AM: My knee felt pretty good all day yesterday. Before going to bed last night I applied some KT Tape (following the runner's knee instructions), and right away my knee felt almost normal. When I woke up today I thought there was no way it could be this easy--my knee felt great and I was about to toss my skepticism aside and buy a whole case of the miracle tape. Unfortunately, the miracle was over as soon as I hit the track. I wasn't in agony, but my knee certainly didn't feel normal, and the tape did nothing to change that. Or maybe it did something--it's really hard to tell sometimes. Anyways, I'll keep using the tape because it was free and it doesn't seem to be hurting. I'll wait till the roll is gone to decided whether it's actually worth buying. Anyways, my knee felt okay--not great, but okay--throughout my five-mile jog, but it hurt quite a bit when I stopped. Very stiff and sore. But 30 minutes after my run it felt no worse than it did before my run. I'm not sure if this means I should keep running on the track or not. The doctor said it would be okay, and it doesn't seem to make things worse, but my goal is to get better, not to not get worse. For now, I think I'll continue doing easy runs on the track, plus workouts on the stair-stepper, in the pool, and on the treadmill (at a steep incline). Unfortunately, I suspect Speedgoat won't be happening this year.
37:40 PM: Treadmill miles. I've found that while my knee is tolerable running at easy paces on the flats, it seems to feel just fine running uphill. I figure that's a pretty good deal, since it means I can maintain my strength without pounding my knee too hard. With that in mind, I started with a 10-minute warmup and then set the treadmill to 15 percent for a 30-minute hill climb. I started with 2.5 minutes at 5 mph, then I did three 5-minute reps at 5.5 mph with five minutes at 5 mph between them (I finished the last interval with 30 seconds at 6.5 mph). I ended the climb with another 2.5 minutes at 5 mph, then I leveled out the treadmill and ran at an easy pace until I hit 5 miles in just over 50 minutes.
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