Where have I been?

So my blog has been silent since May.  Where have i been?

Last summer I was running a lot of 5k's and posting race recaps after each one.  I was pretty busy.  This summer has been the total opposite so far.  I mentioned in my last post that I was battling plantar fasciitis.  It all started when I was training for the GO! half marathon in April and it was only in my right foot.  When I was running, I didn't feel any pain.  But when I woke up every morning, I found that I was limping the first 5 minutes until my right foot "warmed up."  The pain was just awful, but then it would go away for a while.  At my full-time job I sit at my desk most of the time and I am always cold.  When I would get up to walk away from my desk, the pain would return and again I found myself limping until my right foot warmed up to moving again.  Even when I was working at the gym, I could feel that my right foot felt different from my left and sometimes I would feel a little pain.

When I realized that it just wasn't going to magically go away, I started Googling how to treat it and one of the suggestions was of course "rest."  So this summer, I took a break from running long distances.  I kept a tennis ball at my desk to roll my foot over throughout the day, which seemed to help.  I bought the Gaiam Restore Hot & Cold Therapy Kit for use at home, and I LOVED how it made my right foot feel afterward.  Slowly I started feeling like myself again.  Slowly.

Then yesterday, the Fleet Feet fall half marathon training program had it's kick-off party.  One of my co-workers was also returning to the program and since the kick-off did not include a group run, we decided to meet up before the party to get in a quick run.  We ended up run-walking 2.5 miles and it felt great despite the awful humidity!  When we got to the kick-off party, we met our new pace groups.  This time I opted to be in the 8:1 group, which means 8 minutes of running and 1 minute of walking repeated during the long runs.

I am so pleased with the members of my pace group this season.  We have a gentleman that was talked into running his first half marathon by his brother, yet he hates running.  Several runners who are returning after a hiatus from running and other members who are also running their first half marathon.  Then you have our leader has run 31 half marathons.  So a wide-range of ages, paces, personalities, and experiences and I look forward to training with them and getting to know them this season.

As I look at the training schedule they provided us, I like the structure and how each day is laid out with what to do, how long, and what intensity to do it at.  I can follow a schedule fairly well.  Sometimes I still feel pain in my right foot, so I am still going to continue rolling my foot both at home and at work because I want to get back to running.  I have really missed it!