Staying Productive On Forced Rest Days
I'm having to take a few days off from running to try and get my legs back in order for training. From the looks of the weather, though, I'm not missing a whole lot.
Don't get me wrong, I love a good run in the rain, but it does take a bit more drive to get out the door when it's starting to get cool out and it's raining. The cold weather is a time that I have let my running lapse in the past and it has always set me back significantly. This year, my goal is to not change my schedule at all due to the weather. I'm lucky since central North Carolina's winters are not as harsh as some other places and you never know when it might be 25 degrees and rainy one day, but 55 degrees and sunny the next!
Through a little bit of research, I believe that I've got a slight pull or something in one of my hamstrings. It doesn't seem too serious, but it's enough that I can definitely feel it giving me problems even on shorter runs. I've had a little trouble with it on and off for about a month, but it flared back up last week, so I'm taking a few more days off now to try and rehab it. I had taken a few days off last week so I went out on a three miler on Saturday to see how it felt. The weather was gorgeous - about 60 degrees and sunny - and it felt really good to be out running again, but within a couple miles I could tell that I needed to take it easy on my injury. I've got a couple exercises to strengthen it and I'm icing it so hopefully I'll be back to 100% this week.
In addition to rehabbing the hamstring, I am using this down time to get more into weight lifting. I used to find lifting far more enjoyable than running, but now it almost feels cumbersome to have to pick which lifts to do, what progression to use, what weight to use, and all that; as opposed to running where all I have to do is pull on my shorts, turn on a podcast, and get out the door. I think the difference cane about once I started increasing my running distance so I was able to get out and run longer with less physical strain. Three miles used to be a chore and now those are the runs that I finish up and am tempted to go out for a round two.
I'm also going to use the down time to work more on a podcast that I'm starting with a few of my friends called What Else Sucks. Podcast editing is a new animal for me so it'll be interesting to get into that, but I always like getting new editing work to sink my teeth into. It's a fun new avenue because these are guys I've played lots of music with and talked to for years and now we're putting that into a more structured and recorded format, although it's very weird to listen to my own recorded voice.
My plan is still to do a more meaty post roughly every weekend, but have some smaller updates throughout the week. This coming weekend, I'm going to post about the things that I now deem essential to my new training routine!