monday night I’d made the judgement that it would be raining Tuesday morning and set my alarm for “sleep in”.

So I knew this morning I should run today, but I decided I didn’t want to run in the morning. I decided I’d… “go in the afternoon”. The theory in this was that my Saturday race is in the evening, so it’d be a good idea to get a feel for evening weather before then.

Ha! “I’ll go in the afternoon” is a euphemism. It’s like when you’re on a really bad date and you end it with “I’ll call you.” It ain’t gonna happen, sweetheart.

But surprise and surprise again! I did go out on a run! I was motivated by the thought of my race on Sunday. Or maybe it was the three cookies I wolfed down in the afternoon*.

And like a bad first date, this was not the happiest of runs. The first km my legs felt like jelly. I wondered if I looked like spaghetti woman, wibbly wobbling my way along.

Then the stitch hit. As if I wasn’t having enough fun already, a side stitch hit within 500m of starting. And it stayed on me like mould on bread for the next 4.22km (yes, I checked my watch). And again like a bad date, I was checking my watch every few minutes wondering when it would end and contemplating whether I should end it a little early.

But then – to move away from the bad date analogy – magic! At that 4.22km mark of my 6k recovery run my stitch eased, my energy soared and I really settled in to my pace. But despite it all, I enjoyed the scenery. I rarely run beside the river in the evening. Seeing all the other cyclists, runners, and walkers out there was inspiring. Especially the commuters. Awesome job, active commuters! We could use more like you.

As I dragged myself along the first 4k (and even the last 2k) of the 6k run, I couldn’t help but hope that this isn’t a precursor to what to expect on Saturday’s race. I don’t think I’ll have it in me to warm up for 4km before the 10k race. And I certainly hope I don’t have wibbly wobbly legs!

*Note to self – don’t eat cookies on Saturday before the race!