Injury Recovery

Well, it's been almost two weeks since my last post.  I did no running at all last week.  It was all power walking, but I did put in 35 miles.  The glute has improved a lot and I wasn't taking any ibuprofen.  I dropped my power walking pace from 13:15/mile down to 11:40/mile by the end of the week.  Starting on Sunday, I decided to mix in some running (5 minutes walking/2 minutes running).  Today, Thursday, I am at 2 minutes walking/2 minutes running.  Glute still has a twinge here and there, but continues to improve little by little.  I am still not sure whether I will be racing at Irish Fest 5K or just running it.  We will just have to see.

Injury Time

It's been a rough couple of weeks.  It started with the Winterfest 5K in Kankakee.  It was a pretty nice day compared to last year (didn't make it because of a semi-blizzard).  Wasn't planning on trying to crazy racing, but did figure I would be able to run in the low 22's again.  But within the first quarter mile, I was feeling my right hip.  And the pain continued to get worse over the next half mile.  I even thought the leg might give out a couple times.  It definitely slowed me down.  At the mile mark, I backed off hoping it would help.  I was able to keep going this way.  And by Mile 2, it seemed to have numbed up and I actually picked it up a bit.  By the end, I realized it was my right gluten not my hip.  Ended up 23:10, 38th overall and 4th in my AG.  A little disappointing, but what can you do?  

Next day, it still hurt pretty bad.  As the week went by, I took it real easy and the pain seemed to get better.  But I also was taking ibuprofen and it turned out, it was masking more than I thought.  By Friday, I knew that I would not be racing the Frosty 5 Mile on Sunday.  But being a circuit race, I still wanted to at least run it leisurely.  

Sunday came with a good amount of snow just before race time.  I did take ibuprofen a couple of hours before the race.  Ended up running almost two minutes per mile slower than usual, but actually enjoyed running with people in the mid-pack and having some nice conversations.  But the glute hurt just as bad as the last week by the end.  Ran 44:43, 79th overall and 6th AG.

I just can't stop training for a week or two, so I am going to try just walking (power walking) all this week and hope things will improve.  Two days in, the glute hurts even when I walk, but this is without any ibuprofen or aspirin at all.  It was better today, than yesterday.  Irish Fest Parade 5K in three weeks.  But really the main goal is to be healed by the Frankfort Half-Marathon on April 30th.