Since running my last race, I’ve been trying to be good and set myself up for a good finish to the running season, but I always screw it up. After taking it easy for a week after the ultra at Broken Anvil, I jumped right back into the fire and did too much, too soon. My plan was to keep adding miles to my annual total to see if I could get close to 2,000 miles for the year, but I’m not sure that is going to happen. The quadracep/thigh muscles just above my knee were telling me that I still haven’t recovered enough to keep adding miles on my sore legs, no matter how slowly I was doing it. And to make sure that I was going to sabotage myself, I went ahead and signed up for the fall 25K trail race that I like to do in November. That may now be in jeopardy, but it is still a couple of weeks away, and with some rest I may be able to hobble through it.
The past couple of weeks have been better, and I was up in northern Wisconsin to hang out around our lake home and take care of some fall things that needed to be done. There are some great trail running locations up there, and I couldn’t resist running on them. Although we missed the peak fall foliage, there were still some great views along the trail. Kari and I even took a trip to Hurley, near the Michigan U.P., to see a small waterfall that I was prepared to be underwhelmed by. It was actually really neat. I had forgotten how much I enjoy running trails that are dirt and grass, with fun stuff to navigate through and around.
I spent the week doing e-bike rides with Kari and keeping the runs at a 5-mile max. distance, and I was beginning to feel better. Upon returning home, I added a run/walked 10-miler with no issues. When I did it again two days later, my left hamstring sent me a strong signal at 7.5 miles that it won’t tolerate my shenanigans anymore. I tried to jog super slowly again today, but it clearly isn’t going to let me do that. I’m going to have to rest my leg for a while and substitute cycling and walking for running. I can walk just fine, which seems odd.
Oh well, at 63 years old, I can expect a few setbacks now and again, and live to run another day. Plenty of time left in the year to keep adding to the annual mileage.
