Saturday, January 22, 2011

Pain in the Butt

Sorry I haven't been updating the blog very much (especially "The Road to Rocky" series), but I've been busy crunching numbers, finding holes in data and general rabble rousing the proposed closure of my son's school.

Along the way I discovered that I really enjoy agitating. Regular readers will not be shocked.

But as this is a running blog and not a political one, I will leave it at this: to all our political leaders out there - slashing education funding to the bone is not the solution. It leaves our school districts with no option but to cuts thousands of excellent teachers, not just in Austin but Statewide.

Value education, value our teachers, value our children.  And stop trying to score cheap political points at the expense of all three.

Just saying.

Anyway, less agitating and more running.

What with all the other stuff going on at the moment, the one thing I could console myself with was the fact that I was happily running injury free. Which is an awfully dangerous thing to say, because sure enough I woke up last Monday barely able to walk.

I've had problems with a tight or painful left hip flexor for a while. I don't know if this pain was coming from that or my IT band (or even piriformis syndrome), but I was certainly feeling it. Sitting down and crossing my legs to take my shoes off was practically impossible, shifting around in bed caused shooting pain, and any kind of yoga that needed me to bend my knee was out.

The irony was that while everyday things like taking my shoes off and getting into the car were painful, the one thing that didn't cause me (much) discomfort was running. I was aware of it for sure, but that was all.

On Tuesday I ran 10 miles at a 7:20 pace, and the only time I felt any pain was when I climbed back into the car at the end.

Most inconvenient just over two weeks out from Rocky. On the plus side I've run through worse, and it does seem to be loosening up some (though cross legged sitting is still impossible).

I ran 8 yesterday and another 15 this morning without issue.

Though I have to say, after looking forward to Rocky for quite a while, other things seem to have overtaken it. I suspect my season peaked at White Rock, and now I just want to get it done.

But I still want to run a great race, because it's going to be my last for a good long while.


And let's end on a good note - I just caught Dylan raiding the fridge for grapes. When I caught him he offered me one and went right back to it. Gotta love it.

Going out for a rare date tonight with my gorgeous wife, and I'm certainly looking forward to that.

Despite all the white noise, I'm a very lucky guy.

3 comments:

K said...

Butt pain... I identify with that this week!!!

Grapes rule... politicians drool. That's all I'm saying!

LK said...

You're so trained for RR. The timing of your pain couldn't have been better timed since it's taper time. You're not going to get any more adaptations this close to the race, anyway. Just take care of yourself for the next few weeks and try to minimize any weight gain. I'm being really selfish in my request, since I'd like to see you really nail it in Huntsville after all the great, hard trainining you've put in.

Mark said...

Thanks Larry. It's amazing how a few well chosen words can change your whole perspective on things.