Slow and Steady

This morning, I had only my second out of doors run, meaning NOT on the treadmill. While it was so emotionally freeing to be in the fresh air (read humidity) it was much harder than running on 1% incline on the treadmill. My pace is very slow right now (7:30) (yikes!) but I'm more focused on working on time actually running, as opposed to my speed. I know that I'll eventually get back to my average 6:00 pace - so I'm not really worried.

Again, I just never realized that this injury would set me this far back in my running ability. The route I ran has a few small hills, really just what we call a rise and fall here in Bet Shemesh, which never used to be hard at all. Now, I've got to slow my pace and almost inch up those little hills. The whole time I'm pacing the hills, I'm continually telling myself to be calm, that eventually it will all come back.

The other problem I had on my run this morning was that I seemed to turn my ankle a little, which caused my peroneous to ache a bit. I'll take some AI meds and see if it goes away. I do not want a return of that tendonitus.

Today I also took my grandchildren swimming at the local pool where we ran into an entire gaggle of old women doing a water aerobics class. My granddaughter calls all older women Safta, which is hebrew for Grandmother, and me, I'm Bubby. It was so nice to see the respect she has, already at the age of 3, for this generation. It makes me proud that my children are doing such a good job raising my grandchildren... lol. My granddaughter is not swimming at all, mostly I bounce around the pool swimming with her around my neck and trying to get her used to the water. She certainly gave me a good water workout!

Tomorrow's a cross training day, and it is swimming! Hooray!

I'm going to be profiled!

Woo Hoo!

Melissa Hinson Neely is writing a new book on first time marathoners. She had a call out on her website to participate as one of six featured runners that she would follow during their first time marathon training and eventually profile in her book. So while I wasn't one of the selected '6' - she has decided that she would like to profile me on her website and tell my story. I'm so psyched!

This is her first book.

My own marathon training will start in two weeks, and for now I'm working on increasing speed and km. While I did try and stay fit while off with my injury - I didn't realize how much I would lose during the fourteen weeks off. I'm trying very hard NOT to be disappointed, and focus on the fact that at least I'm running, and God willing, will run my first marathon.

Certainly much to be happy about!

Guess Who's Back?

Whoo Hoo!

Happy, very happy to say that I'm back to running. Thanx God!

The Orthopedist finally gave the OK to start up again. He said there would probably be some minor pain - and that I could run through it - as long as I stopped if the pain was too bad. After that, he gave me a referral to an Ankle Specialist in case I wasn't better.

Well - glory be - things are fine. I'm up to 40 min sessions and the walk/run ratio is 1 min walk, 3 min run. By next week I should be able to run the full 40 minutes. It's a bit disappointing that according to the treadmill I am only running at a 8.6 km pace (where my usual speed is around 10 km), but I hope to eventually get it back to where it was prior to the injury.

I have plans to run a half marathon in December, and then my first full marathon in Tiberius on January 6, 2011. Training will start in September and I hope to be at full speed by then.

Obviously because there was no clear reason for my injury, there must also be a not so obvious lesson in all this. Meaning, there is something to learn from this long time off, and I'm going to do a little more introspection to figure it out.

Happy to be back!