Faking It

I faked my first race today. This entire week I haven't run, I've eaten nothing but junk food, I've taken back up my Diet Coke habit, I averaged four hours of sleep a night, and to top it off, I need to hold onto the railings going up and down stairs because my right leg cannot support me. To that end, I ran a half-mary in 1:32:24 (7:03 pace) today. I was expecting much much worse.

Although five minutes slower than my personal best at that distance, it is also the second fastest half I've ever run and I went into the race expecting to run 1:35 plus. All in all, not a bad race. I don't think I could fake a marathon though. My body was done at about the 7 mile mark. Seeing Liz and Zane at mile 9 gave me the charge I needed to finish strong.

I made two critical mistakes though. I ran my first mile at 6:12 to clear myself of traffic. Horrible idea. I was dead the rest of the race and was never comfortable. Mistake #2, I wore my racing flats. The two blisters on the bottoms of each of my big toes are still cursing at me. It's hard for me to break old habits. You race, you wear the fast shoes.

Speaking of shoes, I just returned from my shoe guy. I bought the new Mizuno Nirvanas for Boston. I'll write a review of them after I run in them for a week. It turns out my shoe guy is also a homeopath. He gave me this ruta stuff. Some herb that helps the ligaments. We'll see if ruta, Bextra, and my upcoming cortisone shot can get me through Boston. I have a feeling that something is seriously wrong with my right leg. The entire leg hurts, not just the ITB. I'm going to have a MRI after Boston and will likely need to take a few months off. It'll be back to the pool.