Calf'us Interuptus!

On Sunday, while trying to finish up a short run on a recovery week, my left calf muscle popped and turned my last mile home into a sad hobble. In some ways, I could tell that things weren't going all that well because I just wasn't feeling very recovered during that week, my knees were achey, and I just felt a bit physically overextended. The calf pop was just the final icing on an overextended 8 weeks of very high mileage and hard speedwork. I think the Testosterone recovery allowed me to push my body harder than this ancient musculoskeletal system could allow. I had violated the old man runner rule of taking a recovery week at least EVERY THREE WEEKS. So, for the third time in two years, I have irritated the same spot on the center on my left calf just about where it attaches to my achiles tendon. The first time was when I was first coming back from the big crash, and started doing very short fast intervals. I lost 9 training days to it. The second time was visiting Billy in Jersey for his first chemo go round. It was hilly there, and because it is so flat in Deming, I purposely tried to hit every hill I could, and popped it there. I missed 5 days that time. I used compression calf sleeves for the first time on that trip, and they helped me recover a bit faster. So, on monday I went to the gym and did a half hour on the exercycle and weights, and came home and did three sessions of ultrasound, icing, stretching, and kept the conpression sleeve on even when I went to sleep last night. I have to take Deb to El Paso on thursday, so my hope is that I will be able to tolerate a short run on friday, and slowly build back up. That would cause me to miss 4 days. So, if things go well, I can hobble together (pun intended) three reasonable weeks before racing on November 20th. Won't be the preparation I was hoping for, but it is what it is.......Probably going to be a tough last two years trying to make this body try to race, but that is the promise I made to myself, so I gotta keep my word!