Pushed the Button, One Week to the Cape Cod Marathon

I have had a very poor three weeks of running, since racing the Applefest 1/2 marathon. I had a two week cold of some type, a sore calf-achilles, and for the past two weeks my left side has been acting up. I only got about 2 or 3 runs in per week with nothing over 8 miles. I decided, with the weather outlook this weekend, that I wouldn't get another long run in and so I wouldn't enter the Cape Cod Marathon next weekend. Yesterday wasn't a bad day, like they predicted, and after doing a new Feldenkrais lesson Saturday afternoon, my left leg straightened up a bit and the pains of the last 2 weeks left, so I drank a glass of water and headed out for a run.

I had a nice loose run, although I lost a lot of conditioning during the downtime, something I also noticed Wednesday night at the track when I struggled through 3 X 1600 in 6:13, 6:07, and 6:06. I was enjoying feeling loose again and decided to try to go 16 miles. I started losing my form around 13 miles, but soldiered on thinking I would go 21 miles. At about 16 miles, I changed my mind, as I had nothing to eat or drink and going longer would only do some harm. I headed home and ended up doing 18 miles.

I got a long run in, so today a hit the "Enter" button and entered the Cape Cod Marathon for next Sunday. I am not going to worry about time and just see what happens. I guess I would be happy just running under 3:30, although if everything feels right I could go faster. If I qualify for Boston, it gives me an option to do that race in the Spring.

The past two weeks, my left leg has been acting up (out of whack). When that happens, I get a pain in my butt, in my lower back, and my knee feels tight and constricted. I also notice my left foot rotates out to the side more and when I run I have to roll over on the inner side of the foot which twists my knee, tightens my adductors, and gives me pains all over. Usually this is where I start stretching and beating myself up making it worse. I was doing lots of back Feldenkrais lessons, but started looking for foot-ankle lessons. The lesson I finally found, had me working on the ankles, my left one has limited mobility in one quadrant. I noticed that while rotating the ankle, I could feel its effect right in my left glute that gets really tight. There is a definite connection there and after about 1/2 hour of gentle movement and rotations, I was getting a smoother movement. When I was done, things weren't perfect, but I could run without the constrictions I had beem feeling all over my left side. I find it very fascinating noticing, through Feldenkrais, the ability to move in different ways and the positive effect I can achieve. I am slowly unraveling the tension and tight spots throughout my body and feel a lot freer in the back and hips. I also still find a lot of tight spots, so this is going to be a long process. Today is the best my body has felt in the past three weeks!

I don't expect much out of this marathon, in fact it is probably stupid to do it as I should not put new movement patterns under so much stress, so I will keep it low key and turn it into a long run. Hopefully the weather will be better than what the runners in the Bay State Marathon had to face today.