When I got injured the first time, I had to cancel or defer my entry to several races. There was the Spring Lake Five, the largest five mile race in the country, and a huge local summer tradition here. And of course there was the Atlantic City Half Marathon, which was to be my first "big" goal.
I am now injured again, but this time I will NOT be cancelling or deferring the races I have already registered for. I have already decided that I will heal and complete these races.
I am not doing this haphazardly or irresponsibly, however.
Of course I want to heal again properly and return to running properly and train properly, under a physician's guidance. But last night I came to terms that while I would love to run these races, I don't necessarily have to. I've seen that races generally have a 16 minute per mile time limit, which is fine for brisk walking
There is a lot of debate about the Galloway method (walk-run) and general walking in these races. If you walk, did you "run" the race? You can't say you "ran" a marathon if you walked part of it, they say
When I started running, I did not want to walk, and a very deep part of me still has the goal of truly "running" a marathon, and "running" Goofy. To each his own, but I will not be personally satisfied until I RUN the entire Goofy.
Here's what we have laid out for the next year or so:
Now through January 2013 -- heal smart, heal responsibly, be patient. When I return to running again, will get gait and form analyzed. March 23, 2013 -- Allstate 13.1 Marathon, New York-- I understand that when I heal and recover, there will only be a short time to train for a half marathon, and I want to avoid injury again. The thing is, I realized I can WALK this if I have to! May 5, 2013 -- New Jersey Marathon -- this is to be my first full marathon. Again, I do not want to get injured. I want to train smart and accelerate mileage only as appropriate. But I can WALK this to if I need to.
(13.1 Marathon + NJ Marathon = NY/NJ Challenge!) October 13, 2013 -- Atlantic City Half Marathon-- I deferred this from this year. This will simply be a training run for ...
January 11-12, 2014 -- Walt Disney World Goofy's Race and Half Challenge -- That's the half marathon on Saturday, followed by the full marathon on sunday.
This is the point and purpose of this whole blog. And my goal. I see it! I'm there. In my mind, it is accomplished. Thank you.
Tonight I'm more motivated to run again than ever before.
I want to prove the naysayers wrong. I cannot wait until I run my first half marathon, my first marathon, and my first Goofy just to show them that they were wrong.
Do NOT tell me I can't do something.
I've gotten a lot of words of discouragement, the most striking in my mind,
"Your running days are over," and even, "your dreams of running again are shattered."
And to set the record straight, they were NOT from my doctor. Heck, most comments are from NONrunners.
Don't tell me what I can't do. I'll prove you wrong.
Before the answer, there must be a question.
And right now, for me, the question is this:
"Should I run again?"
I started running about one year ago, and two weeks ago I suffered my third injury, my second stress fracture in eight months, serious enough to require non-weight bearing status and crutches. Major sideline from training. Major sideline off my feet.
All week I've been hearing the same thing from coworkers and pretty much everyone else who knows me and who just saw me get off months of crutches: Criticism and "constructive" advice instead of encouragement:
"You ran again?" "You should stop running!" "Find another sport ... try biking or swimming." "Your running days are over!"
And at first glance, the answer is obvious. I ran, got injured, got better, ran again, got injured again. So "obviously" I shouldn't run again. Obvious answer, right?
BUT WAIT.
Why? Why should I stop running? If my son falls off his bicycle, should I tell him to stop riding his bike?
When I was growing up, and made a mistake while playing the piano, did I stop? The answer is NO. You correct your mistakes, learn from then, get up and try again!
"But that's different, you're hurting yourself," they would say. Well, technically, when I eat steak, I am hurting my self too, but I enjoy steak, so I will continue to eat it!
That's the point. I enjoy running. Truly. I can't express how much of a joy it is. Running. Getting out there ... being outside, no matter the weather, no matter what time, how early ... and running. And that feeling of accomplishment, when the run is done, looking at my time, looking at the distance, and just feeling good. How can I give that up? It would be like giving up piano because I made a mistake, or my son giving up trying to ride a bike because he fell off. I can correct mistakes, get up, and run again.
But honestly this question, and this soul searching, has been a struggle. If I run again, and I hurt myself a third or fourth, it will be like a "duh" moment, and frankly will just look stupid. No one will have any sympathy. But ... if I don't run again, I'll spend the rest of my life wondering "what if?" and on top of that I will just be missing running. It would be giving up a hobby, and giving up a joy.
Well, tonight I found the answer ... or the answer found me.
Tonight was our office's holiday party, and per tradition we the employers gave our staff gifts, and the staff gave us individual gifts.
The staff said, "this is for you when you get better ..." and presented me with this:
A GPS watch!!
How thoughtful. Really, how very thoughtful. Other from those extremely close to me, this was the first sign of encouragement that I got from anyone in regards to running since this most recent injury.
Yesterday I saw my orthopedic podiatrist, got an MRI, as confirmed a stress fracture in my distal tibia.
another stress fracture?!?!?!?! another injury?!?!?!?!
This is my second stress fracture this year.
I'm in a boot and on crutches again. I had just gotten off 5 months of crutches and cane.
I came to the sad realization today that I probably should not run anymore. Even if and when I recover from this, it would just be stupid to run and get injured a THIRD time ... wouldn't it?
I haven't posted in a while. I was actually making good progress getting back into running after my injury, my right femoral neck stress fracture that had sidelined me for 6 months.
I started back up again, slowly ... or so I thought. I did the Couch to 5k again, or at least started again, then transferred over to the Hal Higdon Novice 1 Marathon training program. I followed it religiously, taking rest days when prescribed, only doing the miles indicated, no more. Cross training as scheduled. Furthermore, I ran half my miles on a supposedly less impact inducing treadmill. Even did a couple of soft surfaced trails. Everything was going great, my long run built up to 7 miles without being tired, and I felt awesome.
Then last weak I felt a twinge on the medial side of my left ankle. Great. I ran a couple more times. Ankle hurt more, so I stopped.
Still hurts now, but I can walk on it. i'm walking carefully. I'm taking naproxen, put a lidoderm patch on it, and wrapped in in an ACE bandage. i iced it last night and kept it elevated. It feels fine at rest, hurts on toe push off. There is point tenderness just posteriosuperior to the medial malleolus.
I ran 5k yesterday, 3.1 miles. It was the longest I had run since my injury 6 months ago May 2012. In fact, my last "real" run before my injury was the Ocean Medical Center 5k, where I PR'd at 23:48.31, or 7:40 pace.
Yesterday I was much slower, at 10:23 pace, barely shuffling along at times I felt, but I could not be happier! I'm back! I'm running! And it feels great.
But I have to be much smarter, and I'm doing my best to be careful, listening to my body, planning ahead, and not doing too much at one time, and not accelerating either my pace or my mileage too fast ... at least that's the plan.
Because of my injury, I missed several races ... the most important of which was the Atlantic City Half Marathon, this October 2012.
I was there this year, as I had had the hotel booked and everything, but I was a spectator. It was initially to be my first Half Marathon, (officially anyway, I have run a 2:04 half marathon in training), and although I was disappointed in not being able to run, by the time I was standing at the finish line watching everyone go by, I was ok with it, and at that moment I knew I would be back.
Running had to be put on hold for a couple of weeks at least ... as Hurricane Sandy hit the Jersey Shore pretty bad ...
It hit very close to home. My own immediate family and home were out of power, heat, and hot water for more than a week, but we were the lucky ones. Many of our friends and coworkers lost their homes. It has been almost a month since the storm hit. The effects and the damage will last a long time, but the Jersey Shore is rebuilding. At a time like this running seems almost inconsequential ... strange that I started this whole running thing by running up and down the boardwalk, and my regular route eventually became running down to Point Pleasant Beach, up and down the boardwalk, and back home. Now much of that route is wiped out, as you can see from the above videos.
I am now, as I mentioned, starting to run slowly, and I did find a short place to run close to home. I like the idea of running towards a goal ... and yes my ultimate goal, and the purpose of this blog, is still to run the Goofy Challenge (marathon and a half 39.3 challenge) in Walt Disney World January 2014. To get there I did set a couple of goals along the way ...
I spent a couple of days looking to racing calendars (check out running in the usa) and racing schedules to find at least one half marathon and one full marathon that I can train for and run before training for the Goofy. My idea is to do a half in february or march 2013, on the way to training for a spring marathon. I did find a spring marathon, the New Jersey Marathon! Which is perfect as it's a spring marathon, and happens to be right here on the Jersey Shore. After a lot of considerations with my own work schedule and everything, I looked at some half marathons : the Red Rock Half Marathon in Las Vegas, the Rock n Roll Mardis Gras Half Marathon, even the Williamsburg Half Marathon. Those would be destination races I guess ... there is the E. Murray Todd half marathon here in new jersey also, but it looks small (field wise) and hilly. At this point for my first real half marathon, I want something somewhat festive, and big, and especially after an injury, I want it to be flat if possible.
then you have completed the NY / NJ Challenge and to boot you get a third medal ...
AWESOME. This is perfect for so many reasons. The 13.1 Marathon is close by in NYC, right on target in March 2013, with training for the May 2013 NJ Marathon, which is right here on the Jersey Shore, and the NY/NJ Challenge might just a preview of the Goofy Challenge!
I'm so excited. For my training, I'm following my own modified version of Hal Higdon's Novice 1 Marathon training program. It's written as an 18 week gradually progressive program with 3 maintenance runs during the week, and I long run each weekend with a "step back" in mileage every 3rd weekend. I'm modifying it to make it longer, for even more gradual acceleration, and may even skip one of the 3 mid week runs for more rest time. We'll see how it goes.
Today I RAN for the first time since my injury 5 months ago. After a month of self-rehab on the elliptical (getting up to a one hour easy session) ... I ran today.
Nothing super special, no celebration, no pat on the back ... it felt very natural actually, and a couple of times i had to consciously remind myself to appreciate it. But i was careful, timid actually, excited and happy with a twinge of fear mixed in. I do NOT want to get injured again.
If i didn't get injured, at this point i could have been tapering down my long runs in my training for the Atlantic City Half Marathon to be run in 2 weeks. This was originally my first big goal, I have since deferred my entry for this year, and i am very ok with that. Content and not frustrated anymore.
If it wasn't for my injury i could have also been ramping up my training this week, as i had also registered for the Walt Disney World full Marathon for 2013. The AC half marathon would have just been another long run in the training for Disney. (I'm still in contact with runDisney on how to defer that entry).
But no. Today was not a long run of 10-13 miles or more. It was not a maintainance run for 3,5,8 miles or whatever. It was a first run. Again. I ran, or more correctly, did a walk-run, as i did Week 1 of the couch ton5k program. Yup, run 60 sec, walk 2 min. Repeat for 20-30min.
It felt good, but i didnt want to get hurt, so i concentrated on form and stepping lightly and not pushing.
This is a second chance. A do-over. I get to do it right this time.
