Haven’t had a chance to write in the last week, so here is a review of what I’ve been up to!
Went to Middlebury VT last weekend. My wife was speaking on a panel at alumni weekend at the college. Middlebury is very nice. We stayed at a great bed and breakfast, and tooled around the various small towns there including Bristol and Vergennes. Also went to the Robert Frost trail in Bread Loaf, but it was mostly closed due to some flood damage from the winter.
I brought my bike with me to Middlebury, and had an amazing, and humbling ride. My intention was to bike out and back from Middlebury, on rt 125, to Lake Champlain (see route here). It was about 15 miles each way. The hills were relentless, and wore me down to no end, and I could only cover about 12 miles before turning around. 24 miles in total, and a really awesome and hard workout. I realize that real bikers and triathletes can handle these kinds of hills with no issues, so I need to figure out how to add more hills to my bike workouts. I like riding at my weekend house in Little Silver, NJ, but there are very few ‘real’ hills out there. Anyway, it was an awesome ride, and a great tune up for my triathlon this weekend.
As good as the ride was, I think the hills aggrevated my groin. It was really acting up on Sunday and Monday. The good news is that it helped me to isolate exactly where the pain is coming from, so now I know where to focus my ice treatments.
Monday night was softball, up in Inwood. With my groin issue, I was not able to run full out, but the light running in the outfield and on the bases, combined with lots of stretchng, actually made it feel a little better. Collectively we had a great game, and won 11-7.
Didn’t do any workouts on Tuesday because I had to run down to my weekend house and do some lawn and grounds care, and morning workouts are too hard until school is over for my kids. Wednesday nights are no good for swimming because there is only a small window the pool is available for lap swimming, so I went for a run last night.
Did my 4 mile out and back to East River Park. I have a hard time doing ‘easy’ runs, and ran it pretty hard. Finished up in 34:56, about 8:45 pace. The groin issue is so far not preventing me from running. It only bothers me a little as I get started with a run, and loosens up pretty quickly. However, I’ve lately also been feeling some tendonitis behind my left knee, and that I can feel with every step in a run. It is not a lot of pain, but just a little bit of very noticeable discomfort. While not preventing me from running, I think it would prevent me from running all out in a speed workout or race condition. So far, ice on its own has not done anything. May need to work on leg based stretches and exercises to smooth it out.
It is interesting. These are my first real injuries since I started this blog over a year ago. In the past, I constantly had injury issues and I think this is the longest I’ve ever gone without issue. My last big injury was when I blew out my lower back in July 2007. Historically, I’ve always had leg problems on my right side – patellar tendinitis, plantar fasciitis, shin splits, etc. Left leg was always great. Therefore, never really focused on left side. My current injuries are on my left side. Ooops. Guess I need to pay attention to both sides going forward!
This morning, heading to my older daughters school. She is 13 and graduating middle school in 2 weeks. Today is an honors ceremony, and she is doing a solo tap dance routine. Then off to work, and hopefully to the pool to swim tonight.
With my triathlon coming up quickly on Sunday, I need to make sure I’m well prepared for all 3 events, for the transitions, and most importantly, need to practice getting the wetsuit on and off!
