My Triathlon Adventure

So the last 6 months has been very busy.  I have a new job, which is keeping me busy.  We have also purchased a new house and I’ve been working on some remodeling work there during all of my free time.  So I have done no working out of any kind since last summer.

Prior to that I was plagued with injuries stemming from a back injury, and as a result I put on about 15 pounds from my lowest weight back at the start of last year.  Since February I have been eating better, and I”m now down about 11 pounds, so I’m close to my fighting weight. 

The good news is that we are moving in this weekend, and I hope to pick up the training once we settle in.  I’m most likely going to start with some weight training to get myself ready to do some running.  I still have a goal of completing a marathon, and we’ll see if this is the year for that.

I’ll try to keep up with my posts, because, honestly it is a good record for me of what I’ve done right, and more importantly, what I’ve done wrong.  Wish me luck, I’m going to need it.

OK, so I was out of the water for about 4 weeks with pain on the top of my foot.  I stopped all running just to be safe, and then last week I finally visited my doctor.  He said rest was the right direction.  He recommended new shoes (which I already had ready to go) and to ice and use Aleve if I needed to for pain.  He thinks it’s just tendonitis and that I should be able to run through it, so, yay!

I went running 3 miles the next day, then 3 miles at the Color me Rad race the next day.  I ran again (4 miles) this past Saturday.  I plan to start picking up the distance training again this week.

I also did my first open water swim of the year this past Sunday,  and it went ok.

One last update, I signed up for the Amica Ocean Beach Triathlon on Sunday, and I’m going to have to get serious with my training now or it’s gonna hurt.

Happy training!

Work has kept me very busy, so, although I have been maintaining my run schedule, I have not been posting about it.

This past weekend I had a 13.1 mile training run.  I was super excited to be able to run that distance without knee pain.  Unfortunately, the day before I had moved my grandparents to a new home, and re-injured my back.  It was sore the morning of my run, and I considered bailing on the run, but I went for it anyway.  My neck and shoulders were also sore, but my back was my biggest issue.

My back was fine throughout the run, but oddly, my neck got stiffer and stiffer.  I suspect that I was favoring my back, and therefore tweaking everything else.  My knee was sore a few hours after the run, and I suspect that was a result of my back as well.  It took a couple of days for my knee to feel better, but even now my back is still pretty sore.

I hope to squeeze an easy run in this afternoon if I can swing it, and see how my back does.

Bike and swim training have gone by the wayside at this point as I focus on the run.  I have a lot of projects going on at home too that are eating up a lot of my time.  I plan to continue the running, and if all goes well I’ll be doing the Iron Horse Half Marathon in June.  Wish me luck!

As I build up my run distance I have been required to run during the week.  With daylight in short supply, and work in high demand, my time for running has been limited.   Undeterred I have been running on the treadmill at work.  In the past I’ve had issues with my shins hurting while running.  In fact, last night I reviewed my run long from my first year of running, and even then I noted that my my right shin hurt while running, and that I thought I was landing harder on my right leg.

I had no shin issues while running last year, all of those runs were outside for short distances.  Even earlier this year my shins didn’t bother me at all while running outside.  Interestingly, however, the problems with my shins (especially my left one) started right away when I ran on the treadmill.  From about .5 miles to about 2.5 or so, my shins would kill.  They felt really tight, and really sore.  After 2.5 miles or so they would loosen up, and the pain was more tolerable.

On my quest to fix it, I found some comments on a running forum about increasing the slope of the treadmill.  I tried going to a 1% incline, and that seems to work.  My shins have been much better.  It isn’t perfect, they still get tight, just not as bad, and totally tolerable.  So, hopefully this trend can continue.  Next week I’ll reach 7.5 miles for my run (though I have an indoor tri next weekend, so we’ll see how that impacts my ability to actually get a full run in.  I’m keeping my fingers crossed that everything will work out alright.  Here’s to an injury free year.