My Knees are Killing Me!

I started to write this blog right after my run this morning.... but my knees, ankles and feet were so freaking swollen i had to shower, take some motrin and take a recovery nap :-)

What one line can characterize today's run?

Lord, when will this be over?

LOL...

but let me start from the beginning...

I was nervous about today's long run after the disaster that was my last long run 2 weeks ago...

Because I had only completed 12 out of the 16 miles from 2 weeks ago... technically I was supposed to only run 15 miles today because we are only supposed to make 2-3 mile jumps. But I planned to do 16 miles, 1. to make it a nice round number :-) and 2. so that I could justify another four mile jump 2 weeks from today in order to participate in the 20 mile run...

Either way... I was not going to do the full 18 miles... I had sufficiently learned my lesson from last time and was going to stick to the game plan...

This run was TOTALLY different.... I felt GREAT... the entire run...

Three weeks of showing up on Saturday mornings, getting my runs in during the week, cutting out [most of] the junk food and making sure I ate at least twice a day made all of the difference.

I also finally got it together and went to Target yesterday and bought "runners snacks" (power gels that give you a boost in energy with a combination of carbs, sodium, potassium, sugar and caffeine and gummy fish with the same ingredients). Eating those things throughout the run instead of those do nothing soy bars that I've been eating during training was WONDERFUL. When I could feel my energy/sugar dropping... they provided that boost I needed to keep pushing through.

This week we ran further north then we've ever run, its beautiful over there! Its crazy how completely different it is from the south side. The thing about the north side is, there are no mile markers once you get to the beach!

So instead of being able to turn around a mile early at Diversey for my altered route, I ended up running all the way to Addison with my group!

I wasn't especially concerned about it though because at the 9 mile turn around I still felt really good. Truthfully (like our coach had warned us before the run)... the last 2 miles were really the roughest. Which was strange, because I really should have started feeling it at mile 14-16.

But my body held up the whole way through, and I didn't start wishing for it to be over (lol) until miles 16-18... and even then... I didn't feel ANYWHERE near as bad as I did two weeks ago... Isn't that crazy?

All in all, I finished up strong, fully enjoyed my run and besides some swollen feet, ankles and knees.... my body was in great shape! I didn't feel exhausted at all!

I'm really proud of myself... running 18 miles successfully is a great feeling :-)

peace.