I’ve been avoiding running because I didn’t have new shoes, while at the same time avoiding buying new shoes because I didn’t seem to run anymore. Obviously, I set that situation up so that I could continue doing nothing, but I finally got up the nerve to break the cycle and ordered some new shoes. Brooks doesn’t make the Ravenna 3 anymore, so I ordered the same size in a Ravenna 5. They arrived on Friday and I spent some time trying to figure out the best way to lace them up in a fashion similar to how my old shoes are laced.

They don’t tell you this when you start into running, but you don’t lace up your running shoes the way you have been taught to lace up shoes all your life. Oh no. You have to do some fancy maneuvers so that when you pull your laces to tie your shoes it doesn’t mess everything up down the line. I don’t fully understand it, but I think it has to do with buying shoes that are bigger than your feet when you’re not running… then tightening up the top so your feet don’t slide around too much while you’re getting going. Eventually enough blood goes down to your feet that they expand and fill your shoes. So I had to work out how to lace them up. I had hoped to just copy what I had setup on my old shoes, but the new pair has an extra set of holes… my whole system was off. The first few times I didn’t even have enough lace left to tie anything.

I did eventually figure something out and then I got to try them out this morning. Yes, I said morning. It’s nice and cool in the mornings here, so it’s the perfect time to run. I headed out a little before 8. I guess that’s later than most people start running around here. I didn’t see any bikes or runners the whole time. I doubt I’ll ever get up much earlier than that, but you never know.

I’m not used to running in the morning. I don’t know if I should eat anything or drink anything before I go out there. I decided pretty quickly that I should have had something to drink. Just a few hundred yards into the “run” and I was completely dried out. My legs were also wasted by then. Needless to say, I’m totally out of shape already. So I walked a bit and jogged a bit as I worked my way in and out of residential streets in my neighborhood. I have no idea where most of them go, but they were nice and quiet.

I eventually made it back home. My legs are jello. I think I need a day or two to recover. But at least I got out there and the best part… my achilles isn’t in pain. It’s a little tight, but I think that’s to be expected. But no pain. W00t.

(no link to activity details, because runkeeper.com no longer shows anything to non-members… very dickish)

I haven’t been running since I hurt my achilles way back in November of 2013. I haven’t really even been walking. I have been on my bike once or twice, but I’ve mostly been sitting around making up excuses to stay sitting around.

That all changed this week when I finally stopped giving in to the excuses and walked the whole 2 miles from work back home. I had Charmaine drop me off in the morning so I wouldn’t have any way home other than walking. It was still about 85 degrees outside when I started walking, but there was a nice breeze and a lot of shade. If I hadn’t had to wait for two lights right at the end, I would have averaged under 15:00/mile… and that was carrying my computer, noise canceling headphones, and a few books in my backpack.

Charmaine says we may ride our bikes to Santa Cruz tomorrow. That would be about 60 miles round trip. I’m not sure I’m up for that, but we’ll see what happens.

This is where I would normally link to my activity on Runkeeper, but they are being dicks these days and don’t show activities to non-members, so I no longer link to them. In fact, maybe it’s time to switch back to Strava for tracking my runs. Actually, I’m a little pissed at Strava right now too. The latest update to their Android app requires you allow the app to read your phone number and all the calls you make. I refuse to allow that. I’m not sure what the solution is yet. I’ll probably end up with a GPS watch or something and just upload the raw data to something.

I started off fast. I was headed down a little hill to start things off and then across some flat before going into the first hill that I always climb when I run around here. I was already feeling a little off before I even made it out of the parking lot at Pell Place.

At first I told myself that fast run on Monday must have taken more out of my feet than I had thought. I tried to stay fast, but I dropped off as I rounded the corner and headed across the flat section in front of the elementary school.

My left foot started to ache in a place I haven’t ever felt pain before. I started slowing down, but the pain continued to grow. I dropped out of my rhythm and started walking. I was only 1/3 of a mile into the run and I was walking. And my left foot continued to bother me. The pain was very low and very far back. I’ve had my Achilles Tendon be sore once or twice. When it’s been sore, I’ve always felt it directly behind my ankle, never so low. I wasn’t sure if it was even my Achilles or not, because it was so low. It almost felt like there was a problem with my shoe… right at the bottom at the very back of my left shoe.

I tried to think about what could be wrong as I walked up the hill past the library to the light at Carmel Country Road. When the light turned green I tried to jog, but it wasn’t going to happen. As soon as I was across the street I was back to walking. When I turned the corner at the church I wondered if it was one of those things that might hurt more walking than running. I was wrong. It hurt more running, so I dropped back to a walk.

I didn’t make it to the top of the hill before it hurt so bad that I came to a complete stop. I put my hand on the back of my leg to see if there was a problem with my Achilles, but it seemed ok. It didn’t hurt to put pressure on it from the back; It didn’t hurt to pinch it. Those have always been my tell-tale signs that something bad is happening, but they were absent this time. I tried to stretch my leg by leaning against a tree. It seemed to make me feel a little better, but I knew I wasn’t going on. I was going back. I started walking back down the hill and it wasn’t hurting that much. It was definitely feeling better than it had when I was going up hill.

Stupidly, I decided the diminished amount of pain meant I could start jogging again. It hurt more to jog, but I pushed through the pain. I got back past the school and started climbing towards Pell Place again when I had to walk. The pain was excruciating. I couldn’t even walk up that last hill. I was hobbling and really hurting.

I still don’t know what’s wrong. It’s been several hours and I’m still in fairly serious pain. I can’t stand straight up. I can’t even sit down for very long without needing to move to make it feel a little better. It seems to be mostly OK when my foot is pointed, but if I try to flex my foot it really hurts. Even if I just relax my leg muscles and try to position my foot that way with my hands (to stretch the tendon) it’s maddeningly painful.

I really hope I feel better in the morning, otherwise I may have danced my last dance on these particular streets.

I have never had someone stop me while running (or biking) to ask for directions until today… and it happened twice! The first time I was actually stopped, waiting to cross Del Mar Heights Road where it joins Carmel Valley Road, so I didn’t really think much about it. I did wind up missing the light and waiting through another cycle, but I wasn’t sad about getting a bit of extra rest at that juncture. I managed to keep my rhythm and run all the way through Palacio Del Mar and start heading up the big hill home when a guy in a truck cut across three empty lanes to pull up right in front of me and ask how to get to Escondido. He didn’t have a lot of other options, so I was nice and told him how easy it was to get there.

I was a little upset that I had come to a complete stop to talk to this guy. I was convinced it had messed me up for running that last hill, so I pushed even harder. Now, as I look back on it, I wonder if I ended up going faster up that last hill precisely because I stopped and gave that guy directions. We’ll never know, but I’m always going to help someone out if at all possible.

I changed my route up a bit after looking back through my logs of my faster runs last spring. When I was running faster I was starting off running downhill. It added more uphill to my runs, but I had a theory that starting off going fast without having to push hard would get me into a good rhythm. I wasn’t wrong. I cruised through almost the whole first mile (which has 150 feet of climbing). I did run out of air right at the end and walk a bit to catch my breath, but I didn’t walk long. I pushed hard through mile 2 and hit 6:00/mi going down the steep hill through Lansdale, but that really killed me mentally and I walked a little bit more to catch my breath again. I got right back to it and ran almost the whole way home (minus the stoplight and the guy trying to find Escondido). I did walk a couple times on that last big hill, but never for very long.

I finished pretty strong and really felt great.

Unlike Monday, I got up and had a good breakfast this morning. Maybe it was a little too good, because I lost track of time and worked right on through the lunch hour. In fact around 1:45 Charmaine came in and asked why I decided not to run today. Doh. I thought it was still morning. I jumped up, pounded some orange juice, smashed a slice of pumpkin bread in my face, and got ready.

I tried to take it a little easier on the first mile today, but I’m not sure how much of a difference it made. I still let myself walk at the end of the first mile and again near the end of the second mile. After that the course goes down hill, and I was able to keep going (and avoid most lights) until I hit the beginning of mile 6.

I usually walk the beginning of mile 6. Sometimes I walk the whole thing. It’s a pretty good hill and I’m usually pretty beat up by the time I get there. Today was different. I didn’t walk even once the whole way from the beginning of mile 6 all the way home. I did hit a red light that took forever, but I’m very sure I wouldn’t have walked if I had made the light. As I started up the hill, I really wanted to walk, but I kept reminding myself that I had a bunch of extra energy left over when I got home on Monday, so I knew I still had enough juice to jog up that last hill. And so I did.

Finishing strong always makes you feel good, and I really felt great finishing strong today.

I didn’t mean for it to happen this way, but I wound up having 2 oatmeal chocolate chip cookies for breakfast. And a glass of 2% milk. That wasn’t supposed to be breakfast, but I got too caught up in work email to notice how quickly time was passing. By the time I came up for air, it was after noon and I hadn’t had anything to eat.

I poured myself a small glass of orange juice (not so much that it will keep popping up to remind me it’s there) and chugged it down. I filled up my two tiny water bottles and grabbed a vanilla Gu and stuffed it in my utility belt. All the cool runners have utility belts with water bottles, food, etc. on hand at all times. I must be cool, because I have one too.

I have this crazy idea that if I start my run with a quick cadence that the rest of the run will be faster. I’m not sure it’s true or false yet, but I am happier with my overall performance today than with most of my previous runs (even those where my final time was very similar to today’s time). So I may play around with that some more.

I pushed pretty hard through that first mile that has nothing but uphill. It’s not super steep or anything, but it always seems to kill me. Maybe it’s because I hit the hill right as I start out the gate? I don’t know, but it kills me. Today was no exception. After pushing through that first mile, I found myself walking a bit on that second mile.

I did pull it together again, though I felt slow through the end of mile 3. Then I sucked down my vanilla Gu and felt energized. At first I just told myself I had to run now that I had used the Gu, but then I genuinely felt like I had more energy. But not only that, I felt like my form was pretty good. I was looking pretty far down the road, breathing well, and none of my joints or limbs were hurting at all. It was really great. I kept that up all the way to the end of mile 5 and the bottom of the hill.

I didn’t walk up the hill though. I managed to jog up most of it. I did walk one of the steeper sections, but the rest of it was all jogging and/or running. I still had a lot of juice left when I hit the home stretch, and I was feeling great. My time wasn’t amazing or anything, but the feeling I had those last 3 or 4 miles was really great. I wish I felt that way every time I ran.