Run - Ice - Roll - Repeat

I have kept up pretty good on my icing after runs as well as my rolling almost every night. The rolling is getting easier. My IT band is not a tender when I roll on it as well as the quads, hammies, and calves. I think my arms are getting stronger too since I have to hold my body in some interesting positions to roll properly.

Saturday I ran 7 miles with no pain. I went to the Trailbreaker Marathon close to my home to cheer on a few of my friends before they set out on the marathon. I found my friend Dana who was running the half marathon as a training run and we ended up running 6 miles before the half together. It was an easy pace, especially for him, but it was nice to go that far. So far so good on the IT front.

We finished about a half hour before the half marathon started so I was able to see Paul and wish him well. I could not find Amy but ended up seeing her about 200 meters into the race. About a half hour later, I was able to get on a bike I brought and I rode the course to find my friends. It is a mostly out and back course so I would be able to see them on the trail easily. First I found Dana who was running easy. Then I found Paul and then Amy both running well. I continued on and saw Chris who was running the full marathon on his way back. He was running very well. Then I saw Robin who was taking it easy on the course.

After biking ahead for awhile, I turned around and tried to find everyone again though I had gone up the trail pretty far. Suddenly I saw a train on the track that parallel the path about 20 meter off. I knew the tracks crossed the course with just over 2 miles to go so I knew there would be trouble. Turns out Paul was stopped for 6 minutes and Amy for a couple minutes bu they train. Chris got off lucky by a minute or 2. So there was a large bunch of runners stuck including the top 2 runners in the full marathon. I know I would be totally pissed if I was stopped by a train, especially if I had a good time going. After looking at the results of the half, it looks like the train was about 7 to 8 minutes long. There is a gap that big in the results. Let's hope the race director gets that fixed for next year. Every year I ran this event, there was not a train, so maybe this was an unscheduled or off schedule train.

I did find Chris on my way back when he had about a half mile to go. He was feeling good and I cheered him on to the finish. He finished in 4th place overall in 3:18. Another friend of mine, Gerry, finished in 5th overall. I didn't even know he was running. Unfortunately I was unable to stick around to see Brandi finish. I hope she did well. I saw her time but do not know if she was happy with it or not.

Today was a whole different story with my run. After work, I went 5 miles with Mike and felt like I was totally out of shape. I could barely keep a 9:20 pace and felt crappy. This shall pass (I hope).

Keep on Running!!!