tough choices

To run or not to run.

I woke up to go on my long run.  I didn't feel like going.  But I went.

However, as soon as I started I felt a little niggling pain in my right calf.  It didn't really go away, and I decided to run for two miles and see how it felt.  After the two miles I stopped, stretched a little, and started running again.  It still felt a little sore, so I decided to head back home.

This was a tough decision.  But basically it comes down to if I want to get injured or not.  I think I'm training at too fast a pace, my body isn't ready for it yet.  I need to slow it down and not injure myself.  I want to keep going, I want to try my best, but I need to hold back a little.  I know a lot of people will push through the pain, it wasn't too bad and kind of subsided when I ran.  But if I stopped, then restarted the pain would start again.  I asked myself, who am I competing with?  The answer: Myself.  And I can't beat my old self if I get injured.

Sure, I wanted to hit 30 miles this week.  But I didn't run yesterday, because of the same little pain.  I am happy with my choice of not running.  I think I will take it easy this week, and then ramp it up again.  I haven't really had a cutback week yet, so I think it is what I needed.  I still have four weeks until my half marathon, so there is plenty of time to run!

My splits from this mornings four mile run:

Split	Time	Distance	Avg Pace
Summary	39:15.7	4.00	9:49
1	10:09.5	1.00	10:10
2	9:56.0	1.00	9:56
3	9:37.6	1.00	9:37
4	9:32.6	1.00	9:33

This run was still tough, my legs were a little heavy (plus that small pain).  I started out slower as I thought I might be running up to 12 miles.  I'm happy with it though.  Not all runs can be perfect.