Back to "Running"

Well, as with all injuries, there comes a day when you have to put your foot down (oh, that hurt even me) and run out the injury (enough - someone take away his laptop now!).  I have always been warned about Achilles injuries.  The typical conversation goes like this:  "Hey Joe, I'm thinking of getting injured again.  Any suggestions on what type?".  "Hmmm.  Have you tried a fractured tibia?  Very cool healing process".  "No, what about a torn Achilles tendon?".  "Um.  No, don't try that one".

As mentioned in the previous blog, I tried a few normal healing procedures.  I also tried a few unorthodox methods.  Some were better than others, but none provided me with a conclusive healing trend.  So I did what I do best and ignored the injury.  I should mention that technically, I did not ignore the injury, as it forced me to once again adjust my running schedule.  Let's just say I didn't put "healing" at the top of the list.  The new methodology was to run until it hurt too much to continue, then stop.  I added a nifty twist, in that every day I would increase the time and/or duration of the run!  I come up with these brainchildren at Honda, when I'm supposed to be working.

So I ran 1.5K on Monday, 2K on Tuesday, 2.2K on Wednesday, took Thursday off, 7.5K on Friday and 10K on Saturday.  No one would consider 23K to be a monumental weekly total, but the important aspect is that on Monday, running was very painful and on Saturday, I felt a tiny little pain reminder on each step, but nothing debilitating.  I'm cured!

So, with 3 weeks until my 24 hour race, all I can joyfully say is "Let the ramp-up begin!".  I think most people who read my blog do so, because it makes their running practices seem reasonable by comparison. 

Well, I have 8 more days to work this year.  Honda provides a significant plant shutdown at the end of December and I had some vacation days to kill, so I took every Friday in December off.  My last day this year is Thursday, December 19!  More time to experiment with healing and recovery.

I'm going to see if I can find a picture of Gino, who won the Trail Runner Trophy Series (ultra) this year.  The previous picture was Dale, who was 2nd place.  Ontario ultra runners are doing some amazing things.

Cheers!