Distance: 5.02 km
Weather: Cloudy
Temp: 6ºC
Wind: gusts up to 50+ km/h
Calories burned: 351
Average pace: 5:33/km
Total distance to date: 1080 km
A funny thing happened a month ago.
I completed my run on February 6th and all seemed well. I had improved on my previous time and seemed back on track for a )hopefully) successful year of running.
The day after that run I was walking to the store to get a loaf of bread or BreadQuest as I like to call it. As I walked I felt a funny little twinge around my right ankle. When I got home I poked and prodded and discovered that the spot on my ankle that had been sore — and that I had just taken three months off from running to allow to heal — was every bit as sore as it ever was. Not wanting to risk further injury, I very reluctantly decided to hold off on further running until I could have it looked at.
This time I chose not to go to a walk-in clinic but to sign up with an actual doctor, the same one my partner has had for years — keep it in the family, so to speak. We had a consultation on February 29th and he told me the likeliest cause of the soreness was a small hernia. Unless it gets severe there is no specific treatment apart from icing it and basic monitoring. So I was cleared to run again. Woo!
Today I did just that. It was a chilly but sunny day and also windy as heck, with gusts over 50 km/h. I do not like running in the wind, so I waited until later in the afternoon, hoping it would die down. The good news is it clouded over in the meantime. Wait, that’s not good. As I headed out I quickly realized a single layer was insufficient and came back to grab my jogging jacket and a pair of gloves. The jacket was a good move, the gloves proved unnecessary as my route around Burnaby Lake proved an excellent windbreak due to the copious stands of trees alongside Cottonwood Trail.
The route I took:
- Sapperton to Sperling/Burnaby Lake SkyTrain station. Total calories burned: about 10.
- Sperling SkyTrain station to Cottonwood Trail at Burnaby Lake (approx. 1 km). Walked briskly.
- Cottonwood Trail at Burnaby Lake, north side: 5:02 km.
- Central Valley Greenway to home (approx. 4 km). Walked briskly.
My average pace of 5:33/km was down from my previous run of 5:28 but considering I’d been off for a month, that’s not bad (and better than the run prior to that when I came in at 5:39). At the 2K mark the cramps became fairly bad so I walked them off for 15-20 seconds and then finished the run without any further issue. The legs feel fine now, no soreness or pain.
I expect a little soreness tomorrow. And a good sleep tonight.
My next run will be on Wednesday if all goes well.
Chart:
| Mar 5 |
Feb 6 |
Feb 3 |
|
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 km | 5:02 | 5:06 | 5:06 |
| 2 km | 5:17 | 5:15 | 5:21 |
| 3 km | 5:24 | 5:21 | 5:31 |
| 4 km | 5:30 | 5:25 | 5:37 |
| 5 km | 5:33 | 5:28 | 5:39 |
