Grinding It Out

Yesterday was a pretty long day for me. I got up at 4:45am to do my strength workout before work. Then, at work, I was going full throttle the whole day. My boss has been in Germany the past three weeks, so I've been helping out on his project a lot.

After work, I drove over to Stony Creek for a road ride. The weather report in the morning said it would be a little cool, but didn't say anything about rain. So, I only packed a short-sleeved jersey and shorts that morning. I always take arm warmers and knee warmers with me, so I figured I'd be fine.

It turned out to be colder than I expected and windy (it's always windy at Stony Creek!), and, only a few minutes into my ride, it started raining. Fortunately, the rain didn't last long. It was actually pretty comfortable when the sun peeked out. I got rained on again on my second lap (in a different spot); I got pretty wet that second time. I stayed dry on my third lap. I rode for about an hour and a half, and I saw exactly two other people out riding. Usually, the roads of Stony are packed with cyclists in the afternoon.

After that, I went straight over to Bloomer Park (home of our velodrome) to meet Sarah and her Boot Camp group. I'm volunteering for a "trail run" they're doing on Saturday. So, I thought they were going to talk about the race and what I needed to do, then let the people doing the race scout out the course. I envisioned that I would be mostly sitting on a park bench eating my sandwich. What happened instead is that we all ran through the course. It's been a long time since I've done any significant running, but I ended up putting in almost 3 miles before I bailed because my knees were bothering me. It actually felt really good to get out and run, it was too bad I couldn't do the whole thing.

I did some super knee treatment protocol last night, which seems to have helped. I used my stick to massage my legs (last night and this morning), took a constrast shower and took a couple of ibuprofens. This morning, my knees are still sore, but it's not too bad. Mostly IT band soreness.

Interesting point about the massage. I tend to find a tight spot on my calf (both legs); it hurts like crazy to roll over it with the stick, but my legs always feel better afterward. Anyway, I'm wondering if this point on my calf and my knee issues are somehow connected, but I don't know.