I have been running again now for going seven weeks now and today marked the first time since my return that I hit double digits on a run. 10 miles. It was a muggy and humid 10 miles on the Monon with Marshall and the stroller. Lindsey had a long brick to do for Muncie this morning so I loaded up Marshall and hit the path.

Lindsey ready to hit the road for 50 with Jake. Muncie 70.3 is coming quickly.

Marshall at the end of the muggy 10 mile run. Don’t be fooled. He was ready to be done and so was I.

It has been a slow progressing build back to 10 miles but it is coming back.

Week 1:

• 4 runs
• 14 miles
• 1:51 of run time

Week 2

• 4 runs
• 18 miles
• 2:15 of run time

Week 3

• 4 runs
• 20 miles
• 2:28 of run time

Week 4

• 4 runs
• 21 miles
• 2:37 of run time

Week 5

• 5 runs
• 31 miles
• 3:41 of run time

Week 6

• 5 runs
• 30 miles
• 3:36 of run time

Week 7 (In progress so thus far)

• 4 runs
• 30 miles
• 3:31 of run time

The first couple weeks back all I focused on was getting used to running again. Nothing strenuous. Easy miles. To be honest, it was kind of touch and go for a while with my mind. I had some scar tissue that was flaring up on my hamstring but the more I ran and the more I foam rolled the better it felt.

Beginning in week 5, I started to add some small stress workouts into my running. It has been the Wednesday run. It began with a one mile fast finish near tempo and has grown each week by 1 mile.

So this week was a 3 mile warm up, 3 miles @ descending tempo (6:10, 6:02, 5:45), and a one mile cool down. Good lord…that one hurt on Wednesday. The 3 miles was long enough that it really began to tax me but still short enough that I could handle it. I have yet to decide for next week if I am going to take it up to 4 or  maintain for another week and then add…my guess is that I will add but we will see.

As it stands today, I am starting to feel really good about my running again. I have 3 or 4 more weeks of base building before Chicago training officially kicks off. I should be up to about 44 miles or so by the time Chicago kicks off and that will provide a nice starting point to ramp up the marathon training. I have yet to attempt a repeat of any sort…but I think that will come in a week or two. That is the last mental and physical check box for my return. I injured myself during a repeat workout so I need to do a repeat workout.

It has been a long road back from my hamstring injury in January but following that 10 miles today I feel good and I am ready to chase down that 2:45 marathon come October.

The post Returning to Training appeared first on Lindsey Hein.

I settled on not running Carmel and set my sights on a new goal race, Chicago. We ran the Chicago Marathon back in 2010 relatively unprepared and one week after riding our bikes 800 miles to NYC for Love 146. 

October 2010, Indianapolis to NYC on our bikes for Love146.

I’ve always wanted to give Chicago a proper try and what better place then The Windy City to tkae my run at 2:45. I was sold. Run Chicago in the fall and just get back into running over the next couple of weeks and just go on my way.

The post Taking a Month Off appeared first on Lindsey Hein.

I should be in the middle of week 4 of my training cycle but instead I find myself just hanging out, resting and doing a lot of light stretching. At the time of the injury, it didn’t seem very severe and I thought no big deal, inconvenient, but no big deal. I thought I’ll take a week off and be back at it in on time. WRONG!

I am relatively pain free at this point which is different then last week.  I have attempted two test runs and both stopped within 18 seconds of starting and when I say test runs it was trying to run from the car to the grocery store the other day and to the car from home. So maybe a total of 150 feet. Those light runs told me very quickly that my leg is not ready and will not be ready anytime soon.

I am going to go see a Sports Medicine Doctor today to evaluate my options and see if we can do anything to accelerate the healing process. In the back of my mind, I kind of think the only thing that will work is time off. I am not ready to face that reality. Even though that is what it seems to be anymore.

I am hopeful that he will suggest some sort of therapy that have me running in another 10 days or so. I don’t know where that leaves me for the Carmel Marathon. In a tough spot I know that. That would leave me 10 weeks to race day and really probably only 7-8 weeks of being actually able to do some real work with a build up in running and a small taper period. If everything went perfectly from here I fully believe that I can get back into some pretty good shape and take a run at 2:52 or so…2:45 is probably gone in my book. That is definitely not optimal but that is all I can hope for right now because otherwise I don’t know what to do with myself.

We’ll see what the Dr. says today.

I feel like I am now chasing a ghost.

Have you ever dealt with an injury? What did your recovery look like? How did you handle it mentally?

*Update: I saw the doctor today and it went pretty well so I am very encouraged by that. She thought that  a pretty decent strain at the the top of my hamstring by my butt but no rupture of the muscle based on my healing to date.  She recommended PT three days a week and thought that in a couple of weeks I would be back to my marathon cycle mileage. So that is very encouraging! I start therapy on Monday so we’ll see how it goes.

Also on a side note, I am pretty sure the doctor was about my age. So apparently we are now old enough to have doctors as peers. Time to face it I guess.

Glenn

The post Still Not Running appeared first on Lindsey Hein.

It’s time for me to practice what I preach and I’ll be honest it is easier said than done that is for sure. The first two weeks of marathon training have not exactly gone very smoothly.


During the first week, my foot was kind of flaring up but I wasn’t really worried about it because it never bothered me while running. It was just something I was going to deal with and hope that it went away…and it did during week 2. With the new week, I got a new issue to deal with, the hamstring.

Wednesday’s workout called for 9 miles total with 5 x 1 mile repeats @ 5:36 descending to 5:27. It was a good workout and I felt strong. No red flags or anything. Later in the day, however, my left hamstring felt a little tight. I didn’t think much about it…just figured it was some soreness from the speed work.

Thursday morning was a different story though, it was real tight and real sore. Something was definitely not right. I decided to take my rest day on Thursday instead of Sunday and hoped it would go away.

Friday rolled around and it felt better so I decided to do my run as scheduled. I could still feel the hammy but it was nothing too bad. The workout was an 8 mile tempo run with 6 @ 6:00 per mile. I did a bad job of scheduling the workload for the week as I needed a second easy day in between the speed and tempo…but that learning process is for another post.

During the run I could definitely feel a slight pulling pretty much the entire time. In the back of my head I knew where this was heading but I was not ready to admit it yet. I told myself lets see how Saturday goes. Once again, I hoped lets see if it just takes care of itself…with more running. That makes sense, right?

With the hammy and a late night on Friday, I decided to just run with Lindsey. I probably should have started resting the injury before Saturday but the run on Saturday confirmed what I already knew. I need to take some time off and try and get this thing healthy before it becomes an issue with my plans and goals.

My one week self imposed rest period started yesterday on Sunday and I plan to take it through next Sunday which will give me a full seven days of no running and very little cross training. I have a list of exercises that I found searching the internet for ways to deal with a strained/pulled hamstring. The basic takeaway was if you are not careful with it the issue will stick around for a long time. So I am going to be very careful with this thing as the training cycle is still early that this should hopefully be just a bump in the road.

If everything goes as planned my leg will be ready to run in one week and starting next Monday I will enter a “recovery” week as scheduled and then resume the plan as normal two weeks from now. I am confident that slowing down now and taking some time away will help stay in front of the injury and come April I will be ready to race.

Questions: Have you had any injuries to deal with? How did you do with downtime? Adjustment to expectations?

Glenn

The post Taking a Break – Week 2 appeared first on Lindsey Hein.