my foot hurts

Total Distance So Far: 296.0 miles

Group run again on Saturday. We're tapering now, so the distance was supposed to be 12 miles for the Portland Marathon group. My foot has been sore since the 20 miler. Worse initially, but slowly getting less painful. Still, I was feeling it Saturday morning before we stepped off for the run.

This pain is not where my plantar fasciitis is located, but rather along the left side of my left foot (not on the bottom of my foot). Sometimes it feels like a cramp, sometimes it feels like sore ligaments or something, sometimes it hurts like my foot has a hairline fracture... but I do know: it doesn't hurt when I'm not moving my foot or standing on it, and it doesn't hurt when I swim.

On Saturday morning, I decided to just try running on it; See if the pain went away as it warmed up. It kinda sorta started feeling better after 1 mile. But then at around 3 miles it cramped up on me so that I had to walk for a while. Once that sensation went away, I tried running again. Val accompanied me as I ran/walk past the halfway point (where it painfully cramped up on me again). Finally I decided what I was experiencing was lame, and I should stop. Luckily I was able to get the message (via bicycle) to Karl, who came to get me in his car. That was sweet. I called it a day at 7.5 miles.

When I first told Karl I was having trouble with my foot (around 4 miles) he seemed to indicate that I should tough it out. When he rescued me at 7.5 miles he apologized and said the better advice was to avoid injurring yourself further. We are tapering right now, which means the purpose of the next couple of weeks is to recover from that 20 mile run, and heal, and be ready on Oct 7 to face 26.2 miles.

Hopefully I didn't hurt myself too bad. My foot still hurts, but I'd like to imagine it hurts less every day. I'll go lap swimming tonight, and probably also on Wednesday and Thursday evenings this week. Keep my activity level up and my impact on my foot down.

MARATHON IS IN LESS THAN 2 WEEKS!!!! AHHH!