Injury Delimma

Turns out falling down the stairs while marathon training isn't the best thing that can happen to a person. I'm still battling my poor little knee injury 5.5 weeks after falling. Brilliant. To say I'm behind on marathon training would be an understatement.

The big question now is, can I still run the NYC marathon or am I too far behind to actually do it? And if I have to back out, what race can I run that is reasonable? Either way I still need to raise the money I committed to raising for cancer research so I need to find something to train for even if it isn't NYC in 2011. The "good" news is that if I have to defer my 2011 NYC entry I can run in 2012 which while less than ideal is better than nothing.

Truthfully I'm pretty disappointed about the whole thing. Turns out I kind of enjoy marathon training. Who knew??? Now if my knee would just hurry up and heal I'd be all set!

Guests

So this past week has involved playing hostess to one of my favorite people in the world, my cousin and her step-daugher. While I will admit things have been a little crammed from time to time, overall it's been really fantastic having them here. Really makes me wish I lived nearer to my family! If only my family could live somewhere better than Indianapolis...but I digress...

I always love when people are here exploring the city. It inspires me to do so as well, which quite frankly is a good thing because left to my own devices I can be a little lazy about exploring the city I love so much. Sometimes I think I take it for granted because it's right here and so easy to access that I don't do as much as I'd like to. In fact, many of my "30 before 30" goals are around doing things in the city. I suppose I should post those goals here too in order to keep myself accountable! But I'll wait until after the summer goals are done

In other news, I ran again yesterday without pain! That's four pain free runs my friends! Very exciting here. The sad news is that I've absolutely lost some of the endurance I've worked up over the past few months which has filled me with doubt regarding the half marathon and the full marathon. But I've reached out to some various people for advice about this and am hoping to come up with a plan to get me back on track.

I'm planning to do a long run this weekend (8-10 miles) to see if I can truly run the half marathon next weekend. Wish me luck, I'm nervous!

Doubt

Doubt is what happens when you spend weeks 11-14 of your 27 week marathon training plan sidelined with a knee injury you sustained falling down the stairs.

Let's face it, I was always nervous about my ability to train for a marathon without getting injured. But being nervous about not being able to run and actually not being able to run are two very different things. I've gone from ramping my way up to 18 miles a week down to two 4 mile weeks, one 10 mile week and one 11 mile week.

My longest run to date is 11 miles and that was FOUR weeks ago and I'm supposed to run a half marathon in two weeks. Something about this just doesn't seem right.

I'm not even entirely sure how to ramp back up into running and training for the marathon. I can't just go back into the plan I was running can I? That just screams injury to me. But the plan I was following was really conservative, and running any less than that plan screams not going to actually finish the marathon to me. Neither option is one that I like very much.

Summer Goals Update #4

Another Friday (opps...Saturday!) update on my goals...

I've included my updates in colors:

Green = success

Blue = plan

Red = failure

I'm going to be changing a few goals/combining some for next week too and moving those that are complete from the week before to the bottom...

Fitness Goals:

1. Run 3 days a week, follow my half marathon/marathon training schedule 100% - Weeks 5 - 66%, missed 0ne run due to knee, but should be back at it three days a week from now on

2. Cross train 3 days a week (yoga, swimming, elliptical, strength training, etc.) - Week 5 - done! FOUR Local Barre classes, one treadmill (incline walking) session and lots of walking

6. Stretch regularly and use my foam roller every day - Not every day, but most days!

7. Combining goals 3/4/5 into one goal - Attend 40 sessions total (local barre + bootcamp + gym classes + swimming + elliptical) Week 5 - 5 more sessions down, 26 to go, probably a pipe dream but I'll keep trying!

Health Goals:

2. Log food into myfitnesspal.com every day - week 5 - Yes!

3. Stay at or under my net calories for the day 6 days a week - week 5 - 6 days!!

4. Experiment with vegan cooking, purchase 2 vegan cookbooks - need to find another cookbook

5. Stay away from meat as much as possible - chicken nuggets one day, otherwise no meat

Personal Goals:

1. Take more pictures - took more pictures of Petey, which is something

2. Blog 5 days a week and post pictures most of the time - 3 posts done, I think 5 may have been too ambitious (same!)

3. Do one more big purge of junk in the apartment and take stuff to goodwill - purge is done, just need to go to goodwill

5. Petey, training - find a local trainer we can work with - did find a dog walker, but still need to find a trainer

6. Read Harry Potter Books 1-7 (new! started on book #1 yesterday) - Done week 5!

7. Download and read books recommended to me for "self improvement" - Downloaded in week 5, just need to start reading

Educational Goals:

1. Purchase Rosetta Stone French once computer is fixed and spend time learning French - Got through lesson 2, I'll take it

2. Watch Damodoran's Corporate Finance Class in it's entirety - haven't watched one class yet

3. Start playing the piano again (find a new teacher?) - haven't done anything with

4. Start playing the flute again (find a teacher?) - haven't done anything with

6. Review the level 1 CFA books - found a friend I can borrow them from, now just need to actually get them (same status)

Completed Goals:

4. Fix computer before the warranty runs out - Check!! DONE in Week 2

1. Set up bi-weekly massage appointments at Massage Envy to help with my hip/leg tightness - Done in week 4!

6. Take and track body measurements every two weeks - Done in Week 4! Will track every other Monday

5. Read Joyful Wisdom - Done in week 4!

So in some ways I feel like I'm doing really well, staying under my calories, working out, etc. But some things I'm sucking at majorly, like say goals 2-4 of my educational goals? Uh probably not going to happen. I knew going into this that not everything would get done, so I just am going to focus on being proud of what I've accomplished so far and see what I can accomplish in the next three weeks!

4 Weeks...

4 weeks left until I rejoin the working world. Time is flying. It's funny because on one hand, a 4 week vacation would be a very long vacation indeed, but when looking at 4 weeks as the amount of truly free time I have left it feels like very little time! I guess it's all about perspective.

I'm hoping that these last four weeks will be filled with running (am currently still sidelined due to my knee, awesome), gym workouts, local barre workouts (my new favorite obsession!), healthy food and time with friends. Oh and many many hours spent on the beach.

I'm also REALLY hoping that I get to run the half marathon in three weeks from yesterday, but am starting to doubt I'll actually be able to. My knee is still giving me trouble and I finally broke down and went to see a physical therapist and paid out of pocket since I don't have insurance. He doesn't think I did any serious damage, but he does think that the damage I did do could take some time to heal. And he also warned me that running before I'm ready, and running too much could do more damage and put me on the sidelines even longer. So I'm doing the delicate dance of resting enough to heal but not too much so I don't lose all of my endurance thing right now. It kinda stinks. But it could be worse right?

In other news, I LOVE Local Barre. I bought a groupon back in May for a place called Local Barre in Hoboken and I'm hooked. I'm truly terrible at it but I love it. I'm hoping I'll be a bit better at it once my month is up. I'm also hoping that it helps me with my poor posture and my weak glutes (two things it promises to do.)

Summer Goals Update #3

Another Friday (opps...Thursday!) update on my goals...

I've included my updates in colors:

Green = success

Blue = plan

Red = failure

I'm going to be changing a few goals/combining some for next week too and moving those that are complete from the week before to the bottom...

Fitness Goals:

1. Run 3 days a week, follow my half marathon/marathon training schedule 100% - Weeks 4 - 66%, missed 0ne run due to knee :-(

2. Cross train 3 days a week (yoga, swimming, elliptical, strength training, etc.) - Week 4 - done! Two Local Barre classes, one elliptical session and lots of walking

3. Go to the gym a total of 30 times to get the most out of my membership - 1 more time gone, 23 left to go

4. Activate my Local Barre Groupon and attend at least 10 classes (will help with #2!) - Done! And have attended 2 classes

5. Activate my Boot Camp Groupon and attend at least 5 classes (will help with #2!) - planning to do next week (same)

6. Stretch regularly and use my foam roller every day - Not every day, but most days!

7. Combining goals 3/4/5 into one goal - Attend 40 sessions total (local barre + bootcamp + gym classes + swimming + elliptical) - Status as of this week - 31 sessions left to go

Health Goals:

1. Set up bi-weekly massage appointments at Massage Envy to help with my hip/leg tightness - Done in week 4!

2. Log food into myfitnesspal.com every day - week 4 - Yes!

3. Stay at or under my net calories for the day 6 days a week - week 4 - 5 days, I'll take it!

4. Experiment with vegan cooking, purchase 2 vegan cookbooks - need to find another cookbook

5. Stay away from meat as much as possible - zero meat in week 4

6. Take and track body measurements every two weeks - Done in Week 4! Will track every Monday

Personal Goals:

1. Take more pictures - FAIL, need to do better with this

2. Blog 5 days a week and post pictures most of the time - 3 posts done, I think 5 may have been too ambitious

3. Do one more big purge of junk in the apartment and take stuff to goodwill - still on my to do list

5. Petey, training - find a local trainer we can work with - did find a dog walker, but still need to find a trainer

6. Read Harry Potter Books 1-7 (new! started on book #1 yesterday) - Just started book 6

7. Download and read books recommended to me for "self improvement" - still on my to do list

Educational Goals:

1. Purchase Rosetta Stone French once computer is fixed and spend time learning French - Got through 1 lesson, need to do more

2. Watch Damodoran's Corporate Finance Class in it's entirety - haven't watched one class yet

3. Start playing the piano again (find a new teacher?) - haven't done anything with

4. Start playing the flute again (find a teacher?) - haven't done anything with

5. Read Joyful Wisdom - Done in week 4!

6. Review the level 1 CFA books - found a friend I can borrow them from, now just need to actually get them (same status)

Completed Goals:

4. Fix computer before the warranty runs out - Check!! DONE in Week 2

4 Pain FREE Miles!

After Sunday's running debacle I've been a bit hesitant to run again so I took two days off to let my knee rest and hopefully keep healing. I did hit three miles on the elliptical on Monday and have done about 7 miles worth of walking between Monday and Tuesday, but no running. So today was a test to see how I'd feel and I'm THRILLED to report that I ran 4 pain free miles! And I ran them relatively fast (for me that is!)

Here are the stats from this run:

4.0 Miles

46:11

11:32 avg minutes/mile

149 avg bpm

472 calories burned

Not too shabby! I can only hope and cross my fingers and toes that this is the beginning of getting back on track for me. I've only got 25 more days until the half and this weekend's set back really made me wonder if I'm actually going to be able to run it. Only time will tell.