My brother, Jess and I did the Enchanted Forest Wine Run, which is a trail half-marathon in Grants Pass, OR, today. It was about 90 degrees at the start (noon) and very hot in exposed areas of the course. There were about 2700 feet of vertical, per my Garmin. Jared's and Jess's more or less agreed. Jess was the fourth female and 26th of 143, finishing in 2:11:47. Pretty impressive, especially given the fact that she didn't carry any water and had maybe 5 sips from aid stations along the way. My brother finished in 3:14, and I finished in 2:33.
The first few miles circle around the vineyard cross-country style, and then there's a half mile climb on the road to the trailhead. From there, it's straight up, and then you have to do it again as part of a second, sort of truncated, loop. After the second loop of climbing nice single-track, switchback trails, the trail empties back out onto the road for a bit, finishing at the vineyard. I really liked the course. As part of the race package, we each got a buff; post-race, we got really good hot organic food and a glass of wine (with the wine glass).
9.29.2012
9.25.2012
Minimus too minimal?
I woke up Monday morning with a good sized bruise on the bottom of my left foot after 12 mile trail run in west rock. Pretty rocky terrain. I'm thinking the NB minimus arent enough shoe for this kind of trail. Or am I doing something wrong? Anybody have this problem?
9.16.2012
Oh well
At the last 1/2 mile of my long run today I screwed up my knee again. Same shootin pain as before and now a dull ache. I'll try to run on tuesday but I'm not optimistic. Very disappointing. Very stupid of me to be doing so much mileage on pavement, butni figured I better get ready for it since MDI is all pavement. And maybe too much to soon.
9.06.2012
Scar tissue
Although I'm grateful to finally be running again, my right leg/knee is still not perfect. It's not the injury for which I had surgery that's not perfect; it's the two scars from the incisions where the surgeon performed an arthroscopy to excise the medial plica and the one scar (the largest of the three) where the surgeon opened up my leg to debride part of the semimembranosus tendon. I realize that surgeons are in the business of making scar, but my scars are super annoying--much more annoying than the four scars on my left foot. In fact, those four scars never really bothered me at all.
The two arthroscopy scars click and pop from the scar tissue build-up, and sometimes they even cause pain--not while running but when squatting or doing other leg strengthening exercises. These two scars are just minor annoyances compared to the annoyance of the debridement scar on the medial aspect of my knee. That scar, which measures about an inch and half long, is still adhered to the subcutaneous tissue. In other words, the outer most layer of skin is literally stuck to whatever's underneath. That skin is supposed to move freely over that underlying layer. This presents a host of problems.
1. There's a rather important nerve that runs through that area that is being blocked or squeezed by the tissue/inflammation, which has resulted in a lack of full sensation in parts of my leg and foot. It's super annoying, but I know that once the scar tissue is broken up and that adhesion is released, full sensation will return.
2. Because the outer most layer of skin is not able to move independently of the underlying tissue, it pulls on the tissue and causes weird pain and soreness in other areas of my knee--nothing at all serious but very annoying.
3. When I flex my hip through its full range of motion--that is, bring my knee to my chest in a standing position--the outer most layer of skin is pulled on so much by the underlying tissue that it causes a huge indentation in my leg and very funny feeling.
So, what I've begun to do, which I probably should have done as soon as possible following the surgery, is manipulate the tissue. It's super painful, but these layers of tissue must be separated. I refuse to see a therapist, so I've scoured the Internet for techniques to do this. I've found a few and have gotten to work on it. I hope that I'll be able to resolve this on my own.
The two arthroscopy scars click and pop from the scar tissue build-up, and sometimes they even cause pain--not while running but when squatting or doing other leg strengthening exercises. These two scars are just minor annoyances compared to the annoyance of the debridement scar on the medial aspect of my knee. That scar, which measures about an inch and half long, is still adhered to the subcutaneous tissue. In other words, the outer most layer of skin is literally stuck to whatever's underneath. That skin is supposed to move freely over that underlying layer. This presents a host of problems.
1. There's a rather important nerve that runs through that area that is being blocked or squeezed by the tissue/inflammation, which has resulted in a lack of full sensation in parts of my leg and foot. It's super annoying, but I know that once the scar tissue is broken up and that adhesion is released, full sensation will return.
2. Because the outer most layer of skin is not able to move independently of the underlying tissue, it pulls on the tissue and causes weird pain and soreness in other areas of my knee--nothing at all serious but very annoying.
3. When I flex my hip through its full range of motion--that is, bring my knee to my chest in a standing position--the outer most layer of skin is pulled on so much by the underlying tissue that it causes a huge indentation in my leg and very funny feeling.
So, what I've begun to do, which I probably should have done as soon as possible following the surgery, is manipulate the tissue. It's super painful, but these layers of tissue must be separated. I refuse to see a therapist, so I've scoured the Internet for techniques to do this. I've found a few and have gotten to work on it. I hope that I'll be able to resolve this on my own.
9.04.2012
Over doing it
I did a long run yesterday, about 18 miles. Run was nice, through the trails of great falls national park in VA. However,starting feeling shitty in the afternoon and was running a bit of a fever by night time. Woke up feeling ok this morning, just tired. Anybody ever get a fever after long run?
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