This week has certainly been a bittersweet one for me.
On Sunday I decided that I fancied a bit of a change to my regular running haunt, sometimes I feel the need to mix my routes up so they don’t become stale and routine. One of the great things about running is that you can just step outside the front door and be working out and building up a sweat in minutes, but I am also lucky that within 15 minutes I can jump in my car and travel to the coast and run along the sea front instead. My Dad also lives by the coast and I have him to blame for my compulsion to run. He has ran every week for the past 35 years come rain or shine, so without much persuasion he decided to join me.
Running along the coast can be liberating when the majority of my run routes take me around the large, urban sprawl of my home town. This particular morning I was joined by a few passers by, out for an early morning stretch of the legs, a couple of fisherman sitting on the beach, sheltered under their waterproof garments, a few plucky boats bobbing up and down in the English channel and a rather large, dead fish that had been washed up the previous night and had been laid to rest on the coastal walkway. I must admit, this did startle me somewhat, I was so engrossed in my run that I failed to notice it looking up at me forlornly until I was almost upon it.
Apart from the feeling of total freedom, I was also lucky to start my run whilst it was raining. This may seem like a strange statement, but I enjoy running in the rain. If it happened to rain in small doses on April 26th next year, I would be more than happy. Obviously I don’t wish to run for 4 hours + in a torrential downpour, but a light shower or some of that fine rain would be more than welcome. (Disclaimer – I take no responsibility for the actual conditions on the day if it so happens that we are all extremely soggy, my mere suggestion or request for a little precipitation has no bearing on the weather forecast, unfortunately I do not have any control in that respect).
Maybe I am an odd creature and I would love to hear from other runners in The Lullaby Trust team, but I seem to run better when it rains. In fact, when I look back at other physical activities I have taken part in over the years, I’ve always enjoyed playing/competing in the rain. I used to hope for rain on the day of a big football match, I wasn’t totally satisfied unless the pitch was a mud bath.
So the conditions were perfect. I decided I wanted to run around 6 or 7 miles depending on how I felt as I went around and after the first mile I knew I was going to enjoy this one. I had a surge of adrenaline at 2 miles and before I knew it I had beaten my previous 10k best and still wanted more, so I continued for a further mile. The feeling of beating my previous 10k pb was great, especially because the previous week, I’d hoped to beat my 10k time in a competitive race and ended up having an absolute stinker. I could blame it on the lack of rain, but I think I put too much pressure on myself and blew out rather early on in proceedings.
The rest of the week didn’t go particularly well…..
Two days after setting my 10k pb I went to the running club as normal for a Tuesday night speed session. Well, I say speed session, I could just about muster a jog comfortably but anything more strenuous than that had me in a bit of discomfort. The inner part of my left calf had been sore for a while, but I’d got used to the pain which normally disappeared once I had got into my stride. Tuesday night was different though, I now had an identical pain in my right calf. I continued to run through it uncomfortably for the duration of the session and decided that I would take a couple of days off to rest it and test it out again at the weekend.
I’d planned an 8-9 mile Sunday run which I was looking forward to after not running since Tuesday. My calves felt a little tight, but nothing out of the ordinary, so I felt confident that I could run the distance, but as soon as I had stepped outside the door and took my first strides I knew my calves were still complaining. It was as if I was running on hot coals, every time my foot struck the ground, a shooting pain traveled up from the bottom of the calf towards my knee. I managed about half a mile and decided enough was enough. Angry and frustrated, I trudged back home.
I have made some great progress with my running over the past two years and I really felt recently that I had stepped up a level in terms of speed and endurance, so it was an inconvenient time to develop an injury.
So it’s time for a break. From all the advice I have read online and gathered from friends, resting is the key to recovery, combined with some physio. It’s certainly going to be a frustrating couple of weeks for me.