I opted for the usual Tuesday hilly route, of about 5¼ miles, but treated it as a recovery run and took it at a very steady, very gentle pace! Just about everything south of the midriff was in some level of pain, mainly the left hamstring, right knee, both Achilles tendons, and particularly the right ankle. I put all of this down to Sundays half marathon of course, together with the few days prior. The shooting pain in my right ankle and the general tightness of the Achilles I specifically attribute to a couple of turns in the Stafford course, both of which had fairly steep downhill approaches to sharp right corners. Both potential tendon snappers for tired runners!
I was reading a thread on the Good Run Guide forum earlier about the tricks our minds play on us and the tricks we can use to combat them. In particular mention was made of those insidious thoughts of giving up during a race. I often find myself thinking, usually early in a race, that I'm not in good shape somehow - there's some unexpected pain, my guts don't feel right, my legs are stiff or I just don't feel in the right frame of mind. Strangely on some of these occasions I've turned in some of my best or surprisingly good results - even a couple of PBs. I now find that I can use these experiences to snap myself out of the doldrums and push through. After all, if it's worked out alright before it will again, right? Pack the pain in a little box and post it to someone who doesn't mind being a loser, and concentrate on reeling in the guy in front!
Purely coincidentally, while writing that paragraph I was listening to a song by Juliet called 'Ride the Pain'. Regular readers would know that I'm not a fan of running 'wired for sound', but if I were, I'd be adding that number to my running playlist!
No comments:
Post a Comment