Bolt from the blue

Been a while since I updated this but on my 49th Birthday and 20th Wedding Anniversary our extended family was rocked by the tragic and untimely death of Freddie Nightingale. Coming from a family of girls and marrying into the same, all of my Brothers in law are more like brothers to me. For Freddie this was especially true as he too ran multiple marathons so he got why I run. He completed Dublin 2005 4:53:59, Belfast 2006 3:52:13 and finally Dublin 2006 3:36:42. A prankster of the highest order but I can never recall him not greeting me with a smile and a joke which I will always remember him by.

Gone but never forgotten

 

A brief outline of running over the last six weeks.

Holiday Time. – Clonakilty and another Marathon read more

Blowing off Steam – Report on my new 10K PB read more

Trouble ahead – The warning signs that got ignored read more

Something Ventured Nothing gained – Report from the Quinlan Cup in Tullamore read more

Broken – self explanatory read more

Broken

Monday morning I awoke no pain and took one look at my leg. Swollen quite badly from my knee to my ankle. Luckily I had an appointment with Leon but he really could not do much work on the knee with the swelling. He did work on my right TBL using Electro Shockwave Therapy. He said it would be sore but to be honest I found dry needling to be more severe. One thing with this therapy, I was told not to take any sort of anti inflammatory medication and only ice the area if it was really sore. Secondly only exercise allowed this week was Stationary bike 20 minutes or Front crawl Swim. Breaststroke, Rower, Cross trainer or running where a no go. So my first zero mile week in almost three years.

Luckily I had a spare week to play with between the Special Phase and the Race Specific Phase. Somehow I think it may need 10 to 14 days to fully recover. Still okay but anything longer raises the possibility of not having a crack at a marathon PB in Frankfurt.

Someone told me during the week that runners cycle as regards injuries is as follows. Getting Injured, Injured or recovery from an injury. I tend to agree and hopefully I will be back to getting injured again sometime soon.

Something Ventured, Nothing Gained

Even after last weeks half baked efforts at session’s combined with the early week scare with my knee, I still was of the mind-set to go for it in Tullamore. Recent 10K/5K times had me somewhere between 1:30 and 1:31 but in my head I convinced myself that having a bash at 1:30 was a good idea. On Friday night I had an Army reunion Dinner in Portlaoise which wasn't going to help but I kept the celebrations limited. Still didn't get to bed until 2:30 AM and still under the grand illusion that 1:30 was doable.

Murphy's Law

Courtesy of Rory Mooney

What can go wrong will go wrong. This is exactly what happened on Saturday, why because I am an idiot and let my head rule my body. Got to the race with herself in tow, not feeling too bad all things considered. Went for my warm-up, stiff as a plank and right knee just didn't feel good after a mile. Mile back it seemed to loosen out so a couple of legs swings at the start. Unfortunately my coffee did not kick in and had no effect on the rear but hopefully the channel was empty. Briefly meet with Gary beforehand and lined up behind the 1:30 guys. Plan was to go with them into the slight breeze to halfway and hang on for dear life. After the last race debacle I wore the GPS watch this time, but no need, two guys had the pace bang on from the go. They explained they would lose some time for the first few miles due to the drag and wind. Splits reflect this 6:49; 6:57; 6:59. Passing mile 3 I had to finally accept that this delusion ejeit was not in 1:30 shape, as this felt extremely hard for Mile 3-4. Only 2 weeks previous I had held faster easily. Group started to slowly disappear from here to mile 6 7:11; 7:11 & 7:34. At mile 6 coffee had finally started to work , “where's the Toilet I enquired”, “Up the road” Two more **** miles up the road. It was quite warm at this point and I was flagging badly 7:27 & 7:06 on the downhill stretch, Finally got the Toilet in Mile 8-9 (9:20). On the bog I did a quick calculation that I would need to be 1:06 or better at Mile 9  to try and get a PB. Soon I departed and hit mile 9 (1:06:31) I thought even if I ran 1:30 pace to the finish I would not get a PB (wear a pace band, you cant do maths in a race). Decided to put in some MP miles instead so the day would not be a total waste of time. 7:22, 7:22; 7:23 where at a manageable effort. As I hit the last mile a Tullamore Harriers Runner passed me. All the marshals lined along the route where encouraging him to stay ahead of me. Race on, so I pursued him and finally caught and passed him on the track, we then got hit with what I can on describe as a Monsoon. Luckily It was for my last 200m. Crossed the Line in 1:36:17 disgusted with myself. Last mile was 6:52 with 0:48 for the bit at the end.

Aftermath

Herself was suitable impressed with the spread that was put on afterwards and it was good. For the race itself you could not fault it in any way. Also the facilities available at the club are damn impressive. Its just a pity we cant run the National Half Marathon there instead of having to do the Rock n Roll thingy in Dublin. For me drive home and the right knee had stiffened up. A wise decision was made last week to book an appointment with Leon for Monday. Realistically I should have done a DNS when it showed signs of stiffness in the warm up,that would require a runner with a brain. I would suspect very few would have actually done any different so us runners brains go out the window once we pick-up our race numbers.