Recovering from a marathon is not as simple as I thought it would be. Although I’ve had only 6 complete days off since Boston I’ve had almost 2 weeks off from hard training. Despite this, my hamstrings are super tight when I begin each run and then my glutes vaguely ache after I’ve been running for over an hour. It has certainly surprised me. I think that because I didn’t run the time I wanted I thought the damage wasn’t going to be as great to my body. False.
So after passively recovering for 10 days I am now back in active rehab mode to get my body back on track. I think after any hard training cycle or season it is important to just let your body recover as it pleases. To me this means no icing, stretching, massage, core, etc. and just letting time and sleep do its job.
Eventually a more proactive approach is needed and I’m back in that mindset now. I’ve already seen a local chiropractor and have a massage scheduled for later this week. I have been doing some self massage with a lacrosse ball (poor man’s Trigger Point) and massage stick. I’m also back to doing the ZAP core routine a few times each week. Here’s what my current set looks like:
BLURG approved core set
Running wise, I did my first moderate workout on Thursday. It was a 20 minute fartlek broken up into varying pieces throughout a 13 mile run. It went quite well as I caught a few of my half mile splits and was running the ‘on’ portions of at our below 5 minutes per mile pace which pleasantly surprised me. I was quite sore the next few days but I think I am moving in the right direction health wise.
Thanks for reading!
Twin Pines turf field in Pennington, NJ where my U16 boys team trains.
Here is my last week of training (5/3-5/9):
Sunday: AM: 10 miles
Monday: AM: 15 miles (10×20 sec post run)
Tuesday: AM: 9 miles
Wednesday: OFF
Thursday: AM: 13 miles (4-3-2-1-3-2-1-2-1-1 fartlek w/in run)
Friday: AM: 8 miles PM: 6 miles
Saturday: AM: 9 miles (8×20 sec post run)
Total: 70 miles, 7 runs, 1 day off