Jay Johnson, the Boulder-based running coach, has an interesting blog post on Nike's running site, called "Training Like a Toddler."
No, it doesn't involve a Big Wheel or Legos. It's about how his daughter scraped her nose and was fine that day and the next, but that the stress of the incident caught up to her 48 hours later. Johnson then goes on to compare that to the stress the body feels 48 hours after a particularly hard workout.
It may explain something I'm going through right now.
I ran a 20-miler on Sunday at near-marathon pace. I felt fine during and immediately after the run, had a little DOMS later in the afternoon but loosened up with a light swimming workout Sunday night. Monday was a planned day off, and I did my usual bodily assessment the day after a long run. Everything felt fine, even my previously pesky sacroiliac.
But then I woke up this morning, 48 hours after the long run, with this weird pain on top (not the side) of my right foot, in the fifth metatarsal area. It was not swollen and did not appear discolored. It wasn't a debilitating pain, more a dull ache.
So I went on my scheduled 6 1/2 mile run and didn't feel any foot pain until I finished and walked back into the house to stretch. It's been sore in the hours since, and I've been icing it.
Strange that I could go to sleep with my foot feeling fine, then awaken with it painful.
It reminds me of a story I once read written by a physical therapist, telling about how a runner complained that he pulled his hamstring just walking down the street. The P.T.'s point was that the runner didn't really injury himself walking; it rather was the accumulation of his stressful training finally catching up to him.
I'm hoping, of course, that this foot thing is a bruise caused by -- oh, I don't know, tying my shoes too tightly -- but time will tell. In the meantime, I'm doing this at work (see below) and drawing weird looks from podmates.
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