FEELING RESTLESS

Well tomorrow morning I should have been running in the Lymm 10k, it was also my chance to run and raise the profile of the CATS FOUNDATION which is the Tay Sachs foundation, Tay–Sachs disease is a rare autosomal recessive genetic disorder that mainly affects children.
It causes a relentless deterioration of mental and physical abilities in an individual and results in premature death.

With me only being able to walk due to physio's advice I have emailed them(with no response) to cancel and see if I can run on another date, hopefully I can as they've sent me a running vest.
My stretches and exercise is going ok, when I first started them I felt an initial boost and felt it was working straight away, but after a week of doing the exercises I still get a bit of pain so I have to be patient and not rush this, hard when all I want to do is get out there and run. My left ankle still feels weaker than the right so I need to keep going and get it up to strength then I can start jogging again slowly. Pyhsio said I need to be walking uphill if I can, there are some good hills down by the river very close to here so doing that should aid me as well before I go to see the physio again next Thursday.

Lots of my facebook running group are doing the Edinburgh half marathon tomorrow, I wish them luck, maybe one day I'll do a bigger event, saying that The Great North Run in September is not that small a do.

End in sight???????????

Here are a couple of photos from last weeks run in Runcorn. The top one is of the start with the Runcorn Bridge in the background, the 2nd one below is one of me near the finish, I look fat, slow, bald and knackered. If it had been a close up you'd have seen me hot and sweaty too, I must learn to dress for the weather conditions.

 

Having visited the physio on Saturday I have been doing my exercise and stretch whilst out at work driving the truck. When I have to stop to load or unload I now have to look round for a curb or an empty pallet to use as a step, I stand on the ball of my foot on the pallet/curb and then lower my ankle down as far as I can and hold for 20 seconds. I then do the same but raise my heel to a neutral position and then drop down again, I have to do this 15 times for 3 reps, 3 times a day. I have done them for 2 days now and I can feel an improvement already, fingers magically crossed that there is an end in sight to this injury, here's hoping.

I haven't given up just yet.......

7 days ago I did the "RUN THE BRIDGE" race which was in Runcorn, the start was on the Runcorn side of the Bridge over the murky Mersey. I had not trained one single step for this race as I had been nursing my Achilles from the 10k race I did in Delamere Forest a few weeks ago.
It was a 5 mile race starting by the station and finishing in some park errr 5 miles away. I had  good warm up jogging around the car park for half an hour, doing some stretches mainly for my ankles and calf's, the start filled up quite quickly and I think there must have been about 700 doing the race, 455 men not sure about the women but there were plenty of them, club runners, plodders like me and one bloke dressed as flash

 

The whistle went and the timer on the land rover started, i saw it get to 3 seconds and that as the last i saw of it as the leaders set off so fast. A slight incline to the Bridge and before I knew it we were over the Mersey, I settled into a comfortable pace, I'd forgotten to charge my Garmin so used my phone to record my route and pace etc, as I'd started Nike+ on my iphone my embarrassing music kicked in and I couldn't turn it off, other runners avoided me as sixties music and classical stuff belted out a slow rhythm not conducive with a faster pace, anyway it kept me going and before I knew it the first mile marker was in sight, we had already passed Eddie Stobart's depot at Widnes and gone through a dismal industrial estate, the route was very flat with no ups or downs apart from the Bridge itself. The scenery was quite boring, a few houses but mainly industrial areas, as we approached the 2 mile marker I started to feel my Achilles getting stiffer, I'm always stiff, I didn't feel I was running fast but slowed down slightly to see if it eased a little, it didn't, so I just carried on and the pain got worse, a lot worse. At mile 3 I'd say I was almost in agony and by mile 4 all I could think was just get to the finish line, we hit the countryside briefly and I tried to look round at something nice to see but failed, the Runcorn area seems more devoid of interest than Northwich does. People I had overtaken started to overtake me back, I kept going, kept leaning forward and gritting my teeth, in other runs I had taken part in I always had a sprint finish, this one was different, the pain was bad in my Achilles and I just couldn't sprint, I did put maximum effort in, maybe it was lack of training and not the pain but I got to the line and breathed a huge sigh of relief but the pain didn't stop, I just wanted to get on the bus to get back to my van and put some freeze gel on the Achilles, I was handed a bottle of water, looked around but couldn't see anyone wearing a medal, what a let down, all that pain for nothing.

 

I got on the bus and sat waiting in the heat, my face was burning, eventually the bus headed back to the start, I got out of my seat and could hardly walk, I managed to get back to my van and was in so much pain I forgot to put anything on my Achilles. I just drank more water and set off back home where I iced it.

 

I had finished the race in a time I am more than happy with 46 Min's and 1 second, a pace of 9.13 a mile, considering I was in so much pain I think I did very well and deserved a medal

 

So seeing as I was in so much pain I decided to see a sports injury specialist or just a physio with big prices as they should be known. Anyway she said I had been doing the worst thing possible, resting my ankle, so she has prescribed me 1 exercise and 1 stretch for me to do for the next few weeks. She also told me what I had also been fearing and that is me having to lose money by cancelling 2 runs Ive already booked in to do, the Lymm 10k and the Chester half marathon.

So no running for the foreseeable future, just walking uphill which is supposed to be best for me and plenty of stretching and exercising the Achilles 3 times a day, I can do that and hopefully strengthen it enough to be able to run the BUPA Manchester 10k on May 26th.

OH and by the way I beat The Flash so that makes me superhuman !!!!