Catching Up, Part 2: Lessons Learned

Hello again friends. Welcome to Part 2 of our latest catch up, en route to, yes you heard right, a ✨👟marathon race report👟✨ (by which, just to be clear, I mean a race report about a marathon, not just, like, a **really long** race report).

Catching Up: Part 1 (icymi)

Where were we? Oh yes! End of July 2025; missing out on Tracksmith SF 5000; recovering from a horrific back strain. Let us move on to late summer.

In general, the plan was:

• Mid August ➡️ train for & run a one-mile time trial on the track
• Late August ➡️ Tahoe vacation with family
• September ➡️ Start training for CIM

AUGUST

In which the future was still so bright (in many ways). My back continued to feel fine; I continued to rip fast workouts on the track without worrying too much about building overall mileage. Having run a 6:28 mile on the roads in May with, like, two weeks of mile-specific training, I was very curious what I could manage on the track in spikes having spent the summer doing honest-to-gods speed work. 6:20? 6:15? Faster?? I tried getting a group together for a time trial day (mostly for my own selfish rabbiting purposes) but at that point people were mostly busy getting ready for other things so I ended up going it alone. On a weirdly humid August 17 I drove to the track, did a little warm-up and some strides, put my spikes on, and did my best to flog myself to one all-out mile, with not-terrible results: 

Catching Up, Yet Again: Part 1

Heyyyyy friends 👋👋👋 Long time no post. Such is life; things take crazy turns and suddenly writing about one's hobbies on the internet no longer falls into the top ten most critical tasks to be spending ostensible free time on. However, I HAVE JUST RUN A MARATHON and I feel that needs to be immortalized in these digital pages one way or another, so I'm making time.

But first, we need some context. This series of catch-up posts ends in a race report, but it's a race report that won't make a ton of sense without quickly (well, relatively quickly) buzzing back through the last seven months. So, without further ado......

Where We Left Off

Last we spoke, I had just run a pretty solid track 5K in Oakland (June 19), with plans to spend four weeks getting even faster, then run another track 5K in San Francisco on July 19.  Things went okay for a couple of weeks, and then, in retrospect, I started getting a bunch of messages from my body that ** Hey we are not okay, maybe take a few days off here **, but none of them were ever, like, BRIGHT BLINKING RED and/or I was just so distracted by everything else going on in life that it never really hit me all at once the way it should have.

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!

Declaring Blog Post Draft Bankruptcy

Hello friends! Long time no post!

One of the reasons I stopped blogging in Fall of 2019 was because I was REALLY GOOD at starting new blog posts and also REALLY BAD at finishing them & getting them up. Turns out, the more things change, the more they they stay the same, sigh.

But also a lot has happened since my last post, sooooo in the interest of trying to not completely disappear into the void again, I'm going to try to just post *some* kind of update, even if it is short and incomplete. So here ya go, a lightening recap of the last, oh, six weeks or so:

Dare I Write A Blog Post?

No matter how many new and shiny podcasts come out, one of my favorite will always and forever remain "This American Life," hosted by Ira Glass.

In one episode, Ira glass said something that I feel in my soul:

"Today’s radio show is about asking a grown-up for advice. I am fully grown up. And I’m older than I sound on the radio....[O]ld enough that, last week, when I read something by somebody in their 30s who said, well, of course nobody ever fully feels like a grown-up, I wanted to say, no, I actually feel like a grown-up. I feel like a grown-up. I feel my responsibilities. I feel the weight of them. I know when I have lived up to my own ideals for how I want to be in the world and treat others around me, and when I haven’t, I feel it. I feel tired in this way that I definitely did not when I was younger."

I heard Ira Glass say this and I very nearly started sobbing into my hands. Because, young people, yes, you do reach a point where you really, truly feel like a grown up, where you do not feel like you're faking it. Not all adults are just grown-up kids making it up as they go. And when you reach that age, it. Is. EXHAUSTING.

Fall Speedfest, Weeks 8 & 9 of 18: Hot Mess Edition

As in, I am one. Seriously; in the last two and a half weeks I have just about completely and totally fallen apart.

You might have already read about my 'meh' race in San Jose. (tl;dr - My heart was never really in it, I woke up not really wanting to run, & managed to hold a decent half marathon pace for the first few miles before it became obvious that whether for lack of fitness, heat, or just plain lack of enthusiasm, that was all I had. I jogged the rest at an easy pace for a 1:51:30 finish.)

The worse part, though, was the aftermath on the left side of my body. I've had chronic plantar fasciitis in my left foot for years; it comes and goes in terms of the severity but for whatever reason a few hours after the race I could barely walk on it. I'd like to tell you the week got better, but...well...

CIM WEEK 8 of 18: Knee Troubles :(

I am always superstitious about filling out my weekly logs before the runs are actually done, like it's somehow going to jinx me & cause me to get sick or hurt or some kind of emergency to come up. But this week I had some extra time early in the week & just thought, "Eh, that's stupid, let me just get this stuff typed up now while I have time." Three days later, I kid you not, I could barely walk.

Here's how the week went down:

Monday 9/19: a.m. strength work / p.m. karate.

This was the day after my 19.5 miles in Half Moon Bay, and I felt totally fine. No knee pain. Now, I was quite tired so pushed strength work to Tuesday, but throughout karate I was completely fine--no hint whatsoever that anything was wrong.

Tuesday 9/20: a.m. strength work / p.m. 2 warm-up, 6 x 200m / 200m jog, 4 miles marathon pace, 6 x 200m / 200m jog, 2 cool down = 11 total

Good solid track workout; again, not a twinge anywhere. I finished it thinking how weird it felt to have these double-digit track workouts starting to feel normal.

Wednesday 9/21: Rest

I had planned a short, easy run as long as I felt good, but in the grand tradition of WTF Wednesdays, I felt awful and exhausted and spent most of the evening sleeping, rising only to devour Shalane's recovery salad & a slice of marathon lasagna.

So here's the deal.

Remember that swollen, tender spot on my left tibia I mentioned a few weeks ago?

Remember how I cut my 16 mile long run short because it was sort of reaching yellow-flag levels of uncomfortable, but then it was fine the rest of the week, and it was fine through my 22 mile long run?

So, the day after that run (8/3), it felt a little tender, but no worse than when I've had shin splints flare up in the past around peak mileage weeks. I was walking fine & went to karate that night as usual. After running a few kata, though, it started to feel more and more uncomfortable, so I sat out the last 15 minutes or so.

The next day (8/4) I had a big track workout, but since I was traveling in the evening I couldn't go to SF Track Club as usual at Kezar. I could have done it during the day before heading to the airport, but the leg still didn't feel quite right, so I decided I'd give it a few more hours of rest & then maybe do it on the treadmill once I got to my hotel. Except, then my flight was delayed so I didn't get to my hotel until 10pm, and since I had a 6:00 am wake up call & hadn't eaten in like seven hours, I definitely did not get on a treadmill. Which I figured was probably for the best; my leg would get an extra day of rest & then I could do the workout on Wednesday.

Well. Wednesday evening (8/5) I got on the treadmill, and less than one minute into the warm-up got a big giant NOPE from my left tibia. It hurt. A lot. In a way that was uncomfortably familiar.

So I thought I'd give it a few more days & see how it felt. The spot on my tibia was kind of diffuse and not particularly painful to touch (it felt more like a large bruise), so I wasn't too worried about it yet.

Well, it didn't get better, even with complete rest. Instead, over the course of my work trip that week, it gradually got worse until even walking on it was quite painful and once or twice I legitimately thought about seeing if I could find some drugstore crutches somewhere just so I didn't make it worse. This is when I started to actually worry.

Also, why am I always alone in a hotel room when things like this happen?

From that point on, there was no question of trying to run on it. After a few days of resting it at home (~8/9ish), it started to feel much better, though by "much better," I mean "could technically walk on it, if I had to, with only a little pain."

Just based on how it felt at this point and how the pain presented (significantly better in the morning, worse by the end of the day), I was pretty sure I had a stress reaction & if I had tried to run on it, I probably could have turned it into a full-on stress fracture pretty easily. Because of where it is & how it feels with bearing weight in different ways, I'm 99% sure it's a result of trying to fix the issue with my left arch, & for all intents & purposes a part of my leg that has gotten away for a long time without doing much was suddenly thrown right into the middle of marathon training. It had been feeling better for a while so I'd gradually weaned myself off of taping up my foot; now I'm not sure that was such a hot idea. (Then again, it's also probably not the sole factor here, either.)

Now, with a stress reaction in a low-risk area (ie, low-risk for complications/nonunion, which tibia is), it is possible to recover with 2-3 weeks off running and then be able to run again, so at that point that's the medical factoid I was clinging to. (Nevermind, of course, that those 2-3 weeks are supposed to be followed by a "sensible return-to-running plan," not a goal marathon. I figured I'd burn that bridge when I came to it.)

I emailed with Coaches Tom & Ashley to let them know what was up, because my concern was that if I hadn't run at all in the 3 weeks prior to the race that it wouldn't even be worth starting, even if my leg was 100% better. They reminded me, though, just how little effect anything you do in those last three weeks has on race day compared to everything that came before, and if I was able to cross train some, it wasn't likely to affect my performance much. At that point (8/10) the plan was to get some cross training in & then see how things felt the following weekend.

And it definitely did improve pretty dramatically. I got some elliptical in instead of running, & by the end of last week (8/14) I was walking completely normally with no pain. I even jogged a few steps up & down the hall, which felt fine. I've been continuing to do my arch exercises, and there is a little pain in the bone with those in the same spot, but it doesn't linger, which is something.

So, we re-evaluated this weekend in terms of the options, which were pretty much 1) start & see how it feels, 2) drop to the half, or 3) don't run. Well, there's no space in the half at this point, so option 2) is out (also 8/1 was the deadline for switching anyway). After some back and forth, the recommendation from Tom & Ashley was to let this one go, get 100% healthy, & run CIM in December instead. The bottom line is that I want an A+ race, and even if I were able to start and even finish, that's looking pretty unlikely.

Obviously, I'm disappointed. Not utterly crushed the way I might have been if this had been a sudden thing (it's funny how two weeks of fretting lets you ease into the possibility), but still pretty bummed that this will be the second time in a row I've paid for this race, driven up to collect swag for it, & gone home without crossing the line.

But...I'm handling it. Okay, I *might* have needed a day to mope around in my pajamas & drink wine, but there's been no gnashing of teeth or rending of garments or throwing of crockery. No ugly-crying.

Part of the process has been making a list of reasons in my head (and, apparently, on the internet) of why not starting is for the best, even though it sucks massive donkey balls:

• Sometimes I don't make good decisions. Yes, it's possible I could start the marathon, and everything could be fine. But it's also possible I could get to mile 22, realize things are Not Good, but be too amped up/dehydrated/emotionally unstable to do the rational thing and quit. (This is why I quit SRM at mile 14 last year. I could have gone farther but the hip was just getting worse, and I knew the closer I got to the finish, the harder it would be to quit.)
• I want to go all-out at my next marathon. Even if my leg were feeling much better, it's still unlikely that I'd be able to give my absolute best effort on Sunday. I'd be thinking about the leg and paying attention to whether it hurts and how much and how bad I should let it get before I quit instead of focusing on my race. For a while I was kind of thinking, "Eh, if it feels okay, I could just aim to finish," except no. I have zero interest right now in running a marathon "just to finish." I would rather wait until I'm ready to kill it.
• It leaves me well positioned for CIM. The rest of "I'll just try to finish" was "and then run CIM." When you think it through, though, the math doesn't really work out. Even if I were to run SRM comfortably AND my leg felt perfect, that's still ~4-6 weeks to recover & be ready to train again, leaving only ~8-10 weeks before CIM. Which means it's pretty unlikely I'd be in top shape. The way things stand now, I have some solid training under my belt, and if I can get my leg taken care of (and cross train in the mean time), I'll be in a good spot to roll that training over to a new cycle & build on it.
• CIM is a better race for that anyway. Don't get me wrong, Santa Rosa is a great marathon on a good course and it's very well run. But it's pretty much accepted out here that if you want the best possible shot at an awesome marathon, given the choice, you run the net downhill race with six turns in December, not the one with 30+ turns in wine country in August.

So here's my loose plan:

• Keep chillin' on the elliptical this week.
• Keep up the arch strength stuff.
• Once I've been 100% pain free for 5-7 days, embark on said "sensible return-to-running" plan & follow the guidelines re: whether or not the pain stays gone.
• Spend 9/2-9/9 in Portland living the good life. (Did I mention this?? SO EXCITED.)
• Stop slacking on strength work & get back in a routine with A.T., focusing particularly on the arch issue because BAAAAH.
• Pick up the serious training again by mid-to-late September (provided all is well with the foot/leg bone).
• Maybe run a half in there somewhere if I'm feeling it.

So....yeah. Boo. Sucks. However, I am trying to make the best of it. I have two friends running, & since I've already got the weekend free & the hotel room & there's a lot of pretty awesome wine to be enjoyed (especially by someone who is not running a marathon Sunday morning), it seems only logical to drown my sorrows in Pinot Noir go enjoy what there is to be enjoyed.

National Running Day had its ups & downs.

I didn't know it until Wednesday morning, but June 3 was apparently National Running Day. YAAAAAY NATIONAL RUNNING DAY!!

I was traveling for work but what kind of lame-o runner doesn't run on National Running Day, so as soon as I got home at 7:30pm I immediately threw on running clothes & busted out a 10 mile tempo run.

Just kidding, I'd already planned it that way because I was a) busy with work Tuesday (when this workout was assigned) & b) travel workouts almost always have to be done on treadmills and UUUUGGGGHH talk about workouts I DO NOT feel like putting myself through on a treadmill.

I didn't end up doing it exactly right. It was supposed to be 7 x 1200m @ LT pace w/ 45 second recoveries, only I couldn't remember how long the recoveries were once I got going, so for simplicity's sake, I kind of said, "Eh, 400m sounds about right." Which, equates to more like 2-2.5 minutes. Oops. Also I only did 6 repeats because I have a nice 10 mile loop that gives me 2 miles of pedestrian/traffic light heavy neighborhood streets at the beginning & end for a warm-up/cool down & that only leaves 6 miles in between. It was late & I did not feel like a) running deeper into the park in the dark, b) running more than 10 miles, or c) frantically dodging pedestrians & cars while trying to tack on another 1200 at either end.

As these types of workouts should be, it felt hard but do-able. I kept up the pace through all six repeats with no problem & felt like I probably could've done a few more at the end (though, I didn't really want to). I think I managed to tape my left foot in a way that actually accomplished something, and found that it was actually easier during the fast intervals to run on my left arch the way I'm supposed to than it was during the easy miles & recoveries. But anyway, it's good to be back to doing my official RunCoach workouts & feeling like I can (finally!) finish them feeling strong and without re-aggravating my leg.

Alas, National Running Day also brought sadness.

A while back I wrote about my first "official" half marathon, The Jungle Run in Los Gatos. After many years away I was looking forward to actually racing it again this summer in reasonably good shape & seeing by just how much I could beat my 2008 time of 2:16. But it was not to be. Wednesday evening I received an email from the organizers that the high school track area (where the start, finish, & staging are located) would be under construction & despite many inquiries into other potential staging areas, they were not able to find a suitable one. So, it looks like the race is cancelled for this year.

I did appreciate that, although all entry fees for this year were automatically rolled over to 2016, they did give participants the option of requesting a refund if they preferred (particularly given that the issue was around getting permits for the course/staging area so the biggest costs have potentially not yet been incurred by the race). I do actually want to run the race again so I accepted the rollover and didn't request a refund.

So now, I'm thinking about whether I want to try & find another good half sometime in July (of which there are not a ton) or just say, eh, screw it, more SRM training time. So far the only even halfway decent candidate I've found is the Davis Moonlight Race on July 11, which looks kind of fun in that it's a evening race (the 1st wave of the half starts at 6:30) and is not that expensive ($60). But to be honest I'm leaning towards 'no' because a) Davis in July can still be 90F+, even in the evening, b) it's kind of a hike from SF for a last-minute non-goal race, c) the course apparently has stretches of gravel. (Ringing any bells there?)

The other option is to run a local little 10K on July 18th. [Real Talk: I am sooo not excited about running a 10K right now.] So, maybe I'll just take a pass on a July race & use what I save in taper/recovery time to put towards SRM training.