Setback??

Pain in my knee - oh no.

The temperature is a bit more reasonable this weekend. Highs in the mid 80's. No reason for old men (even cute old men) to chastise me for this running activity that I've got myself addicted to.

Saturday was my short run. I took Sadie on a back route to meet Jeanie and Shasta at the doggy play park. Pullman is a bit dog unfriendly when it comes to the city parks. We've had a couple people complain in the past about having the dogs off leash (while playing fetch or Frisbee!) in the city's leash twilight zone. The dog catcher was even called on us once. I called city hall and asked where there was a park we could take the dogs to exercise because my border collie had trouble catching a Frisbee while attached to me via leash. The nice lady on the phone told me we had to go outside the city limits. Just to exercise the dogs?!? Whatever... We found a fenced in, seldom used rugby field on the university's campus and called all our friends with dogs and we kind of take over the park once a week with a big dog party. Sometimes up to 8 or 10 dogs. So far so good... When the students come back for the fall semester we will probably have to find another park though because this is the park that the marching band practices on.

So Sadie and I ran to the park as a pre-Frisbee warm-up. My legs were super heavy and weak. Probably still feeling it from the triple digit 6 miler on Thursday. But I also think my diet is still way out of whack from my wisdom teeth surgery last week, which added to my overall feeling of fatigue. With four big holes in the back of my mouth that have to be rinsed out after I eat anything I think that I've been not eating as many times throughout the day (my granola bar and fruit snack attacks) for convenience. So yesterday after the run I made sure I ate as normally as I could.

Today was my long run for the week and I felt much better...at first. It was a scheduled 15 miler (my longest ever) and I choose to veer away from the flat Chipman Trail where I did my last long run and head to the hilly wheat fields where it's simply more relaxing, scenic, and solitary. The route covered paved roads, gravel roads, and some dirt roads. The only thing I was missing was a dip in the river. I felt very strong for the first 12 miles. Very strong. I was attacking the hills and felt like I was keeping a nice steady pace.

Mile 12 to 13 was a bit of a struggle. This section had a few hills that I could only walk up. At around mile 13 I started feeling a pain in my knee. The same pain I had about 3 months back when I decided to take 2 weeks off to rest it. I slowed my pace considerably, hoping that would help. But it didn't. I walked a bit and then tried to run maybe a 1/4 mile, but the knee was not feeling good. If I absolutely had to I could have run through it (like if I was being chased by a killer sloth) but I didn't see any point in trying to push through it. So the last 2 miles were mostly a brisk walk. It's funny because a couple times I tried to jog at the same pace I was walking and the pain returned. But walking it felt fine. I'm not sure what that means. I have no pain sitting here right now, but I'm sure if I went out and tried to run it would flare up.

This is frustrating because I'm a little nervous this may be something that may not go away as quickly as I'd like. Rest day tomorrow and then I'll see how the knee is feeling on Tuesday.

I've been following my training schedule almost on cue in terms of miles per week. Last week because of my surgery I ran about 5 miles less than called for. So I don't think I'm over training. Maybe it's just a little thing that won't be there on my next run... We'll see.

Oh, and I ran out of water. I'm carrying 42 oz. with my fuel belt but it wasn't enough for me and Sadie. Pretty soon I'll start running with milk jugs full of water.

Saturday - 3.5 miles
Sunday - 15 miles

PHOTO 1 - a taste of wheat and hills
PHOTO 2 - Sadie thinks I'm scared of that hill...

Keep running!

Scott