Saturday I ran 27 miles on the bike and bridle trails out at Umstead as my long run. I'd thought I would run that distance a couple weeks before (the weekend of Thanksgiving) when I ended up having a terrible long run of only 13 miles. I was exhausted that entire run a couple weeks ago, so I decided not to push it and called the run at 13. I was bitterly disappointed but figured disappointment was better than injury.
Last weekend I ran the Run at the Rock in Cedarock Park in Burlington, NC. It's a great race that I had done a few times before. You can do a 7-mile single track loop once or twice. This year I opted for twice and had a fabulous 14 miler. I also had a spectacular, superman sprawl fall on the second loop. Thankfully the only thing I injured was my ego. I was a little banged up and bruised, but all in all I came out of that fall unscathed. I need to be very careful on single track. I tend to fall.
So this past Saturday's long run of 27 miles had me on Cloud 9. That is the farthest I've ever run. The fun thing about training for ultras is setting PR distances just with training. I'm hoping to repeat that mileage again this next coming weekend.
I'm currently nursing a sore right forefoot. I first thought it might be a stress fracture but have since decided it must be a Morton's Neuroma. What I need to do is have it looked at by a doctor, since I am not one. In the meantime, though, I've put a Dr. Scholl's forefoot gel cushion on my insole and have been enjoying much less pain when I run in my road shoes. My Montrail trail shoes are another story. They are thinner, lighter, and provide much more information about what my feet are landing on than my road shoes do. Right now, the cumulative effect of that goodness is that my feet hurt like hell when I run in them, even with a gel cushion. So I'm going to stop running in them. I can easily feel comfortable in my road shoes on the bike and bridle trails at Umstead. As for single track, well, I think my trusty Brooks road shoes will have to do there as well. I'm worried about falling in road shoes on single track even more than I would otherwise, but I can't plan to run dozens and dozens of miles with the foot pain I've been enduring. I'm going to experiment a little and keep track of what works and what does not.
Also new for me this weekend was eating Stinger waffles on my long run. I have been starting with Carb-Boom gels and then working my way into more solid stuff. This run I ate gels, Stinger waffles (so delicious...I highly recommend them and in fact went into Bull City Running this afternoon and bought three boxes of them), dried cherries, and goldfish. My only liquid was water. My stomach cramping was kept to a minimum, which was a huge relief.
This week I'm hoping for two runs of 10-12 miles each and a speed work run that will be anywhere from 5-7 miles. Maybe I'll try to add that speed walking workout that I've dropped back into my week.
It's fun to know I've run beyond the marathon distance at this point. I hope to go much, much farther but regardless of what the future holds, no one can take away what I've already done. I've gone beyond the marathon.
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