Time off

I guess I hadn't realized how long I had gone without dropping at blog post...

So, I'm not going to recap all that's happened between then and now.  I'm going to fast forward to September 25 and the Berryman Adventure Race.  This is a race I did with Scott, Jamie, and Brandon.  I was ready for this one with the exception of wishing I had a little more mountain biking time on the season.  Of course we know that's normal for me.  We met at headquarters at 6am and were bussed to the start.  Race started a little after 7am.  Trekking/running first.  We hit the first few checkpoints without issue.  We ran into trouble on I think CP 4 and had to do some back tracking to CP 5 then back to 4, then on to 6.  Due to time we decided to skip 7 & 8.  :-(

Next up was a challenge (climbing and rappelling off a wall), then we ran to a couple more check points.  Then a zip line.  After that we hit the bikes for some extraordinarily grueling dirt road hills.  They seemed to go up, up, up - thanks to my one one gear and stubbornness I didn't have to walk.  This was followed by single track.  We made it thought that unscathed (although I was slower than I would have liked).  Canoe was about 13 miles followed by a short jog to the finish.  We crossed the line in 11hours and 19 minutes (still kicking ourselves for the missing checkpoints, but what can you do??).  It was a fun day overall and we finished happy and ready to go again!
NOTE:  I tried to entertain the team by singing random 80's hair metal songs on the canoe - next year I need to expand my repertoire pre-race!

Now, fast forward to 10-10-2010 - the Mother Road Marathon in Joplin, MO.  I trained right.  Going in to race day I felt good.  I did an Adventure Race 2 weeks prior, but I still felt rested.  I had intentions of breaking a PR (4:09).  Race day started out great.  My 13.1 time was 1:55:01.  Up until about that point I had felt good.  I did go out to fast - my first six miles were all 8:30 pace or faster.  I finally got slowed down to race pace.  A little after mile 13 my stomach started cramping up and made it terrible to try to eat anything.  Brady was on his bike with me and he tried forcing me to eat, drink and take walk breaks.  By mile 15 it had gotten hot and I quit sweating.  Bad sign.  I was able to finish - poorly.  Final time was 4:24:08.  Argh.
I'm ready to try that one again already.  Unfortunately my toes haven't been the same since race day.  I guess it's Morton's neuroma, but it boils down to electrical like nerve pain that shoots up through my 3rd and 4th toes mostly when I run or go down stairs bare foot.  I've been diagnosed before and had cortisone shots, but it's been under control for the last couple years.  I took 2 full weeks off of running (still biking) but it was still there when I started running again last week.  I'm looking at new shoes, doing lots of stretching, icing, not wearing high heels and taking ibuprofin as needed for the time being.  A fast 1.5 miles in the 5 fingers yesterday was tolerable.  Planning to try again in the morning - we shall see.  Advice is welcomed.

Till next time run on!