After all the excitement of last week, this week I just wanted to get back into my training groove and move forward. Having written off the last few training days and taking Saturday as my regular rest day, I had a planned 35 miler for Sunday night. With that in mind Sunday night came and I hit the trails around 8:00pm, my expected return time was sometime between 3:00-4:00am; it’s quite amazing how quickly your pace drops when the sun goes down. I was running local trails at Cheeseboro Canyon which I have run many, many times although never at night, it's a nice mix of climbing and downhills, some fireroad and single track, there's so great views in the daytime but I was expecting nothing much at night. The moon was waning and wasn't due to be high until really late and I would be running on it's lee side anyway.The course was a figure of 8 which I planned to do twice, re-plenning at my car halfway round and after making sure I had parked ‘outside’ the park gate I set off. An uneventful first loop and half with the exception of bumping into the little (about 4") guy above who was out doing his own trail creeping at night; we gave each other a wide berth! Halfway through the second loop I felt that familiar little tingle which rapidly escalated into the usual nagging, grimacing, squinting, crap I have to walk pain of my ITB!
Yes back by popular demand an irritated ITB, this is my Achilles heel of sorts. Despite my stretching and rolling it has decided to rear his ugly head, again; see here and here for previous episodes…gah!
So without fanfare and discretion being the better part of valor I stopped after the fist loop crawling in with just over 20 miles on the clock…well Forerunner in four hours.
Back to rolling twice a day and stretching twice a day, I am pretty confident I can shake this off; I had it earlier in the year and shook it off, given that it only comes on when I am in the late teens my weekday run top off around 15 miles I should be fine.
Ho hum…there’s just never a dull moment! Here's the Garmin Connect data, see how my pace falls off after mile 17!
And so here's some humor on the topic of Achilles' heel...
You and I both (hate ITBS)
ReplyDeleteHope it goes away quickly as it came.
I'm recovering quickly from my recent episode. (Unlike the episode previously, which was a terrible painful night-mare!!)
That "little" guys looks pretty big to me!!! Yikes. But still it is cool to run into wild things;-)
ReplyDeleteok...so i thought I might be the only crazy that would run at 2 or 3 am!! But I was only running 3 miles! Not 20 or 35!!! And I was running on the streets not on the trails! You are hardcore!! Wow!! Do you prefer to run at nite instead of getting up early in the morning and running??
ReplyDeleteThose aren't out in early November are they? Wouldn't want to camp near them.
ReplyDeleteTake it easy. You know what to do for the ITB.
I almost didn't open your blog because of that spider picture. I hate spiders. I hate ITBS even more though. Why do so many of us get it?!
ReplyDeleteDo you think you may be aggravating your ITB when you start to get tired? Maybe your form is slipping? Just a thought...
ReplyDeleteGlad to see your face is better, but sorry about the ITB.
ReplyDeleteThe evening run sounds fantastic - at least you got a good number of miles on your feet
oh no, not again! sounds like you have a great plan to keep it under control! Wow, you left to run at 8pm for 35 miles!? Because of heat? Regardless, wow!
ReplyDelete