No Haliburton ... No Lean Horse ... No Fun ... Injury Update

Okay, I know I promised to post my race report on the Pikes Peak Marathon. Its coming, I am just really slow right now, kind of like in the race itself. In place of the regularly scheduled report is a bunch of other totally uninteresting claptrap. Maybe like me you have nothing better to do with your time and if so I highly encourage you to read on.

Injury has played a major story in the second half of this season. Its cost me time in races and definitely has helped a DNF or 2 along. Turns out that no matter how tough you are or think you are when your body will not work properly you are in for a rough go of it. After a very painful Pikes Peak (more about this in my next post) its become time to deal with this crap.

No Lean Horse
So that meant no Lean Horse in South Dakota for me. Did I make the smart decision and decide not to run this race? Oh course I didn't. Have you not read my blog before this? Have you not gotten a first hand look at my sometimes wonky "its only pain" mentality? Should I repost pictures of my destroyed feet or deer in the headlights expressions during other races?

You might then wonder how I ended up not running at Lean Horse. That answer is simple. They would not let me. Thats right kids I was not allow to register or run. So just how did that happen? Well it went something like this. With a never ending ankle problem and Pikes Peak the weekend before I decided to hold off registering until after I ran up the mountain. Even before I toed the line at Pikes it was painfully obvious that I was not going to run 100 miles at Lean Horse but maybe I could get in 50 miles or 50k.

After finishing Pikes in a state of perpetual limp I though my chances of running at Lean Horse were slim to none. That said we had a hotel booked in Hot Springs so I was still in TBD mode. As the week went on my ankle slowly felt better and by Friday morning a short (like 30 feet) test run was pain free. I knew if I ran any really distance it would start to hurt but screw it, seriously when the heck am I going to be in South Dakota again? I figured I could muscle through 50km on a flat course. I mean I made it 42km on a mountain the week before.

On friday morning we left Deadwood S.D. and headed down Hot Springs with a stop at Mount Rushmore along the way. I figured I would register at package pick up. Honestly I didn't anticipate a problem at all. I mean its not the NYC Marathon for gods sake, its a fairly small ultra. Well I was wrong.

At sometime around 5 or 6 oclock we arrived at the pick up area. I went in, found the person giving out the bibs and asked if I could register. She said she was not sure then asked another guy who informed me that online registration closed on Wednesday. Okay but do I look like I got a computer in my hands here? Seriously you could have knocked me over with a feather at that point. That sound that they heard was my jaw hitting the floor. I mean really is it that hard to take my money and issue me a bib? Really?

In fairness to the race, yes online registration was closed and I really don't know if there was anything on the website about no day before in person registration. Maybe there was. I couldn't find it but I was looking at the site on an Iphone. I have not been able to bring myself to go look again from home. I was pretty disappointed and to be honest just a tad bit bitter about the whole thing. Ultras are usually so accommodating if they haven't hit the cap and I was really caught off guard.

Its my fault that I didn't preregister but that doesn't make me feel any better or any less bitter. That didn't last long though. The next day we headed back to Deadwood for a huge classic car event. Live music, 20 - 30,000 people, restored muscle cars and 2 dollar beers in refillable glasses now what could be better then that.

Okay I lied I am still really %#&* bitter about this but in the end not running was probably a good thing given the continuing Ankle Saga.

A trip to the Doctor
Once home my ankle felt better, until I ran that is. Soon it was more ankle pain and time to head to the doctor because supposedly doctors know stuff. I am skeptical about this but was willing to try anything at this point. After the poking and prodding and xrays and scans there was a small glimmer of hope. No fracture (I was really worried it was a stress fracture), some tendonitis attributed to the injure and a suspected partial tendon / ligament tear.

That means rest should cure all. I can still run as much as the pain will allow.

No Haliburton

In an effort to get this thing healthy again I pulled the plug on running anything at Haliburton. I had though about a slow 50km or maybe pacing but I am trying to be smart. This sucks as I love running Haliburton, its exactly the kind of trail I enjoy running on most of all.

That said I have got to get healthy. The Oil Creek 100 miler is in 1 month and I am worried about being healthy for that. I am also very concerned that I will be sadly out of shape for what is by all accounts a tough 100. My mileage was low to near non existent in August as I recovered from Burning River and battled injury. I don't foresee running again for 4 -6 days and then I will be forced to keep the mileage low. I will try and do some biking / elliptical at the gym but its not the same.

Next up the Pikes Peak Marathon Race Report