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December 30, 2005
clown shorts
I made good on my resolve to spare the hamstring for exactly one day - on Wednesday I slept in, did not run in the morning, went to the gym after work for an hour split between the elliptical and the stairmaster. This all felt ok, and I was surprised that the elliptical is now easier for me than the stairmaster.
Yesterday morning I decided to try 8 very easy miles. The hamstring was tight and sore from the first step, and by 4 miles the soreness had spread to more of the leg, so I decided to make it an easy 6 instead. The soreness wasn't terrible, but I couldn't see those 2 extra miles helping me any more than the leg was hurting me. The leg was even sore to walk on for a little while, but it settled down and I tried not to mope the rest of the day, even did a pretty good job of it.
Last night my luck started to change. I was finally able to fix my laptop keyboard (for some reason c, d, e, 3, and f2 stopped working, which is really bad if you type the word select all the time like I do); this involved taking the laptop partway apart and then putting it back together. I received some stuff I'd bought really really cheap from sierratradingpost.com including some of the reddest red-red running shorts you've ever seen, red with tiny swatches of red-white-and-black flowers on the sides, and one size too big, as it turns out. I spent some time mashing my hamstring and got it to loosen up, and decided to try 8 easy again this morning in the clown shorts so I'd have something to laugh about if the running didn't go so well.
It didn't go so bad, much better than yesterday. I resisted every urge to push or go up or down a hill, and it was pretty much an 8-mile run like any other. I can still feel where the hamstring is tight, and my hip/glute is pretty tight on that side, but I know how to treat that, and I will.
I'd registered for a 5-mile race tomorrow but I'm not going to push my luck. Instead I'm going to run long with the long-lost friend I mentioned a couple of posts back. I hope he won't mind going kinda slow.
Posted by joe positive at December 30, 2005 9:30 AM
Comments
Happy New Year!
Posted by: Dawn (aka Pink Lady) at January 1, 2006 4:45 PM