Totally hurt. My friggin' right knee is causing me such pain. I worked it yesterday doing a couple of striders on the baseball field in bare feet and it felt really good. Last night you would have thought I had run it over with a car. I had pain from my back all the way down to the arch of my foot. Today I threw on the Ace bandagey thing I have which puts a little bit of compression on it and it feels just a bit better. You should see me when I walk to the train at 6 am. My left achilles doesn't work until it gets stretched out so I hobble on that leg and then the knee hurts me so I hobble on that leg. Its looks like I am Hopalong Cassidy. This old thing is for the birds.

Last week I went to the Thursday night run because afterwards Chris McDougall was speaking about his book Born to Run. I am also interested in this whole barefoot running thing because it just makes sense. He was really good. And I tried a couple of laps barefoot and you can read the results above. Once the knee rehabs I am going to give this a good try. I am tired of being injured and changing the way I run may be the cure I am looking for. I was happy to hear he had no problems with the trails around Valley Green. What was most interesting was listening to the older runners talking about how they used to do 60 miles a week in Chuck Taylors or bo bos.

Well another injury has come to me. I am in that spiral I have heard so many others talk about where they go from injury ot injury. I have pretty much written off this year as a running year but my attitude is surprisingly upbeat. I really don't want to race anymore. Just don't have much desire anymore to get another tee shirt, medal or goal. I just want to be able to go out on the weekend and enjoy a run by myself like I have for the past three or four years now. I really enjoy those winter mornings where no one is around, my beard is frozen from my breath and snot, it's dark, the ground is hard and rocky and I am alive.

Last weekend I ran a very slow 10k on saturday, listening to branchs fall behind and in front of me. the first one fell like a shot and I skirted down the path too nervous to look back and see what it was. The second was a tree that I watched as it fell and then was consumed by the bulging angry brown creek. it was a glorious run out from the boy scout camp to bells mill and the back on the lower trail to the inn and then up buck to the car.

sunday, I felt really good and went out on the northside from janette to do the 2 corners around lincoln drive. The first hour was brilliant. I felt good no pain anywhere for hte first time in a while. I got lost in my thoughts a few times and looked around and didn't know how I had gotten to where I was. After the 100 steps I slowed down a lot because I felt the heat getting to me. Right around the Hermit dwelling I felt my knee start to twinge. The way it feels at the end of a marathon or 50k. I slowed and tried to nurse it but something was definately wrong so I walked a great deal and on the flats I ran. Around the 6th hole at Walnut Lane I felt a pop and knew I was in real trouble. I gave great thought to crossing the golf course and just getting back in the car but I toughed it out and finished the walk/run. Once home I iced it and took anti inflamatories which helped. The last two days I ahve been wearing an Ace bandage brace which helps but I tweeked it pretty good asit woke me up in my sleep last night and I have been having difficulty negotiating steps. so the ankle feels tender still but the knee is hurting. I think I might be out of balance compensating for the ankle which is throwing my stride out for the knee. Good times.
Peace

Cool bones. I have been running almost regularly. I blew off the weekend because it was a too weekend. Too hot on Saturday, too raining on Sunday. So Monday I got up early and ran at 4:00. I ran steady for 30 minutes. that was my goal and I succeeded. I just wanted to make it that long without stopping. My heal and ankle felt great. Yesterday, I got out to the trails in the evening and managed to get 1 hour (with a little break in the middle) done.

Had a great weekend of running. Saturday I went out for about 1:45 I did the loop at the lincoln drive end of the park. It was pretty humid and i didn't get out until late about 6:30 but I pretty much had the trails to myself. My ankle and heel did not give me any trouble. I did a 7.5 minute run 1-2 minute walk which worked really well. The trails were beautiful firm, covered and in great shape. I love running on the other side of Lincoln because so few people go over there that I can really just be by myself in nature. I stretched out at about the half way point and that helped as well. I am really focusing on taking care of myself and enjoying the the run. After crossing back to the park side of Lincoln I had a stone in my shoe. I stopped to tap it out and continued on my run. After about 10 minutes the nike plus stopped saying that the run was finished. This was odd but since the footpod didn't register for part of the run and had to be resynced I thought this had happened agian. A few minutes more into the run and it did it again. This time I looked down and discovered that the pod had fallen off. I retraced my steps and found it. As i was stopping to replace it a deer poked its head out onto the trail and watched me the entire time. I didn't want to push myself so I cut the run short and headed back to the car on the main trail.

On Sunday, I got out late again but this time it was because I was watching the lightning. Bad storms were predicted but I really wanted to try and get a second run in to test the legs. I made it over to the park in a light drizzle I decided to head to the in on the northside. After the finger bridge, I headed down the stairs to the lower trail and discovered the creek had taken up occupancy. I headed back up to the upper trail and made it out to Cresheim creek. The creek was really angry and I stopped for a few minutes to watch before turning around and heading back to the car. When I got home we had some incredible rain, which ended up flooding the roads and stranding some drivers.
i am just so happy that I got a full week of running in including the back to back runs.