So my foot was feeling better (not 100%, but better) on Saturday and when I walked in my Brooks running shoes (as opposed to my FiveFingers or barefoot) there was no pain.  So I was really excited to get out today and knock out the longest run I’ve done in the longest time (that’s 7-miles to you, me and Billy Joel).

I won’t go into detail about the psychological damage that I experienced on my first attempt.  Suffice it to day that I spent 2.5 hours driving to and back from the place I thought would be ideal to run without getting out of the car.  Further psychological trauma occurred when I finally went out to run on my regular route and had to quit after a third of a mile.

I wore my cushy and supportive Brooks runners, I warmed up well, I was taking it easy, but after a quarter mile my foot/ankle was painful and the hitch it caused in my stride was putting a huge strain on the back of left knee.  So I came back home and eventually pummeled my Self 1 into 30-minutes in the pool and 40-minutes on the exercise bike (70-minutes of cardio to equate roughly to the training time 7-miles at 10 min/miles would be).

I’m seriously considering the potential necessity of taking a full week off of run training to let my foot/ankle recover.  I’m not happy about it but I’m playing the long (short) game here.  Better to heal completely and then get back at it than to hobble along partially healed for weeks at a time.  Monday is a rest day (see the schedule, I didn’t post it for my health), I’ll make a game time decision on Tuesday (which is also a national holiday at work).

Also, this morning before I ran I retested my push-ups: 57.  A 25% improvement.  The plan for next week (and beyond) is to do an old classic “long” workout on Mondays; the old “fast” workout on Wednesdays; and a wildcard workout that varies each week on Friday.  Back at it tomorrow.