YOU CAN'T TRICK ME

Running is just a series of tests, right? Obstacles present themselves along the way and we have to react to them. These obstacles include things like injuries, weather, family/work/school obligation (i.e. time constraints), motivational issues, etc. How we react to these obstacles usually relates to how well we race.

Of course, (hopefully) we learn from these obstacles so that we’re better able to avoid them in the future or at least deal with them better.

But then the obstacles get “smarter” too. They start to adapt in an effort to teach you more lessons. For example, once you figure out the common injuries, like tendonitis or shin splits, and how to deal with them, all the sudden you’re Googling Priformis Syndrome or Sciatic Nerve. Or, you finally figure out a post-collegiate routine that lets you get your runs in and the next thing you know you have a kid and have to readjust your schedule again.

Then the obstacles throw another curve at you – they start occurring near milestones (i.e. at the end of your largest week or month ever, prior to a big race, etc). I guess this is to ensure that we truly listen to our bodies rather than trying to make our logbook look good.

That’s where I’m at. I’m sitting here with two days left in the month, I’m 3 miles away from 300 for the month - my biggest November ever, I’m 3 days away from a cutback week, and now I have a sore hip.

I’m on to you – you can’t trick me!!!

It’s time to take my own advice, heed my own words, and nip this thing in the bud. I’ve said all along that while my life may work well in 7 day segments called “weeks,” it doesn’t mean that my body and/or training follows that same pattern. So rather than struggle until Saturday just to finish out the week, I’ll start my cutback week today. Today will be a zero in the log book. Tomorrow morning I’ll see Jenna and possibly run later in the day.

Looking back on the last 3 weeks, actually the last 22 days, I’ve had some solid mileage; 259 miles on 22 days (23 runs) or 82.4 MPW. I’ll take it – time to let my body absorb the workload. Here’s a graph of my rolling 7-day mileage since September 22nd. The big dip that starts around day 41 is from my last planned cutback week.

Quote of the day;

“You have to go at your own pace. Egos can’t be involved. That’s exactly how it is in life, too.” – Bonnie Brown