Pain, Prayer, Action

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    Finally, a good week with some good "results." started off kind of funky. I met up for a run with an old cycling friend I haven't seen in a couple years. Like most guys my age, he's pretty busy with a family, house, career, all that business so his training is pretty specific for upcoming races usually. Doesn't always have time to wander around in the woods trying to find himself all the time. I bring this up because as we have similar marathon times, my training tends to be lots of long, slow miles with as many big hills as I can find. While his tends to be shorter, faster runs focusing on intensity. Running with guys like this usually means I have to speed up. You might not think so but it's next to impossible to get speedy guys to slow down to my kind of pace. It just doesn't seem natural to them. Since I could probably use some speed/tempo work from time to time, I just work to their pace.
    I was fresh out of work with about 8-10lbs of work stuff in my backpack and while that's not usually an issue, I could tell today was gonna be different as soon as we took off. Right off the bat I felt a "shock." nothing painful just a shock but I didn't let it bother me and we covered a little over nine miles on all the steepest hills I could sneak in on him.
    The next day it felt like I was wearing a pain belt specifically dialed in to my lower back. It doesn't help that I run in to work. Or maybe it does, but just my 2.2mile commute each way was all I could manage the next three days. I tried stretches at work and home, hit the big foam roller all week and pretty much made ibuprofen a part of my diet. I hate that shit but making weird old man noises and grimaces everytime I got in and out of a chair was getting tired. I took the whole day friday to rest, take care of some life crap and do a lot of walking around the city. Probably did as much for my head and soul as it did my back.
    Saturday I was back in business. Felt really stiff but the pain was a lot more manageable so went ahead with my plan to run a 20-25 miler. Normally I would've dropped it down to 15ish but I've got a 40 miler coming up in a few weeks and wether the training right now actually makes me stronger or not, I should at least be conditioning myself to run while feeling like shit. Today would be perfect for that.
    Stepped out the front door, started running really slow but very "deliberate." Trying to absorb all the shocks from each step and trying not to waste any energy or movements. four hours later I'm back at my door and feeling almost exactly as I did when I left. Amazing! No weird surges, jumps, fartleks. just one solid pace and a focus on my posture that would rival the focus of a safe cracker's. My body was depleted but that was expected with no food but I wasn't sore or delirious or saddled with any of the usual "vision quest run" symptoms. I should really learn to apply this technique in all my ultra races.
    Afterwards, turned out with that slow, fat burning zone pace, I burned off 9 pounds. Only three of it came back. Nice. Guess it doesn't hurt that I've only been eating chicken/spinach salads and frozen vegetables all week. Still, it happened in four hours. kinda cool. Later, foam rollers and back bends on the big yoga ball.
    Sunday, a little pain but it's in a smaller area so i know i've been doing the right stuff and it's going away. Probably need to find a regular chiropractor though. Just in case. I didn't want to lose the gains I'd made yesterday so I headed out on the road bike. It was torture. just mentally, physically it was okay. Just thought it might be a good idea to flush some of the build up in my legs out. Just a flat 20 miler but I think it helped. Using the bike like this might be a good way to work it back into my psyche without the rest of the burdens.
    So as it goes, back, head and soul are feeling better about the upcoming season of agony and ecstasy. The legs will get there. That's the easy part.

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