Festive running or not

Wednesday 8.40 miles, Thursday Rest, Friday 7.12 miles, Saturday Rest, Sunday 10.80 miles, Monday  5.97 miles, Tuesday Rest, Wednesday Rest, Thursday Rest, Friday 13.26 miles, Saturday Rest, Sunday Rest, Monday 3.17 miles and Tuesday Rest =>  48.72 miles

Well I hope everyone had a happy Xmas, I know I certainly did. Running had to give way to real life at times and I did not get in as many runs as I wanted, but Hey Ho Ho Ho! One sad point to report is that I picked up a slight ITB band issue on my right knee when I decided to turn a run into a half-marathon. Here is the story. So I am heading out on a sunny, but cold Boxing day. Feeling relaxed after a couple of days rest I headed out east towards Shoeburyness. It is a good route, even if you do hug the main road for a while. You reach a point on the run where you can cut back and head up towards the High School for Girls, this would give you a run of about nine miles. I decided to head on towards the shore and come back along the beach road. Swinging round at the turn the wind was coming in side ways off the estuary. There will be no headwind on the way back today. At this point around the eight mile mark I was feeling good and picked up the pace a little, even though the legs themselves were feeling tight and my lower back a little sore. By mile ten the head was still good, but my right leg was swinging awkwardly and pain developing in my right outer knee. Any sensible person would have stopped at this point or at the very least slowed down, but not I. Having had a similar issue with my left knee back in March you would think that I would have learned my lesson. The up shot is that during my run yesterday, Monday and after a two day rest at that, the pain began to develop again after a mile. I cut short my run straight away, but as I was a mile from home I decided to slow down and jog home. Slowing down reduced the pain considerably, so I continued at this level and topped out the run at a decent 5k. Last night the knee felt fine, no pain and free movement. This morning it feels a little tight, so I am going to stay off the running for a few days. When my official programme starts in January I will keep to the schedule - low mileage to start with and slower speeds, building up in weeks three and four. In this way I hope that the knee will heal and strengthen at the same time. I can also do some crosstraining to build up, glutes, quads and core. I have to get to the start line in April in one piece and I do not want to defer my place.So with no more running planned for this year the December total is 116 miles. I hope you have a Happy, healthy and prosperous New Year. Here's to 2015.