How Much Discomfort Can I Tolerate?!

Weather - 40 degrees, sunny.

Beautiful day, with the next couple of days going up to 60 degrees. 

I was only able to run 1.5 miles before my knee started hurting.

However, this being  a friendly type of injury, I can do just about anything except run.

Yesterday evening I had too much energy to go to sleep so I went over to Brookens gym at 11:00pm and put in a good workout of 8 sets of strength exercises and also did some jump rope sets. The park district has cable tv set up in the office so I got a chance to watch a few minutes of Million Dollar Baby.

Today 1.5 miles was not going to cut it, so in the late afternoon I went for a 3.5 hour walk. As the sun was setting I arrived at the arboretum and walked the hill for one hour in the dark, but since the moon was almost full there was plenty of illumination.

Walking 3.5 hours made me feel pleasantly spent, as if I had run 90 minutes, and walking the hill raised my heart rate a bit.

At least I am figuring out ways to get a good workout.

Tomorrow I plan on walking 3-4 hours, with more hills.

#450

Weather - 62 degrees, sunny, windy.

Beautiful weather for Feb 9, I guess it makes up for the awful cold of the past 10 weeks. 

This was the toughest 1 mile run I have done in some time.

I planned to walk a full South Farms loop today. I started at 11:30am. When I got to Crystal Lake park I stopped for 15 minutes and did 3 sets of strength exercises, then I continued on to Busey Woods.

I looped around the woods then headed across town to the arboretum. I was covering ground quicker than I thought, and time was flying by, just like a long run.

When I was approaching the South Farms the wind became stronger, and when I got on the road it was stiff and blew directly into me.

I was starting to lose energy, so I ate the snadwich and Cliff bar I had in my pocket. When I got near the end of the road I ran 1/2 mile but my knee felt stiff , and my other leg was sore because it was not used to walking so many miles.

I stopped running and found my knee was now having trouble walking. I started to get glum, I was at the furthest, remotest part of the run, the wind was relentless, I couldn't run, could barely walk, and I started to get blisters on the balls of both feet. I have not had blisters in a long time, but I guess walking uses different parts of the feet than running.

My thoughts turned negative, "I'm not counting a half mile, so my streak is over", "I'm gonna stop blogging until I can run again", and  "I won't be able to run until June or July".

When I made the turn to head back to town the wind was at my back, my knee felt better, and I started walking faster. The blisters would remain manageable until the final half mile. I tried to throw away the negative thoughts, and decided I would try to run another half mile when I got to MBK so that I could keep my running momentum going.

I did complete the final half mile run, but I decided to cut short the loop, and ended up with a 3.5 hour walk, same as yesterday.

So I survived another session, just have to take it day by day and react positively to whatever circumstance brings.

#451

Only able to go 1 mile today. 

I will probably stop running for now, and start up when my body recovers. Injury is a part of the game, so I just have to occupy myself with something else until I am better. 

Will stop blogging while I am recovering, thanks to everyone for the inspiration, this has been a great 18 months.