I Feel Like I Dodged a Few Bullets.

It’s been a week since the Hawaii Bird Conservation Marathon.  I think I can now safely say that I dodged a few bullets.  I’m feeling like this right now.

Going into this race I had a lot of concerns.  First and foremost, I didn’t know if I could do this race without injuring my back.  After my back surgery in June, I was instructed not to do any high impact activities (including running) for 12 weeks.  That’s how long it takes to build up enough scar tissue for a disc to heal.  Before that, you’re at high risk of re-herniation.

The last instructions I received were to resume normal activities, as tolerated.  The next day, I did a trail marathon.  I told myself I would hike the whole thing, but I ended up doing a mixture of running and walking.  Over the next two weeks, I was running twice a week.  Then I started to notice some discomfort in my chest.  It was similar to the discomfort I had at the end of May, but it was on the opposite side of my chest.  I realized I must have re-herniated the disc.

Ninety percent of the time, these injuries heal on their own without surgery.  I kept up my walking, but stopped running.  After a few weeks, I felt normal again.  Since then, I’ve only run a few times.  I’d wait a few weeks, and then test the waters with a seven mile run.  Usually, I felt OK.  One time, I felt some inflammation in the middle of my back.  It went away within 24 hours, but the message was clear.  I wasn’t ready to run yet.

That was at the beginning of November.  I was still planning to run the Hawaii Bird Conservation Marathon in December.  I only ran one more time before the race.  I risked being undertrained, but I knew I had to give myself every possible chance to be fully healed by race day.

Before this race, my longest continuous run since the surgery was only seven miles.  Could I handle running 26.2 miles?  More importantly, could I handle running downhill for 26.2 miles, descending nearly 4,000 feet?  That’s a lot of impact for my spinal column to absorb.  I took a chance.

I didn’t have any back discomfort during the race.  Since then, a week has passed.  I haven’t had any inflammation in my back or any other symptoms that would suggest a nerve impingement.  I think I can finally conclude that I didn’t re-injure my back.  That’s a huge relief.

My second concern was that I might not be in good enough shape for this race.  I knew I was taking a risk by running it.  My only reason for taking that risk was to give myself a chance to break four hours in a Hawaii race, so I could finish my second circuit of 50sub4.  That was a goal that had eluded me for 2½ years.  I was doing almost 100 miles per week of race-walking, but I had run fewer than 100 total miles since May.  I was pretty sure I wasn’t in good enough shape to break four hours on a more typical marathon course.  I was counting on this course being fast enough that I could break four hours here, even without optimal training.  My worst fear was that I wouldn’t be able to break four hours, but I would injury my back by trying.

Neither fear came to pass.  It wasn’t close.  After only a few miles, I realized I would break four hours.  I ended by breaking 3:30.  The downhill course obviously helped, but I may have been in good enough shape to break four hours even on a flat course.  That taught me two lessons:

1.   Race-walking is good cross-training for running
2.   Mileage matters, even if it’s race-walking mileage.

Those were my two pre-race concerns.  I developed other concerns during or after the race.  First among those was the risk of an injury, such as Achilles tendonitis.  The first time I did a steep downhill race was the Revel Rockies Marathon in Colorado.  I had a fast race, but developed a bad case of Achilles tendonitis, most likely as a result of over-striding.

Early in this race, I felt some tightness in my left Achilles tendon.  As the race progressed, I also noticed some tightness in my left calf.  I reminded myself to take short rapid strides.  That probably helped keep it from getting worse, but it wasn’t going to get any better.

After the race, I still had a tight Achilles tendon and a sore calf muscle.  Maybe they would feel better after a few days.  Maybe this was the first symptom of an injury, and they would feel worse after a few days.  At the time, I didn’t know which way it would go.  I curtailed my hiking plans, avoiding anything with uneven footing.  I also curtailed my training when I got home.  For the next few days, I limited my walking to a casual pace, rather than my usual fast pace.  I got better each day.  Now, I’m back to normal training, and both the tendon and the muscle feel fine.

My last concern was my left adductor.  I didn’t notice that until after the race.  As I was moving my legs in different ways to try to loosen up my left calf, I started to notice soreness in my left adductor,  Once I noticed it, the discomfort wouldn’t go away.  I tried to massage the muscle, but it still hurt.  I just had to hope it would feel better after a few days.  I injured this muscle two years ago, so I knew it bad it could get.  It’s the sort of thing that could force me to take several weeks off to let it heal.

As with the Achilles tendon, my adductor felt better after a day or two of taking it easy.  Within a few days, it felt normal again.  Now, it’s not a concern at all.

I had a race that exceeded my wildest expectations, I didn’t re-injure my back, and I didn’t develop any new injuries.  I’m definitely counting my blessings right now.