M'kay

Recovery day.  Already feeling some pain in the quads and some other leg muscles from yesterday's poundings.  Ran thru the Myrtl routine, which was painful but helpful as it stretched out tight muscles.  Then did yardwork around the house.

LM warmup 5.08 miles in 45:55, 9:02/mi, HR 138 & stretching.

Gimped my way through 5 miles with a couple of stretching and walk breaks thrown in.  DOMS in full force today.  The hip tightness was back with a vengeance for today's run, unsurprisingly.

LM warmup, 8.11 miles in 1:04:43, 7:59/mi, & stretching.

Left hip tight, legs uncoordinated again.  Didn't really get better the whole run, but managed to loosen up enough to keep the pace reasonable on the downhill return.  Myrtl routine and leg exercises later in the day. 

LM warmup, 8.13 miles in 1:10:22, 8:39/mi, HR 140, w/ 2 x Drills, 6 x Strides, 1 90 sec Hill Repeat & stretching.

Legs uncoordinated again today.  Stopped every mile for the first 3 to stretch.  Stopping allows the legs to recover the "normal" feeling briefly but the uncoordination returns quickly.  Ran strides/drills at the 3 mile mark, which went well.  Jogged another 1/2 mile to begin hill repeats, but the first one was a clear indicator that my legs probably aren't recovered from Saturday's race and the strides took what was available out of them.  Halfway thru repeat 2 I stopped and jogged to get 8 total miles in.  The return miles were slow and sprinkled with walk breaks.  The legs just didn't have it in them...

LM warmup.  First run was 3.36 mi, 8:19/mi, HR 146 w/ 6 x 1 min repeats.  Trip to the chiropractor.  2nd run was 5.14 mi, 7:51/mi, HR 159 x/ 12 x 1 min repeats.  Stretching afterwards.

Tightness came on again at about 1/2 mile.  Left leg felt like it had no power, couldn't stride out, body tried pulling to the left.  Tried to do some repeats and they went okay, but form still didn't feel right, and about 1.5 miles in, I decided to hurry back home and see if I couldn't get down to see the chiro.  Short version is that my left hip was rotated forward pretty significantly, so I couldn't really stride correctly, tensing muscles that should've been relaxing, etc, etc.  Back home and attempted to finish the workout.  Much, much better, stride was back, virtually no muscle tension issues, and my left leg had power again.  The left hip felt a bit more tired as the workout progressed, but since I've been suffering with this for a while now, I'd suspect the muscles need time to readjust and strengthen, and another trip or two to the chiro will be needed.  But the good news is that I believe I found the problem and can now fix it.  Thank heavens for chiropractors that know what they're doing! 

LM warmup, 8.09 miles in 1:04:27, 7:58/mi, HR 152, w/ 12 x 12 sec Hill Sprints & stretching.

Humid.  Left hip wasn't quite as good as the post-chiro visit yesterday but still much improved.  Felt like the hip got a bit tight for about a mile or so and the uphill got a bit tougher after the first mile.  Occasionally the adductor would tense at the wrong time in a stride.  All things considered, still much better, but I need to hit the chiro again a couple of times next week to make sure the hip stays in the right place.  The hill sprints weren't too bad and its evident that the last couple of sets that I've got were really impacted by the hip. 

37.01 miles in 6:38:12, 10:46/mi, HR 141.

Today's run got away from me a bit.  Was thinking this run would be in the 25-30 mile range.  I decided to run a loop to hit some sections of trail I hadn't before.  The plan was to start with the Anvil connector to Memorial East, Upper Elkspur, Buck's Crossing, Lower Elkspur, Upper Elkspur, Memorial East, Anvil connector and back home.  

Everything went according to plan for the first few hours.  The last section of Upper Elkspur before Buck's Crossing was pretty overgrown, but the section wasn't more than 1.5 miles so not too bad.  The trail crew had been out weed-eating Buck's Crossing recently, so it was nice and wide, although that trail is actually a fairly narrow gully so footing can be tricky.  Passed a couple of horsewomen, exchanged some trail condition info, and jumped onto the Lower Elkspur, headed onto a section I hadn't run before.  Conditions were pretty rough....muddy, some sections overgrown, and not the best trail.  The farther I went, the more conditions deteriorated overall.  Some sections weren't bad, others I couldn't see the trail, and still others took me through 6' seedlings that completely obscured the trail.  Then there was the fun stinging nettles and pricker weeds, so my legs felt like they were getting pretty torn up.  I passed the Diamond Trail intersection, which I had run most of a few weeks back, and was truly in uncharted territory.  The map I had wasn't to scale and I spent the next few hours running on trails that were barely marked and completely overgrown.  I wound up getting lost on a few occasions, came upon unmarked trail intersections, and eventually got to the western trailhead and couldn't find the link between the two Elkspur trails.  It was late and I knew I was going to be back after I'd told my wife, so I jumped onto what I guessed was the 5 road and headed back up the hill.  Something didn't seem right, so I turned around, re-ran some trail only to have it disappear, encountered some closed gates with fresh warnings about spraying some chemical, and had all kinds of other fun before finally committing to the road.  Fortunately, it was the 5 road.  Unfortunately, I was out of water and out of legs, so the remaining 13 miles or so was a real slog.  I eventually found another stream, jumped onto the 6 road, found the Memorial East trail, which was also now terribly overgrown, fought my way back to the Anvil connector, and headed down the hill for home.  Instead of a 5-6pm arrival I got back at 8pm.  My wife was not pleased.  I seriously didn't intend to run this many miles today, so this is definitely the last long run before White River, but the ups and downs of this run was good training for the 100 miler.  I still can't quite figure out how I'm going to survive that since these measley 37 miles kicked my tail.  At least my water purifier seemed to function properly.