spoiling my shins

it only took three years of encountering minor setbacks from various injuries (thankfully never anything serious) for me to learn the proper way of handling them when they first try to set up camp.

when my shins hurt saturday from the running, walking and hiking, i iced them a little saturday night and skipped my sunday long run. i made an ice cup at work (part boredom, part necessity) and iced them during the afternoon on monday. i also ran shorter than originally planned, stretched well (*gasp*) and iced again after my run. they felt better on tuesday although still a little achey, so i iced again at work in the afternoon, ran shorter than planned again and followed it up with another solid stretch regime.

my ice cup. works wonderfully.

today (wednesday) i think they are continuing to feel better and i'm hoping my extra efforts in stretching and icing and taking it easy will help them not become full-on shin splints. the only day they really hurt-hurt was saturday, and they have just been noticeably achey since. so, i'm hoping the crisis is almost fully averted. i gave them the ol' ice cup again at work today, but ran today's run as planned (but slow).

monday (3/9) pm run: 5 miles, 45:42 (9:08 avg pace), avg hr (163)
i'm dog sitting again this week so i took ol' buddy out for 3 miles and then hit the treadmill to finish the run. i feel bad putting him back in his crate after he's been in there all day. i still can't believe how much slower he's gotten. he used to hang with me for 6-7 miles and now i practically have to drag him home on a 3 mile run. it was 81* though, maybe the heat was getting to him. (planned mileage was 8, i didn't really mind doing 5 instead.)

tuesday (3/10) pm run: 6 miles, 50:59 (8:29 avg pace), avg hr (172)
my first non-strictly-easy run since the goofy challenge. it was tough on my tortoise legs. again, i felt bad for the dog, so we did a 2 mile warm up outside and then i hit the treadmill for my intervals. yes, intervals. because we wouldn't want an gentle transition from 6 weeks of easy running now would we.

the plan was: 20 min easy, 10x400 "repetition (r) pace" (1:30) with 3 min easy, 10 min easy. unfortunately for me, i knew i should take it easy on the shins so i only did 5x400. at least it's a start in the speed department. i didn't really know what setting to put the treadmill on since the calibration is off a little, so i picked 9.0. my nike+ is also 'off' whenever i run faster than easy pace since my stride changes i guess, but i figured i'd at least get close enough.

having the treadmill rotate at 9.0 is quite the motivation to pick up your feet. i felt like i was going to be thrown off the back end it was spinning so fast. i'm pretty sure i'm never running intervals on the treadmill again. when i finished a 400, i had to hang on for dear life while trying to turn the speed back down for my recovery.

so obviously, my times weren't exact to the starting/stopping points. i wish they had been better, but i'm not going to adjust them. gotta start somewhere. hopefully the next time i do these (on a track) i'll see better and more accurate results.

5x400 - 1:51, 1:50, 1:50, 1:48, 1:48

see, i'd imagine if you were running on a treadmill at the same speed then your time should be the same... i did improve a little and hopefully my theory as to why my times are so much slower than goal pace (1:30) will be proven soon on the track.

wednesday (3/11) pm run: 7.1 miles, 1:04:50 (9:07 avg pace), avg hr (159)
i headed out later than usual (7pm) with jess. we ran an easy 5 together that was a lot slower than normal but didn't feel so easy to me. when we got back to the house i leashed up the dog and took him out for another 2 miles to complete the run. those two miles were faster and felt better, so i think i just needed to work some kinks and lead out of my legs.