Three Weeks Till Certain Humiliation

It’s three weeks until the Las Vegas Rock N Roll ½ Marathon and I am pooping one of those small, rectangular units of building material, often made from fired clay, and secured with mortar. I’m shitting bricks is what I’m trying to say.

I don’t know if I’m ready. Or if I will be ready. I’m afraid I’ll make a fool of myself. Or worse, injure myself. I actually may already be a success at that second one.

A few weeks ago, the balls of my feet started hurting anytime I would run over an hour, especially the left foot. Now, the smart, reasonable thing to do would be to not run for over an hour. Alas, alack, I’m not fast enough to complete a half marathon in an hour. Or, maybe even two hours.

So last Monday, thinking that perhaps the newish pain was caused by old shoes, I stopped by the running store and purchased new shoes. New, same shoes. As in, the brand and style I’ve been using for the past two years or so. Mizuno Nirvanas, which are oh so ironically named since there is nothing “Nirvana”-like about either the price of those shoes or training for a half. But, those were the shoes recommended by the running store when they analyzed my gait and whatnot, so those have been what I have used.

New shoes always have the same initial issue: blisters. I’m quite blister-prone. Especially when breaking in new shoes. And, of course, I had blisters on my right foot all last week. But the bigger issue was the continuing ball-of-the-feet pain. And, in the mornings, I noticed my feet would hurt for the first few minutes after getting out of bed. I had tender feet and had to pad around carefully.

I ran 6 miles on the treadmill on Saturday (acquiring this lovely new chafe mark – seriously, I do all kinds of contortions to make sure I get Body Glide ALL OVER and the one place I have never had any issues and therefore don’t lube up, gets chafed.) My feet definitely hurt, but I figured I’d just stretch it out.

I started out on my 10 miler at around 3 yesterday, fortified by a waffle and side of bacon ingested at 10:30 and a celebratory glass of champagne with newly-engaged running buddy Amy at around 2:30. I’ve heard that this is how running dynamo Skinny Runner fuels. Oh wait….she drinks Prosecco AFTER a race, not before? Hmmm.

Sure enough, right around the hour mark, my left foot started to throb. It’s like running on a very deep bruise. It almost feels like a bone spur or something, it’s so localized. And, I’m MILES from home. I have no choice but to keep going, or lay down on the side of the trail like a wimp, which was my first choice, but since it wasn’t that busy (ie: no audience), I had to keep going.

I ran 8 miles, then hobbled/ran/walked the last two. And went straight to the running store. They think it might be plantar fasciitis. I got fitted for some new inserts, bought this cool new spiky ball to massage my feet and spent the evening icing and stretching. Fun, glamorous times at my house last night, let me tell you.

So that’s how I spent my weekend. Anyone else do anything fun?

Also: final note. XFE reminded me that the term “soy sauce” came about the other day after he almost bit it on the exact same two steps while clearing dishes. After almost taking a dive, he said, “whoa, I almost soy sauced.” Which is waaaaay funnier than my lame story. And which just proves that (a) he’s funnier than me, and (b) I’m not really “a revisionist” when it comes to my stories, I just have a crappy memory. Because seriously, why would I leave that out if I had remembered it?