Training and Injury
After the 2002 Portland Marathon, I maintained my marathon condition with weekly 12-13 mile walks and walking 100,000 steps a week. Once a month I got in a longer walk of 18 miles. However, I made a critical mistake in April, 2003 and stopped going to my circuit training class because I was so busy with the Discovery Walk Festival. At that point, my only exercise became walking. This is not a wise thing to do, to maintain balance your body needs a variety of exercise. Walking does not tone the quadiceps, while it continues to tone and build the gluteus and hamstrings. Add to this that I do not enjoy stretching, and it is a recipe for injury.By early July I knew I had a problem - lots of pain on the outside of knee following a walk, so much so that driving home was problem. I consulted internet sites and determined that I had ilio-tibial band syndrome (later confirmed by my sports medicine doctor). I began stretching, icing, and going back to circuit training class, plus treatment massage weekly. By skipping circuit training class, I had cost myself a lot.
The sports medicine doctor said it was okay for me to participate in the marathon, even through pain. Ilio-tibial band syndrome is painful, but you will not tear or permanently injure anything by walking or running through the pain. Instead, you might cause it to flare up worse for a number of weeks. This is not good in training - in training you should stop when the pain comes, but if you must complete a goal event you can continue through the pain.
Training Resumes
And so I was behind on my training by the beginning of September. I had limited myself to 6-9 mile days during July and August, and when I went for the longer distance I did so with pain developing. In September I participated in the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer in New York and I had a good 18-mile day with pain that would come and go but not stay. The next weekend we put in a 17-mile day in heat and I saw the same effect. This gave me hope that if I did feel pain, it might not stop me cold.Marathon Day
For the past year I had done the long walks with a few friends - Will, Nancy, and Rachel. On race day the gals met at my house and my husband drove us to the marathon start, where we expected to meet Will. It is very dark at the start of the Portland Marathon and difficult to find anyone. We checked our extra clothing and got in the porta-john line, then lined up with our pace group. We being a group of short women, we hoped Will would find us eventually.The Start
The start of the race is anti-climatic for the back of the pack. We three gals sang the Star Spangled Banner together, and barely detected any motion after the official gun. We crossed the start line at over 4 minutes into the race. It is awesome to see the 8000 participants ahead of us going down the street. The start is always a bit slow, and we headed out together. One of our Portland to Coast team mates, Krista, was there with her father, Tom. We complimented his red-white-and-blue running shorts and admired his 69 year-old legs. We hung with Krista and Tom in sight for the entire race.After the first mile, I was recalling what Will said he was going to wear when we spotted Will just ahead of us, walking with another of our team mates, Wendy H. We greeted them and passed them, knowing Will would catch up to us later and Wendy would be joined by her son after he completed his fast running marathon.
Next: The Marathon Continues
