Training Log 2008.02.21 – 2008.02.23
Thursday: Watched Spirit of the Marathon with Mitch. (He looked at me knowingly when Deena Kastor was talking about the importance of stretching as we age). Went to the hotel gym after the movie. Did 5 mins of walking and then 1.5 miles of slow running as a warm-up. I decided to back off from the planned tempo pace to decrease a chance of my hamstring hurting. Inspired by the movie, I decided to try running for an hour at just under my Boston Qualifying pace (7:29/mile). I felt relatively comfortable at that speed, HR was hovering between 151-155 BPM. Just after 3 miles of BQ pace, I could feel a slight twinge in my left hamstring. I immediately switched to a very slow walk to cool-down. After heading back to my room I read a bunch about stretching.
Friday: Went down to the gym in the morning to hit the stationary bike for 10 mins as a warm-up , then did a few easy hamstring stretches and called it a day.
Saturday: Did a very slow warm-up on the treadmill at home and I could feel tightness in the hamstring so decided to ride a recumbent bike at the gym instead of running with my friends. I felt like a bit of a wimp for not joining on the planned run, but I felt like the odds of the hamstring getting much worse definitely wasn’t worth it.
Overall Thoughts: I’m feeling really frustrated since I am in good aerobic shape, but keep getting these nagging injuries that make me stop/reduce training for a few days at a time. I’m going to stick with riding the bike through at least mid-week and ease into a regular stretching routine. I think the bike riding I was doing 2 times every week when following FIRST consistently was probably helping my flexibility enough to stave off a a lot of the muscle/tendon problems that have been cropping up lately. I’m also hoping that eventually the increase flexibility will help lengthen my short/choppy stride.