Wow its been a while

Sorry guys, I've been struggling a little bit with spurts of depression and apathy, and even more depression. See, its been three months or so since I stopped running consistently, and zero progress is really grating on my nerves. I don't know if I posted this or not, but I finally went to see the orthopedist a month or so ago. The doctor there scheduled an MRI for my knee, but insurance had to clear it first. I just got the call yesterday in class that the insurance did clear it, and after being on hold for damn near 45 minutes, I'm not all good yet. Since I've got titanium plates in my head from a brain surgery I had 5 years ago, the MRI tech wanted the results of my last MRI. I've had a lot of them since I had the plates put in to patch my skull, albeit they were 10-15 years ago, so that might take some doing. All told, I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, but no way to get through the tunnel without getting hit by an oncoming train.

In other news, I am running a little bit though, granted not enough. I try to jog a couple miles once every two days or so. Usually I go two miles, and the furthest I’ve gone is three- definitely not enough to keep me sane. I’m dying to just fly through a 20 mile run right now. Its weird, sometimes I’ll feel fine and I’ll ask myself why I’m not going faster and farther, and then five minutes later I’ll feel like complete shit. Last night’s run was a perfect example. I felt pretty great, granted my knee was giving me a little grief on my way back. Still, I pounded out three miles in 21 minutes and felt great, proportionally. However, when I got home, I f-in hurt, man. You know when you get overtired and your leg or whatever hurts, but you can’t nail it down? I don’t know, to me it feels like its hollow, it hurts like the dickens, and I can even feel my bones grinding together; its not a fun experience.

I'm legitamately pissed right now

My troubles started last Wednesday, when I was still in Illinois. I was running along the shoulder of one of the roads on my way to the forest to go run some trails. This specific road was raised a couple inches such that the shoulder I was running on was raised a good four to five inches off the ground; and it was a straight vertical drop to the grass. It worried me a little, especially when the shoulder narrowed and cars were almost brushing you going 65 mph. It was a little unnerving, and I was always thinking of the worst. So anyway, I was running down the shoulder of this highway, and a car swerved toward me on the shoulder, so I instinctively jumped off the shoulder and into the grass. Actually, I didn't jump, I more like fell. I caught one of my feet on the edge of the shoulder and lost my balance, so I rolled down this hill this road was on. I came up a little rattled and bloody, but none the worse for wear. My knee was killing me, but its always like that after you bump it a little bit. Anyways, I had fallen into a couple bushes as well, so I wasn't feeling the greatest, so I walked/ limped/ ran home.

So whatever, I iced my knee until Saturday morning, and Saturday was my first run. Bad idea. I was expecting some pain and stiffness but yikes. It felt like my kneecap was on fire. I've never felt such intense pain. It was awful, and I had to curtail my run at 15 minutes, all though it wasn't that long since I walked a lot. The next day I drove home, which didn't help matters, even though I got out of the car every hour or so to try and move around. I wasn't getting anywhere. My knee hurt to bend every which way, but more forward and back than side to side. And going up stairs, that was the worst. When I got home it took me like half an hour to make 2 trips up and down the two flights of stairs to my room. I had to go up one step at a time and couldn't put any weight on my left knee or I thought it would collapse, it felt that unstable. Since I got home around 10pm, I only iced for half an hour and went to bed.

That was Sunday, and I iced all of Monday, and Tuesday morning. I was a little shocked Monday night when I could walk with little pain. I mean, I was far from not hurting, but at least I could move around. I could also pinpoint the pain, which was another big step, because now I could do some googleing and figure out what was up. Tuesday I accidentally came down the stars leading with my left leg, which previously led to excruciating pain, but it wasn't there. I mean it still hurt quite a bit, but the stabbing pain wasn't there. So that was good. I decided it was time to start rehabbing for real.

This is really what pisses me off no end. Our school has 2 workout facilities on campus. One is on the south side of campus, one north. The north campus gym doesn't exist anymore since they tore it down and are building a 4 million dollar athletic complex that looks like ****. I got over to the south side and it was closed until the end of first semester. I was beyond mad because it took me a while to hobble over to south gym, and now I had to go back. Beyond that, now I had to find some place to go. Its like this: I could sit on my butt all day and eventually my knee wouldn't hurt anymore. However, I'm looking for my knee to actually get better because I'ma be honest with you; once my knee stops hurting I'm out the door for a few miles. But if it stops hurting, that just means its rested, not actually better. I'm not sure what's wrong, but obviously I'm going to want to strengthen my knee before I run, else I'm just going to get hurt again.

So, my mission was to find a gym or something. Preferably one that had like a week free so I could pretend to be interested for a while and then switch to another one. This was pretty much an overriding concern. I didn't care if I had to workout with bros or guidos but if I could get it for free its all good. Not happening though. Nobody had a free offer more than a day, and most I had to be 21 for, and since they had to have my info on file, I don't think I could get away with lying. So, my second concern was no guidos, guidettes, meat heads, or barbies. I'm already pretty depressed I'm one of those guys who has to join a gym, I don't think I could take a bunch of orange guys walking around. Third concern was cost and time. Of course, I don't want to pay like a million dollars to ride a bike, and I won't do it forever either, allthough it might not be a half bad idea to throw in a day of cross training every week. Anyways, I just need something to do until the school gym opens. Thats part of the problem too, I feel fat and lazy when I don't do anything.

So, I broke down and joined the YMCA. I'm not going to lie, I had to bite my lip and swallow my pride while doing it. While it had excersize bikes, a pool, it was freakin expensive. Like $60 for the month, I think? rediculous. Its nice though because its like a 10 minute walk from work too. So here's what I'm thinking: until next Friday, its all spinning. No exceptions. Hopefully I can work back to 2 hours, at least. After that, I'ma do both, and alternate days spinning and running- probably on the indoor track or tradmill. After that, I'll go to six days a week running, one spinning or biking. That is, if all goes well. So there it is, hold me to that schedule

G- day minus 82/ not running, not racing

I don't have anything to say.

So I really don't know why I'm posting this, but I am. Actually, I did run some this week, but not enough. I ran three days for nine miles, actually two days if you want to get technical. My run on Wednesday was at 2:00 in the morning, so I king of ran a double but the two runs had over 12 hours in between them, thus not making it a double. Anyways, doesn't really matter, but that was probably the best run of the three, which is not saying much. I was still hurting, but not as bad as usual. Maybe that was because I took more motrin than usual, I'm not sure, but all three hurt, so I stopped, no use throwing my whole training away with 12 weeks to go.

Last week was ridiculously busy, so I didn't fault myself too much for not running, although maybe I should have. I was signed up for the Human Race 8k on Saturday, and probably could have ran it, probably, but cooler heads prevailed and I didn't. Physically not running the race was fine, I wasn't upset about it, although it would have been an awesome day for running. What really ate at me was that I had spent $20 on race registration and now that would go to waste. That usually wouldn't weigh on my conscience that much, but this week looks to be an expensive one despite getting my tax return- I've got to pay for my Sigma Chi Formal tickets, MLB Gameday Audio Subscription, Running Socks, reload my bus card, and pay for real food since the cafeteria is closed over spring break- so $20 is a big deal right now. I hate spending money. I called my buddy Joe, who I am training for Grandmas with to ask if he could use my race entry. He said he could, especially since he hadn't run a race before. I picked up my entry and gave it to him then, which is probably totally illegal so arrest me if you want. I hung out with the TC Running crew in TC Running mobile-1, which is the RV that TC Running drives around to a couple local races and exhibits shoes. I hung out with them for a while and ran about a mile in the Nike Zoom Streak XC 2's, which were okay, really skinny, and definitely not my cup 'o tea.

I watched the end of the 5k, which was a hell of a race. I wish I stole those flats from the TC van because I really wanted to run the course and run it fast. After the 5k finished, I took the bus to Run 'N' Fun to complete my tour de running stores. Those guys are my boys, they've got my back. I was surprised that I got somebody to help me out because the place was pretty busy. I mean it always is a popular place, but it was packed for a Sunday. So I got a guy to look at me and he looked at my shoes while I lectured him about how I got injured and why and all that. He put me in a pair of Glycerin 8's and they felt amazing. They're way more cushioned than the Adrenaline 8's I'm currently rocking. He said that I could forget the insoles I currently wear because while they do provide cushion, that cushion will wear out after a while and then my feet have to take the beating which probably triggered my injury. He gave me some flak when I explained that I wouldn't buy the shoes, and I always feel bad when I explain I can't afford things, but it happens.

• Congrats to Steve Stenzel over at Steve in a Speedo for finishing second in the 5k today in 17:11
• Congrats to my training partner Joe Cronin who pinch ran the 8k for me in 36:46
• Visit Run 'n' fun at http://www.run-n-fun.com/

G- day minus 93/ the week that wasn't

Can you believe we're inside 100 days until the marathon? I can't. Its beautiful out, there's no snow, but I'm not running. Actually, I am running, it just happens to be measured in hours instead of miles and I'm in a pool instead of on pavement, but other than that its all good. It all started on Wednesday when I had that super awesome endorphin filled run and then went downhill fast from that point. I kinda think that I could have been in shock or something that whole run because my feet felt like they weren't even hitting the ground. Well, after that my forefoot started hurting. Not bad, just noticeably. I ran on Wednesday and gutted it out, allhough I knew I shouldn't, but my one rule is to never give up on a workout so I didn't, and that was fine. Friday morning I had a meeting with the principal of Ramsey Junior High and had no money for the bus so I walked the mile and a bit there and mile and a bit back in my dress shoes. Bad idea. I chafed so much I have two pretty big holes in my Achilles area. It hurts, and I can't do much about it. See, you're expected to where shoes pretty much everywhere, and if you're a runner you're forced to wear shoes everywhere out of common decency. So its a long, slow process trying to get that healed.

Well, Friday into Saturday it really started bugging me. A stabbing pain in my third and fourth metatarsals. I ran around Lake Calhoun early Saturday trying to find the water stop I was assigned to work at and that just sucked. Actually, it didn't hurt so much after 10 minutes or so, but it was nothing like I've ever felt up until that point. So that was not fun. Pretty much that whole morning was full of pain and cold. Oh yeah, weather.com said it was going to be 50 that morning, so I busted out a long sleeve race shirt and jeans. Nope, it was like 20 or 30, which added to my misery. I can take a considerable amount of pain before I start to notice it, which in my case was a bad thing. I was limping and almost in tears by the end of the day and decided to go to the doctor Sunday, although I dont know why because I knew what they'd say. The doctor said because of my extremely high arch, I was coming down abnormally on my toes, and because my third and fourth toes aren't straight, the heads of those toes take the brunt of every stride. He recommended a forefoot gel pad, when we went to the shoe store to get one, the foot specialist just ripped him to shreds. It was funny, but I think he was right, a metatarsal pad wasn't going to do anything for me, what I needed was more cushion. Also, if you looked at the insole in my GTS 10's, you could see the hole my forefoot dug into the insole. Also, my right foot was slid over in my right insole so that the ball of my foot butted up against the edge of the insole, whereas that didn't happen on the right. I don't really know what that means, but it happened. To address the cushion aspect as well as that my foot moved around side to side a lot, the shoe guy hooked me up with some Spenco Cross Training insoles, a long with a lot of other gibberish to help me run again. He recommend I get custom insoles, which I may take him up on, but still, most of the stuff he suggested probably wouldn't work. See, my feet are arched as high as they are to compensate for my lack of cerebellum, so not every solution for people with high arched feet will work for me.

However, he didn't condemn me for running like the sports medicine doctor did when I told him how many miles I run, which is nice. So its coming to the end of the week, and I feel like I could actually feasibly run on Monday. Obviously, I won't be hitting my planned 57 miles, but I hope to be around 30 with a race on Saturday. Who knows, I won't push it, its too early in the training plan for that. I've got a lot more to say, but I should probably post this since I've been working on it off and on for three days.