Speed kills. Tendons.

Speed kills. Tendons.

Well, my tendons certainly seem to dislike speed - or to be precise, my left hamstring origin tendon dislikes speed.

Sigh. This was supposed to have healed by now.

I had to skip my track and long interval sessions last week - my left leg was still not up to scratch. I hated having to skip sessions so early back into training, but I guess if I push through things now I'm going to make it worse further on down the road.

To be honest, I'm feeling very up and down right now. After initially thinking I was about to get back on track, time seems to be slipping away rapidly and I often feel myself starting to panic when I realise how quickly Melbourne is approaching. But, in reality, there's no point in panicking is there? It's not going to help the situation - it'll just make me more frustrated. Instead, I have to take this whole thing One. Day. At. A. Time.

Yes, there is still a 'big picture'. And I'll get there. I have to. It's just going to take a bit longer than I originally planned. Freaking crying about it won't help.

Interestingly, while we're on the topic of Melbourne, the Melbourne Marathon isn't the Australian Championships this year - they've gone to Sydney. Even if I were in top form I doubt I would have changed my plans and run Sydney. Melbourne has always been faster for me and the elite athlete coordinator, Tim Crosbie, does everything possible to make it a really positive and easy experience for us. I'm out to get the fastest time I can and I think Melbourne's the place for that. Especially now they've sorted out the merge with the half marathon runners.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand.

I did 30k on Sunday (23/6) for my long run. Do you know, I'm pretty sure that's the longest run I've done since Melbourne Marathon last year. It felt good to get it done and the tendon was OK. My endurance held up fine and the next day I only had a tiny bit of tightness in my calves - nothing you'd think twice about and my morning run got rid of it.

I've also been in touch with Mizuno to ask about some other shoes that might be worth testing out. At present I am running most of my kilometres in the Elixir, which is working out well. The Elixir used to be my marathon race shoe and I trained in the Nirvana because it had more support so would be kinder on my body. I'm doing all my track work in the Ronin, which I love. Love, love, love. Best shoe ever.

I've found that using a lower profile shoe, such as the Elixir instead of the Nirvana, helps me maintain the body position and form that I need to focus on to get myself through this injury (and to stay uninjured). There doesn't appear to be any scientific evidence for this - even the Mizuno podiatrist said there wasn't much correlation with hamstring injuries and lower profile shoes and my physio said he didn't know, so all I can go on is how my body feels and how it reacts to different shoes.

I am going to try the Inspire as a training shoe - it's got a little more support than the Elixir but less that the Nirvana, so it might be good for doing lots of kilometres. I supposed I'm lucky in that I'm a lightweight so it's not as vital that I have shoes with loads of cushioning, but I'm going to test the Inspire out and see how it goes. A friend recently started running in a pair and he's really happy with how it feels.

So where to from here? I'm literally taking things day by day - seeing how the body is feeling then deciding if the program has to be modified. This week I swapped some days around but I did all the sessions (but again, the track session was cut short - probably a wise move because my 4k cool down had some 'not-right-discomfort'). I had a 25k trail race scheduled for this Sunday - I had a choice of two. I entered one - Woodford to Glenbrook, that I've won the last four years in a row - knowing I'd only be a 50/50 chance of actually racing, depending on my leg. However, it's been cancelled because of flooding. The other one, the Wingello Trail Classic, is a new race in the Southern Highlands. I am doubtful I'll head down to that. Even if I feel OK on Sunday morning, a two-hour drive before a race is never going to benefit the tendon. Sitting in a car for anything more than 40 minutes still causes it to ache.

I do need to get a race in soon though - just to get it over with. I haven't raced since last November and I'm nervous (more nervous than usual!)

So that's where things are at right now.  I'm still fighting.

Two steps forward... and...

I have been making solid progress in regards to returning to a 'normal' training program. I'm now into week three and, generally, the hamstrings have been behaving themselves and I've been able to do some solid training. Last week I did 95k in total, with a fair bit of quality running. It's made it feel like a weight's been lifted off me and I've been feeling so happy and motivated.

Yesterday and today, however, were not good days. My left hamstring/tendon was definitely feeling something so yesterday I decided to swap Tuesday's track session with Wednesday's 14k run in the hope that an extra day away from the track would settle things down.

Unfortunately when I woke up this morning my hammie felt a bit achey and, as I feared, when I did the hamstring bridge to test things out I felt the slightest little twinge up under my butt. Just the slightest bit, and only for a split second at the start of it, but it was there. Not what I wanted.

So, in an effort to let it settle down completely, today was a cycle only day - as per my instructions from physio Brent that if there is any pain when I do a bridge I'm not to run (let alone to the track session I was planning on doing). I've been feeling very positive these last few weeks so today broke the spirit a little bit. I'll admit to having a bit of a cry this morning, then another one this afternoon when the Athletics NSW email newsletter arrived rubbing salt in the wound.

I just want this to disappear once and for all. I suppose I was naive in thinking there wouldn't be any setbacks when getting back into training. At this stage I suppose I'm prepared to modify my training every now and then to cater for any niggles but the worry is that I'll have to keep modifying it, and modify it too much, to the point that I'm not going to get the best out of myself.

Bah.

Here we go again

I am officially on day two of 'proper' training. Woo hoo!

I finished with my physio last Friday - we just went through the exercises I needed to keep doing (as in, keep doing forever and ever, amen, if I want to continue running) and talked about the warning signs I had to look out for that would signal tendon problems.

The biggest warning sign is pain when I do my hamstring bridge - that's my number one test to make sure everything is still OK. If I get pain I have to back off the training until the pain goes away.

I am also about to start riding around on a scooter. You know, one of those push scooters that kids use. I thought my physio was joking when he told me to use one - he wasn't. It makes sense because it strengthens all the areas I need to work on. This weekend I'm going to go to my parents' place and dig out the (awesome) scooter my younger sister used. And yes, it will probably look like I'm a crazy lady trying to reclaim my youth. I don't care. I'll do anything if it helps my running!

Today I hit the track, as per my program. I've done some track work over the last month or so but they've been short sessions with decent recovery between reps (very basic - two mins fast, two min recovery, just so I felt I was doing something). Today that recovery time was cut in half (two mins fast, one min recovery) and we added some one minute reps (with 45 sec recovery) at the end.

Yes, it was tough for me - it's been at least six months since I've done this. Yes, some of the reps were a bit off the pace, but some were faster than the set pace. In all, I feel so positive and happy that I'm finally back to it.

Life is good.

J