Ironing Boards and mad physio's

I figured it was time for an update.

Well my on-going injury saga is still on going, since my last update on that front I have been having extensive physio.

This included pelvic realignments and various manipulation in the groin area, very painful but apparently necessary as part of the rehabilitation program (hmm I swear my physio is sadistic)

Any how my running with in this period took a back seat as I was really concentrating on beating this injury.

Since the middle of Jan my physio has been concentrating on my back and now seems to think that all my frontal lower ab pain is posture related (The Jury’s out on that one but I will bow to his superior knowledge)

He has had me doing all sorts of strange exercises. But I think the one that made me realise I am in fact dealing with a mad man was when he said I had to strap myself to my ironing board.

Let’s just work that statement through I am a single bloke living on my own, owning an ironing board is fairly low on my list of buying priorities.

Ok joking aside I did and still continue to do the exercises given to me, and surprisingly slowly but surely my running although not totally pain free is getting easier.

I have to really concentrate on my posture when running, I naturally run with my back stooped forward hence why I am getting the lower ab issues. Mentally the concentration ebbs and flows when I concentrate its pain free, as soon as I start running stooped for a prolonged period, I have ruined the run as the pain is back and even if I run with a straight back for the remainder of the run the pain stays until I stop.

I think the sensible thing to do would be to stop running completely for around 3 months to give my body time to heal.  Well my brain can’t compute that statement as it has words like sensible and stop running in it.

So my plan is to carry on with the posture running slowly building up the pain free mileage. (I wonder how long it takes for a new running stance to become your natural stance?)

Then every couple of weeks have a blow out and run a decent distance just for the hell of it. I have no races booked as such this year although I have a few I would quite like to have a bash at but I will have to be patient and see if I am fit enough to really have a crack at them…

My first blow out run is this weekend, which hopefully I will be happily blogging a successful albeit painful run….

Happy Running....

Time For Reflection

Well 2011 has been a hell of a roller coaster for me.

I have experienced my Ultimate Runner highs and lows in one race the GUCR.
I have experienced the depths of despair when you get an injury which does not seem to go away no matter how much rest you throw at it....

But I guess it all pales in to insignificance when you are faced with challenges in your personal life which are effectively out of your control.

Just after the JOGLE tester weekend my wife Anna told me that she was having serious thoughts about our relationship and where it was heading. We talked and agreed to keep going with it hoping things would pick up.

We really tried to make it work but realised that we had grown apart over the last 2 years. So we agreed that things were not going to change and it would be best to separate before we ended up hating each other.
It was not an easy decision to make compounded by the fact we have 4 beautiful children to consider.
We are and will remain good friends as we get on really well with each other just not as partners any more.

To be fair I has taken me a while to comes to terms with this I (more so because not seeing the children every day took some getting used too) and certainly made this transition a lot harder than it could have been (raw emotions take you to some very dark places).

It has certainly made me think about my life though. Anna said that she has felt fairly neglected for the last 2 years and although she did not like to say at the time but my commitment to running has caused probably the majority of the break up.

That is a a big wake up call does that make us Ultra runners selfish?
I guess the simple answer is answered with another question do you see Ultra running as an addiction.
If you do then as with all addictions you become obsessed to the exclusion of everyone and everything else.

So does that make me a bad person if I was obsessed with running?
In some ways yes it does as I lost focus on the important people in my life and that is not a good way to go....

I think the crux of it is though we are/were two very different people with very different outlooks on life.
Anna had/has no real interest in my running to want to live and breath it day in day out and I guess that can become very claustrophobic.


 For me now its time to re focus myself and when I'm not looking after the children find time to rediscover me and who I am and what I want for the future, if it means less running then so be it.

One tough choice I have had to make is that I am not going to be taking part in the JOGLE 2012.
This was not an easy choice to make but I have focus on the here and now and rebuilding for the future.

So Happy New Year All

Bring on 2012 the year of discovery.......

JOGLE 2012 Tester Weekend

Having signed up to do the JOGLE weekend tester, my thoughts quickly turned to the logistics of getting to the start and from the finish point on Saturday morning and Sunday night.

My options were fairly limited and were going to rely heavily on the fact of friends or family being able to drop me and pick me up from train stations (the joys of having only one car). However my Brother in law kindly allowed me the use of his car for the weekend so problem solved I thought.

Then I turned my attention of finding suitable public transport from Church Stretton to Preston. Due to family commitments my somewhat limited options basically meant I would be travelling through the night.

So come Friday evening after leaving the family enjoying a  party I made my way to Church Stretton for my Train which was due to leave at 10.40PM.

Having safely negotiated a change at Crewe Station I found myself at Manchester Airport at 1.15AM Saturday Morning, my connecting train to Preston was due to leave at 4AM.

I decided that I was going to take a walk around the airport as there was no way I was going to sleep. I must admit after 3 circuits of the same deserted corridors and sky walks I got fairly bored although my Garmin (yes I know sad isn’t it) had said I had covered 3.2 miles.

Finally after negotiating some late night revellers on the Train I arrived at Preston Station at 5AM. Having some time to kill before meeting the others I decided to walk the first part of the course as the station was somewhat depressing.

It is very strange walking along unfamiliar streets carrying a hydration pack and an overnight bag being followed by a man who walked as if he had a wooden leg. I found an excuse to stop which involved a very complex method of tying my shoelace which involved a considerable amount of time. By then peg leg was in the distance and it became a role reversal.

Any way I digress I managed to cover around 1.5miles before I realised I had better head back to meet the others.

DAY 1

So at 6.30am I was sat outside Preston Train Station having walked over 6 miles through the night with no sleep trying to eat a pot of rice pudding  without a spoon, when I saw a chap suitably attired ready for running alight from a Taxi.

It was Ian who I had had Email correspondence with but had not met (he must of thought whose this idiot who can’t even remember a spoon).

Very soon all the other runners appeared from various directions, and after a quick phone call we met up with Rory, Jen and Dave Miles.

Soon we were off, my plan for the day was to take it easy and not get drawn into any body else’s game plan. It quickly became apparent that a few of the guys wanted to give Ian a run for his money (I knew before hand he was a quick runner therefore out of my league) so I was not tempted.

I settled into a rhythm which was comfortable and soon found I was running with Dave which was very pleasing as I was hoping to get a chance to pick his brains a bit.

So for the first 10 miles we were chatting away and to be honest that 10mile section was probably the most single important section for me out of the whole weekend. I learnt a lot of useful things from Dave (I learnt a lot of other things over the weekend but spread out and not as intense as that first 2hr section), the man is top draw totally unassuming in the achievement of completing the JOGLE.

Well we soon found ourselves at the first checkpoint at 10miles with Rory scolding us like naughty school children. I found 3 of the other guys there Tom, Tim and Sean unsurprisingly Ian was too quick for them.

When I left the CP we all seemed to fall into step, the pacing was comfortable and everyone seemed in good spirits. We had Dave’s company for a few more miles and then he left us promising to meet us later in the course to support us.

To be fair the course was easy to navigate and we had no real issues quickly navigating are way through Wigan onto the 2^nd CP. A quick pit stop with the usual banter was had and we were on our way out of Wigan and onto Warrington.

To be fair I have never really been in these areas before (apart from Blackpool) and to be honest I have no desire to go back. The area is featureless and quite frankly depressing; Dave said this day on the JOGLE was the worst one in terms of scenery and frankly motivation.

We found ourselves heading out of Warrington after having a bit of an extended walking session through it; I think lethargy had set in.

We found ourselves walking up a hill to then see in the distance the Ultrarace Motor, why does he always park on the top of a hill, I suppose to catch us walking for an unflattering photo (Oh well I guess I will need to get used to walking photos). So CP3 was reached were more food was consumed I had been eating breaded products all day so I decided to have a milkshake, how stupid of me I had forgotten it had made feel rubbish on the GUCR.

So for the next 10miles I was battling with a really dodgy stomach, there was a period of around 5 miles that I really wanted to throw up and did try to force myself at one stage hoping it might help the stomach cramps. I battled through on my own for a fair bit as my pace had dropped enough for the 3 others to have gone out of sight.

Then I saw Dave in his car so had a quick chat and carried on, suddenly that seemed to pick me up because within a few minutes I had caught the other guys, ok they had stopped to talk to Dave but I will take it.

Although the pains were still there it was easier to run so we carried on and soon saw Rory again at a petrol Station to be told we had 5 miles to go, result.

The next 4 miles or so were just head down and grind it out, then with a mile to go we knew we had a bit of navigation to do.

We stuck together at this point for fear of getting lost which became apparent fairly quickly that this is exactly what happened. We consulted the paper map and i phone and phoned Rory. All did not really give us the info we wanted, where on earth were we and where was the hotel.

We stopped a couple of folks who told us where to go so we went running. Tom then had the bright idea of cutting across a golf course as it was part of the hotels (on a footpath I hasten to add), this proved to be his best idea of the day as it led down into the car park of the hotel and to a 10hr 15min finish for 47miles (with detour around 48miles).

A very satisfying day at the office. I must admit with no sleep Friday night I was looking forward to my bed.

DAY 2

Today was a staggered start with Katherine going off at 6am (Rory & Jen somewhat sheepishly confessed they had overslept and missed her going) 4 of us were going at 7am and Ian was going at 8am.

We set off and to be honest I felt very good considering the lack of long runs in the last 2-3 months.

My groin injury had hurt a fair bit from around 10miles through to 26 miles on Day 1 but had then gone away. Normally after a long run I would struggle to get out of bed as the injury would basically stop me standing upright I would be stooped for a while until my posture adjusts and then I could stand, but normally in considerable pain. Today this did not happen, can you actually cure a misaligned pelvis just by running 50miles?

Any how we soon found ourselves on the A49, which was the primary road yesterday and once again was going to be our main companion through out the day.

We settled into a rhythm which once again was working well eating the miles at a steady rate.

We then saw that the A49 was closed ahead and it was a bridge closure so possibly a potential issue. We consulted the map to work out where the detour would take us and decided that it added far too many miles and we thought we could blag our way through the road works if need be. I informed Rory who assured us we would be ok to get through as Katherine had gone that way. We soon came to the closure and found a sleepy watchman who let us through, to then find that Rory had blagged the watchman the other side to let him through. So CP1 was reached bang on target and feeling really good. I decided that today I was going to avoid breaded products as I had felt fairly bloated yesterday afternoon, plus I figured grab a banana and chocolate bar and you can carry on walking.

So on we went over the makeshift bridge and on our merry way to Whitechurch. One thing that was becoming fairly clear yesterday was very featureless and fairly flat, today was in stark contrast much more scenic but also a lot more hills.
Don’t get me wrong there were no monster hills to speak of just frequent hills which disrupted your running pattern a little. Inevitably there was more walking involved, ok normally I would have run a lot more of the hills but in the spirit of the whole weekend I wanted to approach it as I would if it was the event for real. Besides I wanted to see how I would wake up Monday morning, could I go running again if I wanted to or would I have crashed and burned….

 

We soon found ourselves heading out of Whitechurch Jen had caught and passed by then in some springy shoes called Hokas which had been dubbed the tweenie shoes. We had much discussion about these shoes over the weekend and the general consensus was negative rather than positive.

By this time the sun was out and we were really enjoying jogging along country roads, we had to keep our wits about us as the roads were narrow and the cars fast. For me I am used to this type of running as I run a fair bit down unlit country roads, I think it was an eye opener for a couple of the group though.

Soon we saw some folks wearing high viz  ahead and realised it was probably Jen and Katherine, we spotted them crossing to a car so knew CP2 had been reached.

On arrival we learnt that Katherine had been hit a glancing blow by a passing car, she was suffering a fair bit so decided to call it a day.

We gathered our sustenance and was quickly on our way munching as we walked. Jen soon passed us again running up hill and then soon followed by Ian who had caught us up from his later start.

This section for me was quite hard but this seemed to follow a trend because it was the same the day before. I found myself lagging behind the other guys, which was fine; I was sticking to my own pace and not trying to force myself to run at a pace that did not suit me. Mentally I was fine I just knew my body was going through I tired patch and providing I kept going my pace would pick up again.

The day before I had plugged myself in and had listened to music as a distraction, but today I chose not too, to see if I could manage without. To be fair I don’t think I would want to have anyway as the A49 called for full concentration and alertness.

I was amazed by the amount of road kill we had seen in the 2 days of running, one which stood out for me was badger on the side of the road fully intact but with his mouth open and teeth bared as if defiant at the very thing which had probably hit him.

Soon I was crossing a roundabout to find CP3 was the other side, I was surprised to see the other 3 guys at the cp as I assumed they were well ahead of me.

I grabbed the same food banana, chocolate bar and can of coke, it had served me well all day with no stomach issues so I was not about to change it. I headed off a bit behind the other 3; jen had decided to jog with me for a bit still in her hokas although I think they were making her feet hurt a bit by then. She left soon after as Rory was lurking on a street corner ready to pick her up.

It had been decided earlier due to the clock change and some folks not having high viz wear that we would run until 4.30pm and Rory would pick us up at whatever point we had got to.

Any way I carried on my merry way knowing we were coming to probably the trickiest bit of navigation of the day negotiating Shrewsbury. I roughly knew the direction I required and decided that broadly speaking I would head that way knowing full well the road signs would not be very useful to me.

I caught and passed Tim he said he was struggling with his knee and was going to stretch it out.

I headed into the centre getting some strange looks from shoppers, at one point I got disorientated and was unsure of the direction to take, I headed off in what I thought was the correct way. I soon spotted a Traffic Warden who I approached and he assured me I was heading in the right direction and to keep going.

So on I went the road seemed to go on for ages and I had another doubt moment, I spotted a chap clipping his hedge so I asked him for clarification. Big mistake he was very interested to know what I was doing and why, I felt obliged to tell him, after around 5 minutes I managed to get away with the knowledge that the A49 to Ludlow was just ahead.

I soon found myself on the A49 heading out towards Church Stretton, I had about an hour to cover as much ground as I could before Rory was due to pick me up.

I soon found that progress would be hampered a little as the road was fast and the verge was a little overgrown in places. As always when you’re faced with it you dig in and battle on. To be honest I started to enjoy it as it became a battle between me and the other road users and I was not going to loose. I developed a strategy that seemed to work for me I just started singing and the closer they got to me the louder I would sing. Anyone looking in must have thought I was insane!!

My phone rang it was Tom to say that they had just started down the part of the A49 with no path. I was surprised as I assumed the 2 were ahead of me as I had only passed Tim, it later transpired that they got lost badly in Shrewsbury.

Soon Rory appeared to pick me up and inform me I was around 7 miles short of Church Stretton, so 39miles covered on Day2 in 9.5 hours.

All in all it was a great weekend of consistent running at a pace which was comfortable and sustainable.

For me it is the confidence boost I needed knowing that although some of my endurance fitness has gone I have not lost too much due to my injury over the summer. More importantly I have learnt a lot off Rory, Jen & Dave which will hopefully help towards a successful completion come April 2012..

I used my UK GEAR PT1000’s for both days and I had no issues at all they performed just as I wanted them too.

pond water

Since my last update training progress has been slow well you could say stagnant to be honest. I have managed a few 20+ mile runs but nothing to get excited about.

You can always come up with what you consider to be very valid excuses to not to run but lets be fair they have no substance to them, and when you pull away the veil all your left with is an attitude of I cant be bothered.

This is not a good rut to get into and I need to snap out of it very quickly otherwise before I know it will be Christmas and 2012 will be on us. For too long I have kept using the excuse of this long term injury I am carrying but the bottom line is if I keep things slow then the pain is manageable.

So this weekend sees me joining some fellow JOGLE entrants where we will be travelling to Preston. From there we are basically running down the Country  to Church Stretton roughly covering 2 of the JOGLE days. I am hoping that this weekend will be the kick up the backside I need to get back to some regular training.

I received some great kit from Aldi my clothing sponsor for the JOGLE.  I will be testing some of it out over this weekend.

This will also be the first big test for my choice of shoes for the attempt; I am running in my UK Gear PT1000 shoes. This will be my first back to back road runs I will have done in them so hopefully they will perform well.

I will blog next week on how the weekend pans out….

The Summer That Never Was

Well it’s been a while since my last blog, a lot has happened over the summer some good some bad.

I must say congratulations to James Adams for keeping a lot of people entertained during the summer with his blog of his exploits and successful completion in the LANY2011.

For those that don’t know it was the Los Angeles to New York Footrace 3200miles in 70days, somehow I don’t think I could quite justify this one not only to my self but to my family and work.

Well after a bit of wallowing in self pity after my DNF in the Ultra100 I decided that my running was going to take a back seat during July and August (forced a little by my subsequent injury I guess)

I think my longest training run in the summer was 12miles so not ideal training for the Ultra Peaks. To be fair I was not going to do it as I felt the injury would play a significant part in this race but I felt that if I could finish then at least I would be able to complete the 9bar championship, I was certainly not looking to get a top 10 as in previous outings just a finish would be nice.

It was good to catch up with various folks before the race, and to swap running related stories. I seem to be recognising more and more faces at these events now which is all good.

I had a good chat with Dave Miles about his experience in the JOGLE 2012 which was certainly very valuable, any information or tips I can glean I am filing away as I am hoping these will prove to be invaluable.

The race itself for me was all about pain management, but the red mist descended at the start and I foolishly shot off with the front runners until we got to the first hill and I decided to walk it. Then from that point to the first CP it seemed ok I was bumbling along not fast but certainly a reasonable pace, the wheels started coming off around 12 miles when the pain was getting more intense but I was determined to not pop any pills as I wanted to experience the pain level in its raw state. By 16 miles I was reduced to a shuffle, and by 17.5 miles I was walking with no hope of running any more, I was still determined to finish but by mile 19 every step was painful.

So I took the decision to pull out at the second CP realising that it would not be a fruitful exercise to continue. Not a good day at the office, and one to quickly forget.

On the plus side from what I saw of the course it has the makings of being a true classic.

I have now had to make the difficult decision to pull out of all my races for the foreseeable future as I do not want to potentially jeopardise my JOGLE Training.

So now the kids are back at school my new 32 week training plan is kicking in.

Everything running on my plan is based on around 10min milling,  I have decided to train specifically for the JOGLE, normally my training pace even for long runs would 8min milling or less so this is certainly new territory for me, gone are the days of running 22 miles in a sub 2hr 30 time

Although my plan is based on mileage I am focusing on hours rather than actual mileage

My weekly hours spent running will range from 8hrs to 25hrs on my heaviest weeks; I think I only have 3 really heavy weeks planned the average works out at around 13hrs a week.

I am under no illusion this whole process is going to be tough to fit in around family life but if I don’t do it then I won’t have the necessary training required to complete the JOGLE.

Without the support of Anna and my family then I would be doomed to failure from the start, having said that there will still be a lot of tears and difficult choices to make of that I am sure, BUT there will be times of joy and happiness along the way also.

If there wasn’t then I would not even bother starting this journey

Some exciting news to come soon  (hopefully)

The joy of running again...

Well it’s a new month and hopefully for me a turning point for me regarding my running.

July was not a very good running month for me in fact I had 3 weeks were I did not run at all. It was all about finding out what my injury was and if I could train with it.

After a few appointments the general consensus is that I have a sports Hernia (Gilmore’s Groin). This needs to be formally diagnosed yet but I am waiting for a CT or MRI scan.

Once I had an idea what my injury was I did some research into the possibility of running with the injury until I could start a formal treatment program which potentially will be surgery.

I found out that it is possible to run with a hernia but the advice is to invest in some compression shorts (Warm Pants).

I decided to start running though without them so I could assess the level of pain without any aids. I did a couple of 10k’s and boy did the first 2-3 miles hurt on each run then it seemed to settle down. It still hurt but the pain was a more manageable level.

My warm pants dutifully arrived, I tried them on and was a little disappointed as first impressions seemed to be that although they were thicker than standard lycra shorts I could not feel or see how the compression was going to work in the lower abdominal  area.

Still not loosing faith I grabbed the dog and we went for a run, and to my surprise I did not feel the level of pain that I had been experiencing, there was still pain there but it was like having a dull ache (a bit like a used leg muscle ache after 50miles of running). For me this was the result I wanted as now it opened the door back up for me to resume my training.

I finished July with a flourish and managed a reasonable 52 miles in the final week.

While I had been inactive I had decided to look at what my major race plans would be for next year. I find that if I don’t plan ahead then I quickly loose focus and my training becomes very aimless.

I kept getting drawn to the JOGLE, but kept dismissing it as the financial outlay is huge when you have a family to consider.

Then Anna dropped a bombshell she suddenly said one evening that she had signed me up and I was in the JOGLE 2012 race, it felt like all my birthdays and Christmases had come at once. I think I am going to owe her for this one for years to come….

I am under no illusions I have a huge task ahead of me to get the right training in to give myself the best possible chance to finish this race. I am going to have to learn to go slow on all my long runs and also I need to put some solid training weekends in where I am running 60 miles a day for 2 or 3 days.

Its exciting times and I am very much looking forward to the next few months, although this hernia is a slight thorn in the side…

I have even managed to secure a sponsor to provide me with clothing for the JOGLE attempt.

This Saturday is my birthday so I intend to put a long training run in, if my warm pants can take it

More soon…..

Hip Flexors or Hernias take your pick.....

Here is a quick update on my progress after my Ultra100 DNF.

After putting the DNF firmly behind me, although I must admit I still have down moments and wonder should I have continued and finished, but hey ho whats done is done.

Any how I decided post race not to run for 2 weeks, to hopefully give my body a chance to recover and things would be back to normal.

I quickly got bored so ended up doing a lot of jobs around the house which I had neglected. Some jobs were not exactly helping the injury, such as topping some large conifers, this involved climbing the said tree complete with a chainsaw and cutting around 15ft out the top. This process was then repeated lots of times.


After the 2 weeks were up I decided to give myself a little jog test, to be honest I was not holding out much hope. I had noticed over the 2 week rest period that the pain I was experiencing had moved from the hip / groin area to the lower ab area.

Any way I decided to incorporate my test with a dog walk so I would not look too stupid if I had to stop jogging after 20paces. I did manage around 500metres (yes Jason 500metres not miles) before the pain got too much, so suitably annoyed, totally dejected I trudged home to give the news to my wife.

Practical as ever she said phone up the physio tomorrow and try to book an appointment, I knew she was right.

So appointment was booked with a chap called Tony for today.

So today I met Tony who to be fair to him looked like he could rip you apart limb from limb. However he was great and did a thorough examination and pulled me every which way especially in the groin and hip area which is his specialist area. He concluded that I had no groin or hip strains which was good news. He then turned his attention to my lower ab area, he prodded and poked for a while and came to the conclusion that he thought it was a possible hernia.

After he had let that bombshell sink in, he proceeded to tell me that I would require an MRI scan to confirm his diagnosis and then if confirmed were talking a minor op....

After I had got back to the office  and contemplated what I had been told, I realised that if it was a hernia I was looking at a long time frame for it to be fixed. As this op would have to be done on the NHS I guess I will be under there time frame so I guess I am looking at a min of 12 weeks for an op date. That is after I have had it confirmed that it is a hernia.


So on reflection  I am a little bit deflated if I'm honest tonight, still I have to look on the bright side. I am off now to research into the possibility to still maintain some training runs with a hernia.....