After my last post I was about as discouraged as I could have been. What a difference a week and a half makes. The greatest pluses in terms of making my ITBS manageable I believe have been well timed rest, Motrin, ice... a lot of ice, and my big blue foam roller.
I am definitely a creature of habit and the foam roller is now a part of my daily routine. I wake up, brush my teeth, start coffee, then I start rolling my butt and IT bands on the foam roller. The first couple time I used the roller I could tell how much I needed it because of how bad it hurt. Now I can roll my legs for a few minutes and there is little soreness. To me that is a sign that things are getting better. After I roll my legs in the morning I put it in my backpack to take it to work to do the same thing on my lunch break. I always have to make sure the door to my classroom is locked during lunch because I can only imagine what my students would think if they walked in and I was using the roller on either one of my buttcheeks. Finally one more time before I get in bed and I am good to go. On the days I go on runs I also roll my legs before and after.
I took off 5 consecutive days from running last week and also helped a ton. Since then here was how my week looked...
Sunday - 8 miles
Monday - 4 miles
Tuesday - 6 miles
Wednesday - 5 miles
Thursday - 7x800 meters intervals (Yasso repeats) w/ .25 miles rest in between. Totaled 5 miles
Friday - off
Satuday(today) - 20 miles
After each run I put ice packs on my hips where it is an IT hotspot and I also rubdown my legs with ice that I freeze in a cup.
Today my run was great, despite it raining/drizzling for the first 18 miles. I ran at a pretty slow pace, which is actually what I am supposed to do on my long runs. What I was happiest about the most was that I ran this route over some bigger hills and I felt great running my last mile at my race pace of 8:52/mile. At mile 20 to have something left in my tank, no matter what the pace, I must be doing something right.
Now I am just hoping that my body responds well in the time after, because usually it gets most sore about 24 hours after a run.
Thanks to those of you who wrote me encouraging emails after my last post, I really appreciate it.
Nice work. When you find the blue roller is not enough, move to the black one. It's stiffer. Keep it up!
ReplyDelete