Week 1 Recap

The first week of training is always difficult. In the back of my mind I kept thinking, "maybe I'm doing too much, too early." During every run I felt like I was freakishly tuned to each ache and pain in my legs. The 10-mile jaunt at the end of the week left me wondering why I'm following a marathon plan.

Now a few days and workouts later my body has recovered from the rough week and is begging for more punishment. Its been a while since my legs felt this good. I think I'll go leg press a VW Beetle a few times after this blog.

Week 1 consisted of Hal Higdon's plan with minor changes; the first being my lack of weight lifting due to the ACL pain I was experiencing, and the second due to soccer practice. Overall I managed approximately 28 miles in under 5 hours of running. Not a bad first week.

Lazy Day Horray

Its only been four days since I began the 2008 plan and I'm already happy to see the mandatory rest day. There's a good possibility the 14 miles I've run so far this week have something to do with it. Perhaps its my neighbor's relentless barking dog combined with their lack of common decency to bring him inside at 1 AM in 40 degree weather. Hmm...

Not much to report on my training since I'm still feeling my way through the marathon plan. Hal Higdon's plan is well written and doesn't leave much for me to wonder about. The only issue so far has been finding a proper hill with adequate length to run repeats on. The lack of relief in southeast Virginia makes it difficult in that respect. The search continues.

Daylight, or lack there of, will become an issue next week. Right now I hardly have enough light to fit in a three mile run after work. So it only makes sense to run before work and then swim, bike, and lift in the evenings. This means I need to get up about 5:30. Ugh.

And It Begins

Yesterday was the first day of my new plan for 2008. I'd like to say it went well but sadly I can't. It seems my ACL doesn't want to run marathons.

Back in 2003 I partially tore my ACL while playing basketball. I skipped surgery hoping things would heal up tight. After three months I began rehabbing with light resistance. It took another month to heal well enough to run. The true test of its stability came once I returned to soccer because it requires quick cuts back and forth. Its easily been four years since I've thought about the injury.

Now that part of the new plan involves a combination of running and weights I've immediately noticed my legs aren't ready. This surprises me since I can do both independently without pain. Today my ACL aches a bit like a sprain although I didn't hyperextend it. I guess this means no lower body lifting for a while.

I ran the scheduled "easy" three mile run in 25:42, which was a bit faster than the 9:00 pace I wanted. Its going to be tough to slow it down on easy days. I can see now I'll have to swallow my pride on the trail and crawl if I expect to stay healthy in 2008.