Army run Half Marathon race report

On September 23^rd I competed in the Ottawa Army Run half marathon. Now you may ask, “what‘s a guy who avoided serving military service participating in an army run?” Well, not only is this race arguably the biggest half marathon in Ottawa, but it’s also in support of those injured at war, so a great cause to run. Additionally, who wouldn’t be eager to measure themself against the best and fittest of the Canadian armed forces, well, at least of those able to attend?

 In May, I had run a 1:19:35 half on a similar course around Ottawa and this time around I would have the support of my own parents visiting from Sweden and Anais’ recently relocated parents cheering me on towards reaching my goal of breaking 1:19. However, training for the event hadn’t been ideal with me missing just over a week due to a hamstring injury a month before the race. Therefore, much of the preparation was crammed into three weeks, far from ideal, but included a really good 10-mile tempo run a week before the race, which instilled belief 1:19 would be a possibility, but at best a toss-up.  Of course, I was hoping that I would have a “break-through” race and be able to race at a faster pace than ever, but when that has happened in the past there has always been pointers along the way suggesting its possibility and I hadn’t seen any of those so.. I felt ok about my chances and knew that on a bad day I would probably still be able to run around 1:21-22. 

Last time around (in the Ottawa half in May), I had almost missed the start of the race as I was standing in line for the washroom but there was no chance of that happening this time around as we were able to change at Anais’ work located a stone-throw from the start of the race. As I warmed-up outside her office I noticed a huge crowd had gathered at the starting area so I alerted Anais and company that we better head over. Good luck kisses exchanged, I ran ahead into an area of chaos where people were desperately scrambling to get to their allocated starting area through a single entrance in the fence behind a seating area and no one was moving. I was way back in the field, disaster! With three minutes to go to the start I made the decision to turn and run around the thousands of people lined up and try to enter through the opposite side of the starting area, success! Almost noone was trying to enter from the other side so I found myself unbelievably close to the front of the line. And thanks to the nice guy who pointed out an opening in the fence I didn’t have to jump it either. Booooooooooom, the cannon goes off and the race is on! Apart from a guy jogging right in front of me the start went exceptionally well and we entered my favorite part of the course: after a quick sprint uphill on Elgin we turned left in front of the parliament with plenty of crowd support and from here down Wellington to Lebreton it is smooth sailing downhill. The 1^st mile was 5:56 - I was passing others and I felt good. Reaching the barren area of Lebreton flats, the strength of the wind became unpleasantly apparent and I had to push to stay on pace. As I didn’t want to use up too much energy early on, I settled into a decent pace just over goal pace (my goal was 6:02) and I was still catching runners; one in particular I felt bad for was holding on to his taped up hamstring... I told myself to be happy I was able to race today and carried on. 

The wind was gusting and I found myself running undesirably slow around 6:10. I was in no-man’s land, a sitting duck for the enemy the wind to fire at! I needed shelter. There was a group of runners about 100 meters ahead but catching up would mean a significant effort I wasn’t willing to make this early on in the race. The 2^nd mile was 6:05. Mile 3 was pretty much the same, gusting wind combined with some inclines made things uncomfortable. Then I spotted the lead group coming back the other way down the parkway, so I figured the turn-around-point was coming up, and what a relief it was! The 3^rd mile was 6:06, but I had had to push to avoid falling further behind my target and I was mad now! Right then I was caught up with for the first time. “Where did he come from”? Probably caught up with the masses at the start I suppose. Sporting the shirt of a regiment I let him proceed ahead. Mile 4 was a completely different story with the wind in my back. There was another incline on the parkway but it was easy to stay on pace; however, I still felt like I had expanded too much energy to be this early in the race because of the wind. An amazing amount of runners were heading towards the turnaround point on the other side of the road, I just couldn’t believe how many there were, and then I heard one of them cheering me on and I waved back; it was my Anais.  Mile 4 was 5:58, and back on track!

Thumbs up if you're tired

Mile 5 involves turning into Gatineau and passing the war museum with its tanks and aircraft - were there to be a surprise obstacle course heading over the bridge into Quebec perhaps? Land mines? Previously, last year in this race and in the May race, I have always felt good at this part of the course and so too this time, but then surprisingly another runner caught up with me! This one looked like a retired Navy seal, nice! At least he was dressed the part and sporting silver hair. Since he wasn’t running out of range I was intent on not letting him pull ahead. Reaching Gatineau there is a hill and we caught several runners here; mile 5 was 5:59. When we passed a couple of amputees competing in the injured soldier race, we cheered them on. The navy seal pulled a head, but in the hills of Gatineau I felt fast and returned the favour. Downhill I was fast, and I pulled ahead, but there are a few tight corners and mile 6 passed in 6:01. I gathered some strength for the bridge back into Ottawa, but I was breathing a little too hard for my liking now. Reaching the bridge, a guy dressed in orange joined us and there were now three of us. I was pleased the bridge didn’t slow me like it had in the May half, and as we re-connected with downtown Ottawa the support of the onlookers gave me goose bumps and helped carry me up the hill leading back into Ottawa. I didn’t notice at the time, but the first 10k was around 37:30 and exactly where I wanted to be. I was delighted to spot the all-star support of the group consisting of my parents and Anais sister and parents by the National gallery; I waved and smiled. I had told them I would be there at 9:40am and I was right on! Here, we turned a corner and headed downhill and out of the downtown core towards Rockliffe park. Mile 7 had passed in 6:00 but I was starting to feel the hint of a side pinch. “Just bring it to mile 9, then your almost there”, I thought.  

To conserve energy for the miles ahead, I let my foot off the gas a bit during the 8th mile and allowed the others pulled a head. By the Rideau falls there was a huge gust of wind, but because this stretch was mainly downhill it still clock fast at 6:02 with average pace now at 6:00. The funniest thing occurred here at a water station when a woman yelled “only half way to go now”…Thanks, but not true!  During the next mile I caught a couple of runners, including the navy seal, but it also covered some smaller hills and my pace dropped to 6:09. I then spotted the 14 km sign and it was a real sucker punch: I had done all this hard work up to this point already and there was still 1/3^rd to go!? Being in mile 9 sounded much better than 14 km out of 21! Here, the seal tried to surge ahead during a downhill stretch, but I responded once more..”This is it, it’s time to go”! I picked it up a bit to 5:50 pace and pulled a head. I saw some familiar faces and felt strong, “I can do this”!  Then I returned back over the falls and there was the wind again, and a hill… A water station was coming up, did I need a drink? Last second I decided to grab one but it was awkward and I lost my stride and the water tasted like it was from a war zone. Mile 10 was 6:01 and right on target, but I had slowed down the last part of it.  I was catching another runner, but as we closed in on downtown and turned a corner, a gust of wind made him appear to be moving in slow motion, yet, I wasn’t  getting any closer..In fact, the entire part through downtown seemed uphill and into the wind. Someone yelled “great form, looking strong”; I thought, “liar”.  It was tough now, I just didn’t seem to be able to go any faster than 6:15.  Near the end of mile 11, which passed in 6:14, the parents were there to cheer me on again; however, this time I couldn’t afford a wave…With their encouragements I tried picking it up once more, but I was soon back into the 6:15 rut.

Runner 11935 has a 1:19:35 half marathon PR

 Along the canal, the cheering turned scarcer and the wind picked up when turning the corner along Colonel By towards Pretoria bridge. The cheering actually turned pretty loud once more around this point, that is when the navy seal caught up with me again… I finally reached the bridge and got out of the wind but there were only negative thoughts now, such as “Never again a half”… I laugh at it now, but I was in pain and unable to go any faster. The navy seal had pulled ahead and I knew I had missed my target of 1:19. I probably could have pushed a bit harder here, but I knew the seconds of difference wasn’t going to make any meaningful difference. I closed in on the finish and saw the timer counting up towards 1:20. I sprinted all I had the last few 100 m and made it just under in 1:19:56 and 20th place. I was greeted by parents after the finish line, me disappointed but still feeling good.

I really wanted to run sub 1:19, but sometimes you just can’t will yourself to reaching goals. Then again, I question how much I really wanted to run faster in the end: I most certainly could have pushed harder and through the pain the last mile but knowing my goal (of sub 1:19) was out of reach I saw no point of doing that. Evidence is the pictures of me near the finish - I look tired, but not dying tired. When you don’t meet your goal you have to feel disappointed, no matter knowing that achieving the goal would only have brought you to 17^th place rather than 20^th..I lost about 40 seconds over the last 3 miles, a classic half marathon “collapse”. I was only 20 seconds slower than my fastest half, so pretty much the same really, and not at all entirely sucky.   Today, I feel like I made the right decision not to break myself as training since the race has proceeded exceptionally well, while after the half in May I needed a break. I suppose not meeting my time spurred me on to keep training hard, and it’s been going well, so well I signed up to compete in the Ontario Half Marathon Masters Championships ! But that story deserves its own post. Thanks again everyone for supporting me during the army run!

Brooks haunted house & Half Marathon training

When shoe manufacturer Brooks parked a double-decker bus down the street for me I just had to check it out, kinda looked like they converted a carnival/fairs ground haunted house into some kind of promotional gimmick, nice! There were some people sitting by a table, who promised prizes if I gave them my name and address. Sure, stop by to clean up our place any time! I won Run happy sunglasses. Finally I will be able to act like a serious runner running in hi-tech sun glasses..not really, just cheap dollar store shades (Anais says they look like classic Ray bans). Well, at least now I have a new pair to match Anais’ new pair; she just had laser eye surgery and now has to wear sunglasses when outside and when sleeping. I was a bit concerned as now she would be able to really see what I look like but she hasn’t left me yet so it’s ok. Actually, she is “working late” right now, so maybe I take that back…

Who is brave enough to enter? Me that's who!

But here I was in front of the Brooks haunted house bus and then I noticed there was a pair of My Little Ponies on the table of prizes so I inquired how one could win one? I was informed you could not but that they would consider exchanging for a really cool toy. Since I was on my way to the grocery store I offered a plastic bag I had brought with me and pointed out that “it’s a great toy for kids to play with”...They weren’t convinced of its value so I had to reinforced it, “it’s full of air, after all that’s what runner need, isn’t it”? At least they thought that funny and offered me a free gait analysis. This will be fun. So I entered the bus, up the stairs, signed a waiver and onto treadmill. After a brief run my feet were shown on a television screen and it was pointed out to me there was an angle between my foot and my leg of about 172 degrees when landing (as opposed to 180), therefore I was pronating and promptly recommended to run in the beefiest shoes available… terrible conclusion and a very lame gait analysis. I was told my feet were bending but I sure couldn’t see it, not even in slowest motion; in fact, after landing on the treadmill my feet looked surprisingly stable with no inward bending after foot-strike! At least to the guy’s credit he said to stick with what I currently use if it works for me.  “Run until you can’t run no more” was his advice... One thing to come out of it was that there was no difference between my right and left foot in the foot-to-leg degree regard, which I thought there might be. I’m not sure if the foot-to-leg degree really is of any importance. Indeed, when you run your foot should land close to under the centre of your body and consequently your leg will not be perpendicular to the ground, hence the deviation from 180 degrees between foot and leg as noted by the Brooks gait analysis… 

Meanwhile, Half Marathon training has been going really well since returning from injury, with plenty of speed, distance, and speed combined with distance, yet no hamstring or knee pain at all! The only blemish, a blister under my big toe nail..ouch!  That’s what happens when you run this much (in chronological order):

Wed 12.5 miles. Long run along canal (Campus, Mooney’s, Dow’s), felt very good, no feeling of hamstring at all.. pace, a speedy 7:06 average. 

Thu 5.5 easy on tired legs.

Fri rest

Sat 13.0 Long steady-turned-temp run of 8.8 miles: 6:22, 19, 19, 23, 26, 44 (Hog’s back hills were killing me), 28, 26, 18.. very tough in the end, but this is promising. Route is a simulation of Army run half (Rideau to Hog’s back, to Arboretum/Dow’s).

Sun rest, another day off to make sure hamstring is ok.

Total: 38.1 + 1214 = 1252.1

Week 25

Mon 12.6 Afternoon run on Labour Day; deceptively hot (29 Celsius, “feels like” 33), I felt over-heated early on and planned on cancelling the 3 tempo miles I thought of doing at the end of this long run. Included 1.1 of fast running at mile 9 (it just happened) 6:15-5:55.

Tue 5.8 in the rain..felt nice to be running when almost no one else were, and Cannonball cool-down did the trick afterwards (plus planks).

Wed 11.1 Fartlek: 8 x alternating 0.6 miles ~½ mara goal pace (ave 5:57), 0.4 miles ~6:50 pace. Hot and humid evening run, so I was very pleased. “Rest” segments were difficult to keep up towards the end, but the final one I even managed to step it up for some 6:20 pace..felt very good afterwards. One year ago I was doing tempo runs at 6:50 pace!

Thu 2.7 Easy run before dinner at Anais’ parents to rid of tired feeling in legs.

Fri 10.6  Tempo for 7.5 miles: right on target! 6:02, 03, 02, 00, 5:59, 5:59, 6:01, 5:55. Caveat being I took a break jogging over the locks by Arboretum @ mile 5… right now keeping up the pace for extended periods is mental – get over it! Still a good effort though.

Sat 5.6 easy in the wind but perfectly timed between thunderstorms and heavy downpour.

Sun 13.7 Long with Aaron initially which was very nice, @8-8:30 nice as well for a change, then approximately 7:00 pace until mile 10 when I did a 3-mile threshold run, mile paces: 6:06, 5:53, 5:44. Perfect running conditions, about 17 degrees, overcast.

Total: 62.1 + 1252.1 = 1314.2 miles

Week 26

Mon Rest

Tue 9.2 Intervals: 3 x 2 miles, 2:40 jog in between, 5:50 min/mile pace average. Good stuff.

Looking back at this I notice that almost every other run has been over 10 miles, which goes along with my belief fast-paced long runs are perfect preparation for the half marathon. Last week equalled my longest ever milage week, but this week I’m taking it easier with the blister needing some care and the race coming up on the 23^rd… I can’t wait!

The No Race report

Last week I strained my hamstring during a speed session. I quickly put on my doctor’s outfit and prescribed myself some rest, about a week I thought should do. Problem was the Xerox 10k race was only 3 days away and given how well my training had been going until the injury I badly wanted to race! I had had no problems walking normally, but a short run the day before the race revealed there was about 99.9% chance I wouldn’t be able to compete the in the race – there was just this dull tightness in my hamstring that inhibited my normal movement . Of course on race day I just had to give the 0.1% a chance. I met up with Anais at home and as we made our way to the Arboretum rain clouds were gathering over Ottawa, some relief from the heat, ideal for running!  However, when I tested out my leg it was clear I wasn’t 100% - jogging felt fine and perhaps I could have given it a go, but chances were that sometime during those 6.2 miles the hamstring would have given in and all I would have accomplished was additional weeks off running… so, no race for me.

Part of the Xerox 10k race course map. First one to crack the tree numbering code wins a prize! I hung out in the recovery area, but there was no miraculous return from injury this time...

Oh, well. What's a race in the Arboretum? After all, I suppose it would be frightfully dull, and..and..and boring, and..and completely... completely  wonderful! But enough of quoting Cinderella -I was fine with not running in the race.  In fact, seeing so many people race made me happy inside and cheering Anais on was fun. Perhaps there was indeed a Cinderella in the park that night. At the bustle and hustle at the start someone lost their shoe..and it was Anais! If my shoe had been stepped off by someone else I would have been angry and possibly quit, but Anais carried on as nothing had happened, impressive! The race was three laps around the park so I got to cheer Anais on three times – the same number of times as I got to see her during the NY Marathon last November…great memories! I hope one day Anais will be able to cheer me on during a NY Marathon, but right now that seems far away, but I digress. It was the perfect evening to race in August: overcast and surprisingly mild. In the end, there were a bunch of runners who finished in the 35-37 min range, so I bet it would have been a lot of fun to have been involved, but my lack of discipline left me injured. This day, however, I was disciplined as it turned out a good decision not to run. More importantly, when was I going to be able to run again? After all, a hamstring pull is a tear of the hamstring muscle, not just a discomforting, aching muscle due to training. A quick look online suggested anything from running through the pain (which was also heavily opposed by the majority) to 4 weeks off with no running for a mild hamstring strain. Luckily, I found the real answer in my favourite book. Yes, now that I wasn’t running I found myself with some extra time on my hands, and I managed to read and best of all water color the street in front of our house (or let's face it, a very limited portion of it).

So my favourite book, Anais simply refers it as “the green book”, is formally known as The Secret life of Tony Cascarino, and a great (soccer) book!  Or as the reviewers put it: “Compared with the standard-issue footballer’s autobiography, this is Tolstoy” or simply “It’s a lot more interesting than David Beckham’s”… yes, it’s that good…Anyhow, in this masterpiece, pro-footballer Tony Cascarino pulls his hamstring during a game of tennis, plays a game of soccer three days later but he was not OK and likely aggravated the pull and ends up missing another week and a half due to the injury. Not to tout my own horn, but I ought to be in at least the shape of an Irish footballer in the top British beer-infused league of the 90s (book spoiler alert: Tony Cascarino wasn’t really Irish but got away with it and became one of the country’s most capped players).  Therefore, about a week or so off running and then back on track, I thought. A week never went by slower, but there were benefits. I felt fresher. Now a week later and two runs post-strain, it seems like I really made the right decision. In fact, during my week off my right foot made a complete recovery from the sprain it suffered during the “insect attack incident” (previously, after runs, it felt dull and numb and I was favouring it a bit during sprinting, which probably led to the hamstring strain). So something good came of all of this, and I’m rested, healed and with a few weeks to go until the half marathon there is every chance I can still have the best race possible. After a couple of regular runs, focus will be on race pace and long tempo runs from now, exactly the type of work-outs I enjoy, and focus, focus.

You’re such a good listener (not)

The nice thing about running is the more you run the better you get. The caveat is the more you run the more likely you are to get injured. Finding the right balance seems to be a juggling act. You could also say the more you practise anything the better you get, it’s just that in running your improvement is so easily noticeable and likewise measurable (for example, being able to run longer, faster). The same cannot be said about soccer (aka football). During my soccer playing days I very seldom thought of training as something that would make me better. Instead it was the necessary evil which allowed me to be in the starting eleven the next game. (This is not completely true as once in Sweden I missed a full week of practise only to be thrown into a new starting role and because we won the game I pretty much kept my spot until the end of the season). I think the one time I really thought I learned something from practising soccer was when I was playing for Nanaimo United in the top division of the Vancouver island league. The coach was great, but he was of the old British school and made us do all these intricate long ball exercises. I never knew there were so many ways of practising the long ball tactic and it was a lot of fun! Take that, Spain! I’m sad to say, however, that there were many times during my soccer-playing days that I almost wished I’d pick up a slight injury so I could skip the next practise. Now, during my fledgling running days I would hate to have to miss training due to injury. Quite frankly I would try to run through an injury.  

According to Swedish marathon champion and favourite blogger Fredrik Uhrbom, runners are always hurt one way or another, sometimes you have to tough it out and get it done and eventually the pain will disappear. I remember being hurt last year, developing what I think were shin splints. A painful ball developed on my lower leg, I tried to ran through it but when it became so bad I had to stop during a run I took a couple of weeks "off" when I only ran sporadically. When I picked up training again, the ball was smaller but still there and although it didn’t hurt while running, I would feel pain afterwards. I kept running and soon enough the swelling had subsided and there was no pain. Perhaps the injury had healed sufficiently during the light weeks of running, but it’s hard to argue with Uhrbom when something like this occurs and I've heard a lot of people with very similar experiences... but really, listen to your body; by running regularly you’ll know what is serious and what is simply a blemish or muscle soreness. The problem is of course to differentiate between the two. That’s why I say, forget about the intervals, the long runs and all the other types of training we do to improve our running, the most important aspect is to learn to listen to our bodies. 

The Xerox 10k through this park is coming up next week..hopefully I can participate uninjured. Photo: Government of Canada, used with permission.

My shin splints occurred in August last year so I’ve been fearing what August had in store for me this time around.. that popping sound when bending my knee surely must develop into runners’ knee soon, I thought.  Instead, the more I’ve been running lately, the less I’ve noticed it. Then came the ankle sprain scare….Tried running on it, and it worked! Because I’ve really been enjoying my running lately I thought I’d keep on running while carefully monitoring how I felt physically every day, and now 13 days later, I’ve run 13 days in a row since!  I’ve been going by the 20-minute rule: even if you don’t feel completely up for a run, start one and see how you feel after 20 minutes, then make a decision to go home or keep running, and I’ve felt great after 20 minutes every time. Not that I’ve had a problem with not feeling like running, training has been going so well I’ve been raring to head out the door each day. I’ve been feeling fresher than ever after a hard workout, which I speculate may have something to do with me getting used to running every day and therefore requiring less time to recover between workouts. I feel like I know when I’m beat and need a break from running and I haven’t felt like that. 

Recently, focus has been on speed, including fast hill-repeats of 300m, the Fartlek I’ve mentioned before (now extended to five cycles of 4:30 min on and off and faster pace ~ 5:40 pace) and 8 x 800m at 5k pace, 1:30 rest. During the latter I managed to hold 5:30 pace but was that ever tough. I thought about calling it quits after 6 repeats citing excuses such as it is hot out, six is enough, but I kept telling myself when it got tough that "this is the last one" and it worked! I think the same attitude could be applied to long runs if the running gets tough in the final miles. Luckily, I haven’t really had to do that during long runs, but I think I could benefit from running further more often. Therefore I ran 14 miles the other day and I felt great as I handily found a pace just below 7:00 towards the end. I just didn’t want to stop, not even to take a break for water. During that run when passing a couple of friends on bikes one of them said “Wow…You’re being over-taken by a jogger, I’m going to post this on your Facebook”.  I told him “I haven’t passed her yet” as the friend decided to play along and sped up to race me but then slowed down allowing me to pass.   

Naturally, it would have been good to take a pre-emptive day off before fatigue set in, but when you’re feeling this good it’s hard to stop and as I entered my 13^th consecutive day running a break would probably have been wiser. Additionally, I broke the 20-minute rule; I wasn’t feeling good after 20 minutes but seeing it was the weekend and not running on a day off would seem like a waste I kept at it after all… Ironically, I had just been thinking about writing a post about the benefits of hill running over speed-work to avoid injuries. Here, I was blasting through a 12 x 400 m session at 5:00 pace feeling Bolt -fast when my hamstring tightened up. Now I’ve iced it and it feels pretty good the day after so we’ll see. Hopefully I’ll be OK to race the Xerox 10k among the trees of the Arboretum on Tuesday. Either way, I’ll come back smarter and stronger. If I can race, I just hope that all the hill training will have paid off, but that will have to be the subject of a different post.

99 km no problems

Dududu-didudu dududu-didu…. Ah, the Olympics, what a great motivation to run (that was the music from the Olympic medal ceremonies by the way). I've caught a fair bit of the action, even waking up at 7:30 to watch the women’s marathon yesterday. I've really enjoyed the action so far. If you missed the distance races, here is what an analyst had to say about the women’s marathon. Interesting I say, but it’s worth noting that the runner who didn’t wait for things to happen, Mary Keitany, finished outside of the medals in 4^th. I’m looking forward to the men’s marathon on Sunday. A Kenyan will win, but there’s a chance it could be too cold like the Stockholm marathon and then anything can happen...

Check out the ruffles... I accidentally grabbed Anais shorts in the morning and had to run with them for 16 miles... They are comfortable.

  After the 10-miler a couple of weeks ago I set myself the task of running faster. It appeared to me as of late I’ve been scared of breathing hard during my runs so I intended to change that. SO after a 5-mile run the day after the event, I should have been sore but wasn’t, I did an 8 mile progression going from 7:30 to 6 min mile pace over the course of the run. When I hit 6:30-15 pace it seemed like I couldn’t run any faster but then I pushed just a little harder and voila a managed around 6:00 pace for the last two fast miles. It was like I needed to break through a wall and once I did 6:00 pace was no harder than 6:15 pace. So don’t be scared to push the pace this summer for a few miles. The week of the race was a 40 mile week with 6 runs.

With the big race in September now in sight I decided to make myself a training schedule for the next few weeks. It was time to push the envelope just a bit and I made an attempt at running each day of the week, which I’ve never done. I did tempo intervals, sprints or strength routines after easy runs, hill-repeats, a long medium-fast run to build stamina, and a 16 mile run. I also set a goal for this training period to make sure I do the little things. By that I don’t mean drinking raw eggs and running slalom around street signs like the guy in Run fat boy run, but rather:



a) making sure I eat a fruit or something little within 15 min of my run
b) doing my stretches after each run
c) consistently doing strength work and
d) not skipping a run because “it’s only a short run and it doesn’t really matter if I go or not”.  With that in mind, I went for a short run the day following my 16-mile run and I’m glad I did. The long run was harder than I thought it would be but now all other runs seem so much easier. The week concluded with an 8 mile run with Anais and I had done it - ran every day of a week for a total of 99.8 km (or 62 miles) and without any pain or fatigue. I kept going into the next week before taking a break after 10 consecutive days of running.

One of my favourite runs was a fartlek run of four times alternating 0.8 miles at near 10k pace with 0.8 miles of slightly faster than average pace (for me 6:50 pace), which works “speed-endurance”, basically meaning how long you can run at a faster pace such as during a 5 or 10k race. The key is not to completely recover during the slower part of the workout. As always, I include about 15 minutes of warm-up before and cool-down of easy running at a very comfortable pace after the run. I’ve had a real pep in my step as of late resulting in a short, fast, relentless stride - it’s almost like speed-walking. Speaking of which, I noticed that the winner of the 20 km Olympic speed-walk event, well, “ran” just a tad slower than my pace during the May half-marathon..

So everything was working out quite nicely, back in shape and ready for weeks of preparation for the half, when on Saturday I went for a long run with Anais. Two miles into the run I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my lower leg and looked down and saw some large insect attached to it, possibly a hornet, which had stung me. During my runs I’ve been chased by dogs, attacked by birds but this was the first time I had suffered an injury...in the process I dropped our water bottle, stepped on it with my other foot and twisted my foot awkwardly. I was in some discomfort but toughed it out and completed the run. The insect sting was alright, but later that night I could hardly put weight on my other foot and was thinking the worst… Even though there was minimal swelling it felt like a sprain. I quickly looked for examples of similar injuries on-line and uncovered that ex-Toronto Raptor Vince Carter, famous for being out extended periods with ridiculous injuries, once had missed two weeks because of a foot sprain, which greatly instilled hope I wasn’t going to miss much more than maybe a week of running. I applied ice and elevated my foot to help with the healing. In the morning it wasn’t much better, I was limping, but as the day went on I felt stronger and the next day I could walk without any discomfort..what  a relief! Today I ran 5 miles no problem, strangely fast recovery.