NOT DEAD YET (Part 2)

Heyyyyy you came back! Always a good sign.

If you missed Part 1 of this little update, you can find it here.

Onward, shall we?

JUNE, CONT'D
When we left off, I had just run one of my slowest 5Ks ever despite not terrible training. The next race on my docket was Tracksmith Twilight 5000m on the track at Kezar Stadium on July 19th. We had a vacation scheduled for early July, so I thought, "Maybe Stow Lake was just a bad day, let me get a bit of rest and some solid speed workouts in, and then I'll run one more 5K before we leave & see where I'm at." I picked the Stars & Strides 5K in San Jose since it was July 1st & we were leaving the next day. 

Not much else of note happened in June, BUT I did make this delicious cherry clafoutis!

JULY
During June, I started to feel a bit better in both my daily runs and the few workouts I did during that time, but on race day it didn't seem to matter much. At the starting line, I think I might have been having, not a panic attack, exactly, but definitely a feeling of complete and utter dread regarding what was about to happen. My hands were shaky and sweaty and even just standing on the starting line I felt like I was struggling to breathe. Less than a mile in to the race, I felt simultaneously jittery and exhausted and like I was completely disconnected from my body. In spite of trying desperately to speed up, my pace just kept dropping and dropping, until I was running like 8:30 pace and feeling like I was about to pass out. When I heard my watch beep at the first mile, I just thought, "Fuck this" and walked off the course and honestly it was such a relief. I walked back to my car, drove home, and went out to run some extra miles since I'd only run 2.5 at the race so far. I made it to 10 total for the day but felt pretty awful the whole time, which once again left me wondering if my body was just having a really bad day (yet again) or if something more was going on.

In any case, we left for Hawaii the next day for a friend's 50th birthday, and for the next week I didn't think about anything except snorkeling, beach lounging, and gorgeous sunsets.

Once we returned from Hawaii, I had 10 days to sharpen up for the Twilight 5000m. My thinking had gone something like, "Right, maybe a week of rest and relaxation is all we need. Then just a few short, fast workouts and strides the week after, and we should be good to go on July 19th."

On the 13th, I had a workout consisting of two moderate mile repeats followed by five fast 400m's. I was planning to race in spikes but hadn't run in them in a while, so I took them to the track to wear for at least part of the workout. And omg, they felt AMAZING! I had forgotten what a difference spikes make -- for example, I really felt like I was running ~7:20/mile effort and ended up clicking off a 6:50. 🤯 

But then on my rest interval, I felt a little twinge in my calf. It wasn't awful but part of me went, "OK, we ran a mile in the spikes just to remember what they feel like, cool cool cool, put the flats back on." And I did, then started that second moderate mile, aaaaannnnnnd POP. Not a quarter mile into the next mile interval and I completely blew out my calf, in the way that requires you to *immediately* stop running and indicates that you absolutely will not be running on it again for a while.

Part of me was mad, but another part was like, "Well, what did you expect? Running is all shit now. Any time things start going well, something bad happens. Haven't you realized by now that any positive stretch is extremely temporary? SMH."

So, yeah. Not only could I not run for several days, but for a couple, I could barely even walk. I'd held out a tiiiiny shred of hope that maybe it would improve enough by the following week to race, but by the 18th I knew there was no way. It was getting better but not better enough yet.

I still went to the race to cheer on my teammates and take photos, and it was still a really cool experience! Like the Mile of Truth, this is another one that I *really* want to run next year if I can get and stay healthy enough.

A couple days later, I was able to start running again, just a few miles at a time. And the calf held up!

But then (womp womp), on July 30th, I woke up out of nowhere with serious pain in my knee. I tried running a few steps and knew immediately it was a no go. And once again, all I really felt was resignation. Like, really, haven't you learned by now? If it's not one damn thing, it's something else. Sigh...

AUGUST

As far as I can tell, I hadn't done anything in particular to my knee. I hadn't run more than a few miles at a time since the calf strain, nothing even remotely fast or strange, no new shoes or weird terrain, no anything even a little different. My body just seemed determined to keep me from running, and for the next five count 'em FIVE weeks, I had no choice but to oblige.

This was all especially shitty because I was supposed to go run another USATF Masters 12K National Championship race in New Jersey on September 17. I'd signed up back in March dreaming about how incredibly fit I would be by then and how I would be such a credit to the team; now it seemed clear that the best case scenario would be arriving in New Jersey in my absolute WORST shape of my year (which...was saying something), if I was even capable of running 7.5 miles by then at all.

My doctor seemed to think it was quadriceps tendinitis but had no real advice for me other than to stay off of it and wait it out. He referred me to an orthopedic surgeon to see if that doctor might have more to say, but getting an appointment with that doctor took a while. Then they wanted me to get x-rays first. Then on the last day I could possibly get the x-rays done before leaving for a work trip, the walk-in x-ray clinic spontaneously decided to close early, so I could not get them and had to cancel the ortho appointment altogether.

Friends, that month was so disheartening. Not only because I couldn't run, but because I really didn't have any kind of aerobic physical activity I could do comfortably, not even walking. Finally, once again feeling desperate, I bit the bullet and paid for a UCSF fitness center membership so that I would have access to spin bike, elliptical, and swimming. 

Is it the same as running? Not even remotely. But at least I was able to start doing some tiny amount of cardio, salvaging some tiny sliver of whatever of my aerobic fitness remained. I did short elliptical stints, then longer ones as my knee could tolerate it, then added in short high-intensity bike intervals. I remembered how to swim and got in some of that too.

Let's leave Part 2 there, shall we?

When ever you've emotionally recovered, Part 3 is here and waiting for you!