When I left the house for a brisk 3 miler this morning, I wasn’t sure if I’d be going to Bath tomorrow. By the time I returned I’d decided not to run. I did get through the three miles without hobbling, but towards the end I could feel my right calf tightening and beginning to panic. I wouldn’t make it through thirteen miles.
It’s disappointing, but just one of those things you have to accept. I’ve been lucky with injuries, and this is the first race I’ve had to pull out of, so I can’t complain too much. What’s more constructive is trying to decide how this happened. I can’t help feeling that the final stretch of the Reading Half took its toll. I was tired, but ran those last two miles relatively fast to try and beat my Silverstone time. When I stopped running, I was immediately aware of a pain in my calf, and it never really went away. Perhaps if I’d stretched it a bit at that point, and iced it when I got home it may have repaired itself sooner. But I didn’t. I just need to take it easy for a few days and allow it to heal.
Later this afternoon I went to see Sylvia, the local 10K race organiser, to talk about the future of the race. She’s short of volunteers this year, and minded not to hold the race. We talked about last year’s problems, and how things might be improved. I’m going to try recruiting a few volunteers and see if we can’t guarantee the race this year.
This evening, I thought I might as well take advantage of my injury, and we went out for a great meal at one of the local posh pub restaurants. Mmmmm. Injuries do have their silver lining.
