Total mileage: 16.5
See that total mileage at the top of this post? If that’s not an indication that something went wrong this week, I don’t know what would be. But lets start with the good, before I move onto the bad….
After feeling successful about the previous day’s 19.5 mile long run, I was ready to face this week head on! I had the mileage on my side, and was feeling strong after hitting 40 miles a few weeks in a row. Yeah, the long run had been finished on the treadmill, but I didn’t let a thunder storm get in my way, so I was pleased with myself.
Jen was still in town on Monday night and needed to do a 3.5 mi run to keep up with her 10k training, so we decided to head to Eisenhower park to participate in the Nassau County Police Department Memorial 5k. Coming from a family of Cops, causes like this are near and dear to my heart.
After work I stopped at home to change, and then met Jen at the park, where she had already filled out our registrations and was waiting for me to arrive. Luckily, they still had our shirt sizes even though we were registering day-of. We waited by the starting area, Jen running through her prescribed PT exercises pre-run. The national anthem began, and we were off, into the park. This was Jen’s second race post-IT band injury, so she was wary as the mileage began. I don’t get to run with Jen all too often, so I was happy to stick with her as we made our way through the park.
It was a humid night, with a chance of thunder storms on the radar. We got lucky though, with only a few drizzles throughout the race, with no thunder threatening the full distance being completed. The first mile came in at 10 mins even, and we could hear the NCPD academy recruits running to a cadence as we ran a loop onto the next part of the course. I was impressed with their ability to sing while running in this humidity.
Mile 2 included water stations, and we took a quick walk break to get some fluids in. We were both struggling a little with the weather, and I had a nagging pain in my ankle. I usually take the day after long runs off, but I figured an easy paced 5k would be ok. My ankle continued to disagree. The second mile came in at 10:51, and we headed into a tree filled area of the park for the third and final mile. As we grew closer to the finish line, we were both drenched in sweat. Turns out summer is a less-than-ideal time to run – who knew?!
Approaching the finish line we picked up the pace, and completed the distance in 32:27, with an average pace of 10:23. We collected some cool towels they had near the finish, and then completed another .4 miles so that Jen would be able to get her full run distance in. Once that was done we checked out the post-race BBQ that was going on. They had a ton of food options available, but we both agreed that the humid run had made us a little nauseous and agreed to head to my parent’s house to hang out for a bit, rather than staying at the park for longer.
After the race my ankle continued to feel iffy, and of course I couldn’t find my ankle brace Monday night. So on Tuesday I focused on strength training, trying to give my body a break from running. In the morning I did a quick “Beach Body on Demand” workout, and then after work headed to the Gym with Desi, as is the usual Tuesday plan. I took Wednesday completely off, and thankfully a new ankle brace came in the mail that day. A few months ago I dealt with tendonitis that lead to the need for an ankle brace, so at least it was easy to get a new one, as I knew what I was looking for.
Did you know, Kasey “hates” running even more in the summer than she does the rest of the year?
On Thursday Kasey was planning on getting some morning miles in so I planned to meet up with her and figured if my ankle really hurt I would stop. Thankfully, I felt good when I started moving and was able to get in some excellent mileage. Kasey and I got in two miles together before she needed to get ready for work, and then I did an additional 5 miles solo, for a solid 7 mile morning. I started the run with no pressure on my pace, to give myself time to warm-up, and then gradually picked it up, enough that my last 4 miles were at a sub-9 min/mi, and the average pace came in at a 9:12. I felt strong at the end of this run and was glad that skipping some mileage had me feeling better. I figured I could run a little extra on Friday or Saturday to bring the mileage back up.
Thursday night meant, as usual, strength training at planet fitness. This time focused on arms and core. We spent a little more than an hour working through our routine and completed the whole thing without incidence.
I figured on Friday night I would get a few miles in after work before meeting Jen at a beach concert. Of course, I should have just done these miles in the morning. I wound up getting caught at work late, which meant no time for miles before the show.
Den, Desi, and I met up with Jen and her fiancé, Will, at the beach and learned that it wasn’t a concert on the sand like I had expected, but was a concert in an open air bar that was surrounded by sandy beach. I had worn flip flops, something that is fairly out of character for me, thinking my shoes would be full of sand if I attempted to wear sneakers. We found a spot to hang out on the roof of the bar, and had a good time hanging out and catching up. Eventually Jen and I were in need of drink refills, and we headed over to the bar for some refills. As we waited by the bar a waitress rushed by, and in her hasty almost-run, landed on my foot. She apologized quickly and moved on, I assured her it was no big deal, just an accident. My toe hurt, but it was no big, right?
We continued on with our night, eventually joined by my friend Chris, and we all sung our hearts out to classic rock tunes when we made our way to the dance floor. Even Dennis, who usually hates the bar scene, managed to have a good time. It wasn’t until we left the bar and begin the trek back to the car that I realized, WOW, my foot REALLY hurts! I wrote it off as a lot of time on my feet in unfamiliar shoes, and headed to bed when I got home without putting anymore thought to it.
The next morning when I woke up, the first thing that my body called my attention to was the throbbing pain in my foot. Examining my toes, I discovered that I had a bruise that wrapped around my pinky toe and swelling to accompany it.
Well, that’s not a good sign. I had to head to a meeting with the florist that Den and I are using for the wedding, so further evaluation would have to wait until after that. Weight on the foot? Not fun. After the meeting I iced my foot, and proceed to spend most of Saturday planted on the couch, trying to keep off my feet as much as possible. I had a 10k planned for the next day and was seriously questioning if that was in the cards for me. Needless to say, no makeup miles were possible on Saturday.
Sunday morning rolled around, and Desi was at my house bright and early. The Whisper Run 10k, which we were registered for that morning, was meant to be her first 10k ever. My original plan was to race the 10k, and then run another 8 miles to complete that weekends 14 mile long run.
I had pulled out my biggest pair of running shoes, half a size larger than the other pairs, and re-laced it in a way that the internet told me would take pressure off the toes. The course for the race was a repeat of a 5k loop, so I figured if I was in an unbearable amount of pain, I could manage walking at least one 5k loop. Putting the shoe on was painful, but I really felt ok once it was on my foot. We headed to Eisenhower park for the second time this week and picked up our Bibs and shirts. We had just enough time to use the bathroom before we had to line up and get moving.
Desi and I started the race together, but quickly settled into our own paces. It was humid again, but bearable. My foot felt better running than it had walking, and I pushed the pace a bit. I just focused on the mile I was in and found lot of on course support from members of the Merrick Bicycles Tri team, some volunteering and others running with me. When the first loop was complete I headed into the second one feeling strong, focused on the upbeat music I had playing on my headphones. One more loop. I was starting to become a little more aware of my foot, but it still felt ok. My watch was closing in on mile 6, and the course was closing in on the finish line – from looking at my watch while I was running through the area of the park that has more trees I know that my pace was off, so I’m going to chalk the short race distance up to the watch, rather than to a short course. As I approached the finish line, another member of the Tri Team, Andrea, shouted “you better not let me cross that finish line before you!” and it was just the motivation I needed to push a little harder in those last moments. I crossed the finish line and kept moving for a minute, mainly to avoid puking.
I chatted with some of other members of the tri team as I waited for Desi to finish, and when the results were posted I learned that I had managed first place in my age group – I was particularly excited by this, as I had gotten first place AG at this race in 2017 and was hoping to manage it again this year. We hung around for the awards ceremony, and several members of the MBTT had placed in their age groups, woo hoo!
Once the awards ceremony was over, I evaluated how my foot was feeling. Walking sucked way more than running and my foot was screaming about being confined to a shoe. I was happy with my 10k results, and decided not to head out for another 8 miles to complete that 14-mile long run, for fear that this was anything more than a broken toe. I spent the rest of the day relaxing and recovering… and kicking myself a little for deciding to wear flip-flops out on Friday night. What was I thinking?!
In the grand scheme of things, a broken toe isn’t much, but I was afraid that it would be more than a toe. After struggling through the last 5 miles of the NYC marathon last fall, and then having to sit out the Disney marathon in January, I found myself fearful that this would have an impact on the wineglass marathon. Was 2018 just a year that I was not meant to run a full? This was the question that repeated in a loop, as I wallowed in my swollen foot.