Racehorse running again!

Earlier this year, when I was trying to start running again after my last little break, courtesy of my knee, I had a loop that I ran with my puppy, around the back of a race course. The Puppy absolutely loved it, I swear he use to think he was a racehorse! When the mornings started to get darker I stopped doing this route as there was no lights and it was pretty lonely, plus I would have needed to run it twice to get the distance I required. This morning Puppy and I went for and reestablished ourselves on the racecourse loop. It took me 35mins, I think I use to do it in 32, however this time did include a short walk of about 500meters to stretch my knee out a bit. I now have a plan of attack for each week;

1 x racecourse run
1 x longer weekend run
3 x morning walks with puppy and Mr Chelle


Will do that for a couple of weeks and get really serious about my stretching etc and then hopefully up the pace a bit!

Getting fat...

Since doing the Sydney Half a few weeks ago, my 'slightly dodgy before I went skiing and even more so since' knee has been a nightmare. I had to fly to Fiji 48 hours after I ran the Half, sounds great, but I was actually working and the hours there are pretty long, I think the conference organisers are mad, they put these conferences in these great locations and then the day looks a bit like this;

7am, breaky
8am-5pm - Conference
6pm - pre-dinner drinks
7pm - dinner
10pm onwards - 'compulsory' socialising / networking...

Sound fun? Trust me, after the third 2am finish (and I'm drinking water here, cocktails were few and far between!) and 6am start it soon becomes tiring.. Anyway, where was I, oh, because its so full on I didnt have any / much time for stretching or what have you and by Wednesday afternoon my right calf was rock solid, I could actually feel myself dragging my foot as I walked. By Saturday, last day of the conference things were a bit better and I was walking normally at least, my knee was definitely sore though. No running, just walking the week back from Fiji (last week) and I couldnt get an appointment with my wonderful sports masseuse until the following Monday.

The Monday appointment would be one of the more painful I have ever had, she actually asked if I'd been doing my running in heels due to the state of my legs! Y'ouch!

Pat had sent an email out on Monday asking for helpers for the time trial and I decided to go along. I did the warm up and cool down with the guys and helped to slow some of the bikes and cars down while the guys were running. I was SO jealous, I really wanted to run, but the warmup alone was agony. I could feel myself pushing off on my left leg more trying to give my right knee as much 'air time' as possible. As soon as I'd finished my run and was ready for work I took a precautionary Voltaren. Actually, it wasnt too bad, but I am certainly not in running form at the moment, just getting fatter thinking wanting to be able to run.

So, I have seriously started my stretches again, I'd never completely stopped, but I had slackened off and am going to go real slow over the next few weeks, maybe venturing to Pats just once or twice. Not a happy bunny, I thought all this was behind me, but at least its almost the off-season, so I guess its the best time of year to go a bit easier.