Posts Tagged ‘biking’

How happy should I be that in the past two days I have ran a whole 0.4 miles each day without any problems? I think my mind is starting to play games with me … it’s happened every time something hurts. It’s like I’m thinking about it so much that it hurts. But it doesn’t, actually.

This weekend I am participating in the annual Ukrop’s Monument Avenue 10k here in Richmond. From a numbers standpoint, in just nine short years this has become one of the largest road races in the U.S. This year there are 31,000 registered runners and it is host of the USA 10k Championship. So whether I run it all, walk/run it or just walk it, I’ll be a part of something huge. Before you lecture me, I will not do anything stupid. If anything, I’ve never done anything stupid when I’ve gotten injured. I know several people taking part in this race — some who would go at a pace like I’d normally shoot for, others faster, others slower and a couple of walkers — so I hope to have some choices on what to do Saturday morning.

Anyway, back to my injury, or hopefully, the lack thereof. I felt this urge today to go out for a few miles, but something held me back. There’s no need to rush it … if it started hurting, yes, I’d stop, but would it be a setback? With my next “big” race not until the end of August, I’m still very content with riding my bike and not running too much in the next few weeks. Speaking of the bike, it’s very interesting to me the differences in how winded I feel during and after riding vs. running. Once I get used to riding more and increase my distances a bit, I’m curious how my body will handle everything. I’m looking forward to mixing biking into my routine this summer. These next couple of months are great for building a good base for the rest of the summer. And like I said a few posts ago, my health is much more important than setting new PRs. They’ll be nice, but it’s still far from my mind right now.

So two days into the second quarter of 2008, things seem to be looking up. I may have to take it one-tenth of a mile at a time, but I have no problem with that approach right now.

To sum up my left foot injury in one word, I must say that it’s annoying more than anything else. It’s like a silent injury. It came from nowhere in the race and now it’s playing mind games. In the past few days, it hasn’t hurt when I get up in the mornings and it doesn’t bother me during the day. When I take my dog on a walk it doesn’t hurt, but as soon as I make an attempt at running it hurts.

On Thursday, I ran a half mile and it didn’t really bother me. But on Friday, it did. And today it did. So, instead of forcing myself to run, I’ll just continue to not run for a couple of more days before I try it again. It’s not really an intense pain like it was when it first started — it’s just dull and annoying. It sort of feels like a bad bruise that’s almost gone.

In the meantime, I’m amazed at how quickly I’ve gotten used to riding a bike. If this is what I have to do every day for a little while to stay in shape, then I’m OK with that. I’m approaching April as a month to get healed. If I can get to May without being hurt, then I’ll have plenty of time to be in tip-top shape for the Rock and Roll Half. All these goals of setting PRs in other distances will take a back seat until I’m 100 percent.

So I finally bought a decent bike and got in 4.5 miles this morning. Not much, but it was the first time in at least five years that I’ve gone more than a few miles on a bike. Boy do I have a lot to relearn. Of course I didn’t forget how to ride — who does once you learn — but the whole shifting gears thing and getting my butt used to the bumps will take some adjusting. Either way, I’m happy to get an aerobic workout in. My foot is still bothering me slightly, so I haven’t done any running since the race.

Anyway, I’ll have more details soon about my bike and the experiences I’ll get on it this week …

Note to self: Never buy an $80 bike. It only causes issues 5 minutes after riding it. And never buy a bike from Target. Despite loving everything else in this store, including buying 99 percent of my running gear from there, when it comes to bikes, the staff isn’t so helpful. Perhaps Target’s PR department has Google alerts set up and they’ll read about this and get back to me.

I’ll be headed to another store very soon to complete my cross-training purchases and buy a bike that might have tires that last longer than a half-mile trip down the street and have a staff that might be willing to get another bike for me if I return it …