Ouch!

The 2011 Cleveland Half Marathon was the most painful run I've ever done- during and now after! I have to laugh at myself as I yelp in pain upon sitting. It's especially painful to sit down and get back up from my toilet because it's so low. I'm definitely in this much pain because of the 2 week running (4 week long run) break. Six miles in, I was right on pace for my goal time (low 1:40s). But at six and half, my legs turned to stone. No matter what I did, they just wouldn't go any faster. And for the next 6.5 miles, I continued to slowly fade. I pondered dropping out but my ankle and shin weren't that painful enough to stop and hunt down a medic. I'd be more embarrassed of any medical attention. Nor did I see any if I wanted to be transported back to the finish line. So I just kept trotting along and each mile the pain in my muscles got worse. With less than 800 meters to go, I saw James and that lifted my spirits a little. All I could do was laugh. What was I thinking?

In all, I got a nice training run in, 1:47:58 (8:15 pace). And I made it out of there without a worse injury. It was interesting to push through pain for the last 6 miles. While I was going slow, I didn't throw the towel in when I had a ton of chances to. I'll take that lesson from this experience. Critiquing the event, I hated the course. It was very boring and crowd support was dull. However, my sour mood might have been due to my expo experience the day prior to the race. I basically paid $70 for a shirt too big because they ran out of the size I ordered. I also left goody bag-less because they ran out. It was poorly organized. I don't see myself doing this race again.

I do see myself recovering this week, a mix of rest and cross training, and then slowly building back up to 30-35 miles a week, focusing more on speed and shorter distances. I thought I might be ready to race a marathon this fall, but plans fell through again. I'm not too down because I know I will get there eventually. If I go back to the basics and learn how to run faster at the shorter stuff, I think it will make training for the longer stuff easier. The main goal continues to be patience.