Monday, February 2, 2009

Four Miles of Recovery

For those of you who don't want to believe that slower is better, I'm the proof today! If you recall, I've been mentioning some soreness that I've had in my back for the last couple weeks. It was starting to be a nuisance - hurt to sit, hurt to lay down, hurt to bend, hurt to move laterally. About the only time it didn't hurt was while running! How do people with back spasms handle it?

So, I was a little hesitant to head out for my run yesterday afternoon. I decided to do the San Diego Creek trail because it has the least elevation gain/loss of my normal running routes. Since Saturday was my long run, yesterday's run was at Recovery Pace, with average heart rate at 65% to 75% MHR. I stepped pretty gingerly at the outset, but by the time a few hundred yards had passed, I felt pretty good. I settled into a pace that kept my heart rate within range and finished the run. I managed a 4.3 mile run at an average heart rate of 73% MHR. And felt good the whole way. I finished up the week with 30.4 miles at an average pace of 10:55. Not too bad.

Now for the best part - my back pain has started to subside! I am feeling much more comfortable this morning. Maybe I was pushing too hard all this time?

3 comments:

  1. Glad you are doing better and were able to get out there and get some miles in!

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  2. That's great, Glenn. I think sometimes an easy run is good for you. My knee was feeling a little squirrly over the weekend and O did three easy mile today and it actually felt better afterward than it did before. That's "active recovery" for you.

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  3. Back muscles can be quite mercurial. I used to have mysterious aches that were only relieved by running. Of course, you can't run all day and eventually I started seeing a massage therapist to work out the kinks. It worked!

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