MARATHON TRAINING UPDATE: VACATION EDITION

The last time I was in Corol­la, NC, I’d just been laid off. It sounds bad, but the tim­ing was per­fect. The imme­di­ate after­math was so grat­i­fy­ing. It was the start to the best vaca­tion I’ve ever had. Seriously.

This time things are a lit­tle dif­fer­ent. After a fran­tic week spent cov­er­ing the Demo­c­ra­t­ic Nation­al Con­ven­tion from the com­fort of my couch, I’m try­ing to unwind a bit and soak up some sun and surf. I think it’s working.

Unlike our last trip down here, I’m keep­ing up with my train­ing. It’s been a test. My first run in the swel­ter­ing North Car­oli­na heat was a bru­tal sev­en miles along the side of the road. It was a lit­tle scary, but I man­aged to fin­ish in a lit­tle more than an hour. It’s got­ten bet­ter over the week.

The biggest prob­lem I’ve been fac­ing is the ongo­ing bat­tle with my calves and shin splints. I had the same issue dur­ing the fit club train­ing. I keep tying my shoes too tight and it restricts my range of motion, lead­ing to a great deal of stiff­ness and pain. Worse, it pre­vents me from run­ning nat­u­ral­ly and my gait is real­ly messed up. Now that I’ve sort­ed it out, I hope I’ll be able to start run­ning more com­fort­ably before the Philadel­phia Dis­tance Run on Sep­tem­ber 21!