Saturday Jan 12, 2008

AM- 42 miles (5:34) Rampart Range Overlook out and back through Manitou (Roclite)

Ran with Kyle and jacked the anterior tibialis in my left shin. That's the short version, I guess.

I woke up this morning and the shin basically wasn't an issue at all, so Kyle and I set out with him planning on 4-5 hours and myself hoping for 7-8 hrs. It was a beautiful morning, so we dropped our long-sleeves right before heading through the Mesas and actually spent a little while later in the day running shirtless. Ah, January in the Springs.

Rampart Range road ended up being a slick, icy, packed snow-fest. Eventually, we just had to accept the slower pace and settle into the rhythm of slipping with every single step. After nearly getting shot up at the shooting range, the road improved marginally with a few gravel patches and the views improved significantly with great overlooks into both Queen's and Williams Canyons.

After almost 3 hours, Kyle and I got to the overlook, ate a gel, packed some snow in our water bottles and then headed back down. Running down was, of course, much faster but with just as frustratingly poor footing. Kyle's Montrail Highlanders seemed to be getting better traction than my Roclites and after a half hour or so I definitely noticed that my left shin was starting to get a bit aggravated and tight.

By time we got back down to the harder packed road by the shooting range I was slipping and sliding everywhere and the shin was getting more and more angry. I thought maybe just the downhill was causing the issue, so Kyle and I parted ways back in the Garden like we'd planned, but when I encountered the next uphill down in Manitou Springs my shin complained in a big way and I simply limped to the nearest pay phone to call Jocelyn to pick me up.

However, somehow Jocelyn and I missed each other and I ended up running the 5 or 6 miles back to campus on the streets; my shin didn't seem to get any worse on the flats, but it was definitely already pretty inflamed. I finished up with a couple extra miles to get my discarded long-sleeve shirt and finally limped back to the Recovery Room for copious amounts of icing.

Needless to say, the shin was swollen and the anterior tibialis tendon was remarkably inflamed. I'll almost certainly take tomorrow off.