At noon today I opted to run instead of lunch. To expedite matters, I ran on the treadmill instead of outside. It has been a long while since I ran inside or outside.
I started at a speed of 9.5, which translates to a pace of 6:12/km or so. Slower than a typical outdoor run, but fairly decent for the treadmill. I quickly realized that this was Too Fast and set it back to 9. I then realized that running at this or any other pace for more than a few minutes was lighting my calves and ankles on fire. I checked my BPM on the watch, and it was rocketing toward 170. I did not like this, so about 3-4 times when my heart rate started to climb, I dropped down to my walking pace of 6.5 and walked for a minute or so until my BPM settled.
Technically, then, this was not a 30-minute run but more like a 24- or 25-minute run. Still, I finished instead of just quitting and eating a giant pie. I consider this a good start to getting back into the run of things.
I returned today to Burnaby Lake and the Conifer Loop, to see if I could find that tree root that will forever mock me, at least until the trail is resurfaced and it is buried under a crushing load of fresh gravel, which it should be. Or set on fire. I’m not fussy which.
As I was approaching from the opposite direction I wasn’t sure I’d be able to find the spot. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to find the spot at all, really, because the trail looks pretty much the same over long stretches. You got your gravel, your trees and other nature stuff. It’s very idyllic and peaceful when your exposed skin isn’t skidding on the gravel part. I remembered a few details, though. I knew it was before I got to the point where the Spruce Loop and Conifer Loop meet, I knew it was in a shaded area and I knew it wasn’t on a corner. This narrowed my search down to a section that was probably still several hundred meters long, most of which looks the same.
But I think I found it.
The shot below is from a “midway to face-planting on the ground” perspective, looking in the same direction as I was running yesterday. That is to say, I took the shot while crouching. The root is near the bottom center of the photo. You will observe several things:
It’s a very pretty trail
This particular stretch of the trail is what one might call sun-dappled. One might also call it a mix of sun and shade that makes it hard to see objects on the ground, especially when moving at high speed
That is one seriously big tree root to accidentally trip on, so I suggest I was dazzled by #1 and ultimately felled by #2
I think when I run on Monday I’m going to skip the optional Spruce Loop/Conifer Loop combo. There are plenty of other exposed roots to trip on (the Cottonwood trail, which stretches for several km, has a bunch of them and in similar lighting conditions) but it seems a little too playing-with-fire to follow up the fall by running the exact same route. Or maybe I’m just paranoid.
No, I know I’m paranoid. Every root will no longer present itself as something to be simply stepped over, but as a potential trip to the emergency room. I’ll think about wearing my fingerless biking gloves to protect my hands. I’ll wear a helmet. I’ll actually run inside a human-sized hamster ball.
Or maybe I’ll overcome my fear by remembering that I completed 448 runs without tripping and falling.
UPDATE, July 8, 2022: I have changed the title of this post from the original of Tree root: 1, me: 0. Credit to Nic Demers.
Run 449 Average pace: 5:43/km Location: Burnaby Lake (CW) Distance: 10:09 km Time: 57:52 Weather: Sunny Temp: 27ºC Wind: light to moderate BPM: 158 Stride: n/a Weight: 159.6 pounds Total distance to date: 3590 km Device used: Apple Watch and iPhone 6
I was concerned about two things today: my right leg and the temperature. As forecast, it turned out to be very warm so I was glad to head out in the morning. Even then it was already 27ºC but fortunately it stayed there for the length of the run.
The right leg started out fine, which surprised me. I could eventually feel it but not until I was more than 6 km in and it was much milder than on Wednesday. I’d say it was of almost no consequence.
Expecting to detour along the sun-drenched Freeway trail, I opted to run clockwise, to get the extra-hot part out of the way first. As it turned out, the detour wasn’t in effect today so I was able to run the usual route. The excavator that trundles loads of dirt or gravel from a location off the Freeway trail and to the Southshore trail once again had a near-close encounter with me as it came off a feeder trail directly toward me. I was faster so ducked by but I swear that thing has a GPS lock on me. It is always right there no matter when I show up.
Despite the heat and much sweating I felt decent as I continued on, never straining or struggling. I encountered a curiously still snake that didn’t move as I approached it. Maybe it was zonked out from the sun? I hopped over and continued on. Around the 8K mark I dragged my left foot once, which is an indication I’m getting a bit tired. This is bad on a trail with many bumps and uneven surfaces (thank you park workers for helping make the trail smoother, safer and sexier), so I made an effort to pick up my feet. This turned out to be an omen of sorts.
As I entered the Conifer Loop I checked the distance and saw I was at 9.18 km, right about what I expected. I continued down the trail, heading toward the Spruce Loop and the final stretch. I was about 500m from finishing (roughly 2-3 minutes) when it happened.
The tree root.
The Conifer and Spruce Loops are side trails and while some work has been done on them (a foot bridge on Spruce was recently rebuilt as part of the current construction/resurfacing), the trails are in fairly rough shape, with lots of ruts, some loose gravel and tree roots poking through.
I have tripped up on tree roots before, my foot just catching enough to cause me to stagger before righting myself and continuing on.
That did not happen today.
Instead, my left foot firmly wedged against a root, causing my entire body to twist to the left. This made regaining my balance impossible. I was going to fall. And I did. The whole thing happened in less than a second. I remember hearing myself let out an “Oof!” and having enough time, somehow, to stick out my left hand to absorb the impact and prevent my face from hitting the gravel. My cap and glasses popped off. I skidded to a stop and laid there on my right side, looking over to the cap and glasses.
I picked up the glasses and they seemed undamaged, so I popped them back on, did the same with the cap, stood up, then without even bothering to dust off, I resumed the run because I was not going to let a spill at the 9.5K mark end my run early, especially if, as it seemed, I was just bruised and a bit battered.
I finished with a pace of 5:43/km, almost identical to Wednesday, and with a lower BPM of 158. Considering the heat and the fall, that’s pretty decent. My slowest km was actually at the 5K mark.
When I hit 10K (and those few minutes getting there seemed to stretch on unto forever because I really wanted to check out what exactly I’d done to myself) I walked over the dam to the snazzy new fountain and used the bottle-filling part to wash off the affected parts: my right leg, my right arm and left hand. I walked home at a brisker pace than normal, had a warm bath (avoiding using the usual Epsom salts and thus also avoiding screaming) then finally inspected my body in detail.
The right leg looks like a bear raked it with its claws, a set of nasty-looking scrapes along the upper half of the calf.
The right elbow and part of the forearm are nicely banged up.
The top of the right shoulder (covered by my t-shirt) sustained some abrasions, though it doesn’t look like the skin broke.
There’s a sore spot on the right hip that will bruise but again, no broken skin because it was under my shorts (the shorts came through fine, just a little dusty).
The left hand has five puncture wounds where the gravel hit. Three are small, though one still had some gravel embedded, the fourth was more sizable and the last is big enough to be kind of grossbuckets.
There’s probably more I’m missing. The bruises tomorrow should look great and sleeping tonight will probably be fun.
I have applied copious amounts of Polysporin to everything.
Overall, I consider myself pretty fortunate. I didn’t sprain or break any bones, I didn’t hit my head, none of my stuff was damaged and on top of all that, I still finished with a decent pace.
I’m planning on my usual run on Monday and admit I’ll be feeling a little paranoid every time I see a tree root peeking above the trail surface. This is the first time in nearly 450 runs spread over the course of nine years that I’ve actually gone down (not counting that stupid dog) so hopefully this was just a rare convergence of circumstances that is unlikely to ever repeat.
I’ll know in three days!
I’ve put three images of “what happens when my body hits gravel at high speed” in the spoiler tag below. They’re not super gruesome, but you may not want to look at them while eating your Cheerios.
[spoiler title=”Scraped and bloodied” icon=”arrow-circle-1″]
The right leg ain’t quite right right now.
Elbowing my way to various scrape and lacerations.
Yeah, just kind of gross, isn’t it? You can even see a tiny bit of gravel still stuck in there. Kids, don’t try this at home![/spoiler]
Run 407 Average pace: 5:43/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Distance: 10.02 km
Time: 57:20
Weather: Sunny
Temp: 23-27ºC
Wind: light
BPM: 160
Stride: 175 strides/min
Weight: 152.4 pounds
Total distance to date: 3315
Device used: TomTom Runner Cardio
The good news is despite sleeping in a little, my first holiday run actually happened in the morning and temperatures remained comfortable throughout.
The bad news was the thing of evil known as my right hip. Never known for acts of great villainy before, it made up for it today, doing its best to topple me.
Yesterday I walked my usual run router and noticed that the right hip was feeling a little sore. I believe this stemmed from sleeping funny and twisting my leg in a way that is sub-optimal, similar to how some people will wake with sore backs. This happened last year then went away. It returned this year and while I have noticed it on runs it’s never really interfered, it’s more something I feel.
Yesterday’s walk was a warm-up, though, because today the hip made its presence known so strongly it completely knocked me off my usual pace. My left foot also started hurting between the 2-3K mark, though it leveled off quickly and I don’t feel it was a factor.
By around 9K the hip mysteriously started to feel much better, so much so that I put on the afterburners to get a good finish in. Halfway through this (with 300-400 m left) the hip did a full reversal and felt like it was on fire or going to explode or something. I had a few moments where I wondered if I would even finish the run. I did and also managed a slow walk home.
I’m not sure why the hip has suddenly gone haywire, unless I’m continuing to sleep wrong. I would correct this if I could stay awake while I sleep but you see the problem there.
I’ll see if I bounce back from this quickly or if it turns into some yucky long term situation.
Other than Hell Hip, the trail was rather crowded today with walkers and joggers out enjoying the nice weather of BC Day. Bonus: no cyclists!
Run 405 Average pace: 5:25/km
Location: Burnaby Lake (CCW)
Distance: 10.01 km
Time: 54:21
Weather: Overcast, a little sun
Temp: 18-20ºC
Wind: light
BPM: 155
Stride: 180 strides/min
Weight: 155 pounds
Total distance to date: 3297
Device used: TomTom Runner Cardio
Today’s run promised to be exciting an ominous. The excitement would be from wearing new shoes, a shiny blue pair of Saucony Peregrine 5s. These are non-minimalist trail runners, though they have a fairly tiny drop of 4 mm (for non-runners this refers to the height difference between the heel and toes; minimalist shoes have a completely flat or 0 mm drop). The ominous part came from the weather forecast warning of possible downpours in the afternoon with pea-sized hail (!) being possible. I’ve run in hail before and am not a fan.
Luckily, despite some morning showers the worst that happened was a lot of cloud cover, with the sun poking through once in awhile. The temperature stayed low, ranging from 18-20ºC so it was pleasantly comfortable.
The new shoes presented two problems, one right away and the other about 3 km into the run. The first was the left foot started to hurt (not much, more just a “can feel it” sort of thing) as soon as I headed out. This evolved into it actually hurting proper around 5 km into the run itself. The second was the left shoelace (which I retied at home several times before heading out) coming untied less than 3 km in, a major fail and huge pet peeve of mine. Fortunately it remained tied for the rest of the run and the other shoe never came undone.
The laces are not braided so I either need to pay more attention when tying them before heading out or consider swapping in some braided laces or perhaps switch to some crazy space age technology to keep them from coming untied, like Krazy Glue.
The good news for the left foot being sore, such as it was, is that it didn’t keep getting worse, peaking almost immediately, and my overall pace was a virtual tie with my last 10K run (also when the weather was not that summer-like, oddly). My previous time of 54:19 minutes was exceeded by a mere two seconds today at 54:21 and the pace managed to get rounded up to 5:25/km, but realistically was unchanged from the earlier 10K’s 5:24/km.
Stamina-wise there were no issues, though the sore foot kept me from pushing. I suspect my time would have been better if my foot had been happier. It will be interesting to see if the new shoes break in or just break my foot. Outside of my left foot they otherwise felt comfortable and had solid traction, handy for dodging the occasional puddle from the morning shower.
I’m officially reserving judgment for now.
I am pleased that despite the foot I still equaled my previous effort, though. Excelsior!
After finishing the run on September 20th my left leg felt sore but I incorrectly surmised it was my shin again. However, while it was a little tender, that was not the issue. Rather, it’s the ankle, which is new. I can still feel it some 12 days later, so I’m not going to be running again for at least a few more weeks. I’ve read that there is a small chance that regular running on a track or oval can lead to each leg getting a slightly different workout and can increase the risk of injury. I wonder if that’s what has happened here. When I do resume running, I am going to try switching direction every other time, so I run counter-clockwise one day then clockwise the next. I may also plan out my first runs away from the park.
Next week, with the ankle feeling better, I’m going to resume my free weights workout in the interim, so all of my other muscles can be sore and share in the fun, too.
An early afternoon run today with the temperature rising from 15C-17C, breezy and about an equal mix of sun and cloud. It had showered hard in the morning so this was the first run in a long time where I had to navigate around puddles.
It was not a very good run, alas, plagued by a number of issues:
rust from five days off
when the sun came out it felt very humid and muggy
my left leg was clearly bothering me partway through
a persistent cramp in my stomach in the second half of the run
That said, I finished at a pace midway between my two previous runs, clocking in at 5:27/km with a total time of 55:03. I ran a little farther than intended because the glare on my iPod was so bright at the end I could not read the display. It also seemed that clicking the menu button did not, in fact, present me with a menu the first few times I tried it. I suspect Apple wants me to upgrade to the shiny new nano that just came out. Total distance ended up being 10.08 km.
The midway point of the run was ‘highlighted’ by a muscle car revving its engine as it went down nearby Glen, causing a car alarm (apparently on the ‘go off if songbirds are present’ setting) to start wailing and it was that car alarm. You know the one, the worst car alarm ever, the one that has four different alarms, each one annoying in its own way. Fortunately the owner turned it off in short order. Or maybe it was an act of God. Either way I was glad.
There was not much else noteworthy on the run. I found a burst of speed for the 7-8 km stretch but the cramps and general soreness prevented me from maintaining that to the finish. I iced the left calf for about 50 minutes afterward and will see how it feels in a few days. The way things have been going I suspect I will be taking another forced break from running. I may look into some kind of cheap physiotherapy, if such a thing exists.
Chart (red denotes running in especially warm conditions, green denotes cramps during run):
