Running in the Rockies

10.15 mi in 10 min avg pace.

I took Friday, Saturday, and Sunday off in an attempt to let the knee rest and hopefully heal and decided to put the long run off until Monday. I ran 3 w/ the pup, also his first run in a couple weeks and his paw seemed to be okay- no limping anyways. We ran our usual 3 mile loop and I wore microspikes because the dirt road is packed snow and ice. The knee was feeling tight, but okay. I dropped the pup and the microspikes off at home and headed out for a 4.5 mile out and back.

The knee starting feeling worse around mile 5, sort of a dull ache on the outside and inner back section of the knee. I turned around at 7.5 and starting running back down and this is when things degraded pretty quickly. The right hip was feeling tight and the outside of my right ankle was starting to have a dull pain. By around mile 8, the upper section of the calf was feeling achy and when  I would mis-step due to ice, shooting pains would radiate around my knee cap. By mile 9.5ish it started to feel as if my lower leg was actually going to separate from my knee and my foot from my ankle- it was feeling very odd and somewhat scary because I felt like I had much less control of foot placement and I was having to dodge icy sections of the road. My upper right quad was also feeling very tight and almost numb. I finally gave in and started walking around mile 10, I walked for maybe 100 m and then tried to run again.. not possible. The knee was feeling very stiff now and lots of shooting pain. I decided to walk the steeper downhill section (downhill seemed to feel much worse than uphill), and then run the uphill section back to our house. But after walking for about a mile, the knee was not happy about running again and it really felt like my lower leg was going to separate at the knee. So frustrated and freezing at this point. The sun had dropped below the mountains and the temperature dropped very quickly. I only had on a very light weight underlayer and a long sleeved cotton shirt, tights, a hat, and gloves- but I was drenched in sweat from the run and walking the last two miles home in the wind and cold was less than ideal. When I got home I couldn't move my arms, hands, or fingers. I had to drive down to pick up the hubby from the bus stop and I took it very slowly since I was not really able to get my extremities to react quickly. Precarious to say the least.

Took a hot shower after we got back home- had to keep the hands and fingers out of the warm water for a long time because they felt like they were being burned.. not good. I stretched and iced the knee for a long time after dinner.

Really frustrated. How does this happen? I finished the marathon last month and had basically zero soreness afterwards. I go for a 4 mile run and an hour bike ride two weeks ago and the knee has not been the same since. There was no traumatic injury.. no seemingly overuse issue.. I'm just confused. And what's really discouraging is that I pretty much had the next 4-5 months to really focus on my running and fitness since my work load is somewhat reduced. Depressing.