50+ Masters Training and Racing Open Forum

I haven't skated in years. But that feeling of not being sure I will make it up the stairs is what I am after.

Hello Masters Mates.

Long time no write (my loss). I just haven't haven't felt motivated to share my selfish injury woes. I do enjoy reading all posts on a regular basis. Thank you to all y'all. I am grateful for the spirit and education.

Raise your hand if you've made it to 30 days without some form of injury from the glutes to the feet? Crickets. Mine has been left side gluteus min/medius which tends to feel like a hamstring strain from the belly to the poplitius back of the knee. Anyone? I looked through my running logs and see this on a regular basis since 2008. the question I have (betting we all have) is "what works to get healthy enough to return to track training and racing?" I maximimize acupunture, massage, trigger-point lacross ball, firm roller, and stretching. Oh yeah im constantly reminded to drink way way way more water to flush it out.

Hope y'all can shed some magic light on healing.

Best to all y'all.

KP

WOW. Can't believe all the posts!!

Reckon it's classic Piriformis Syndrome. All remedies welcome welcome! Thanks. KP

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Week 259

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Greetings, 50+ers! Well, I promised to interact more with the thread last week, and somehow that didn't happen (not that I didn't enjoy reading every word of your posts.) Glad to see some of you folk on the mend and feeling more optimistic. And thanks for the props regarding the race last week. This week, I made it about 33 miles on six days of running. Log read as such:

Sun: 7.6 easy run + form drills

Mon: 3.8 easy (7:52 pace)

Tues: 6.1 Intervals 3x(1200,30s rest, 400, 2 laps jog recovery)

Wed: 4.1 easyish (7:43 pace)

Thur: 5.2 w/1 mile@6:11

Fri: off

Sat: 6.0 progression starting @8, last two @7:00 pace

Was hoping to run all 7 days, but just wasn't feeling it Friday (the afternoon rain didn't help my demeanor.) I'd also noted that from the previous Friday through Thursday, I'd run every day, and logged 40 miles, so that's a first since last fall. Tuesday's intervals are the only real highlight for the week. Under cold and rainy conditions, completed 3 sets all right at 4:44 for the 1200's and 1:22 for the 400's with a 30s break in between the two and 2 laps of jog recovery between sets. My buddies kidded before we started about the 2-laps recovery, but once they got into it, and how hard the 400's were run, they recognized the need for 2 laps. I should add that the 82sec 400s are not feeling as clunky as they did a few weeks back. Glad to get some form drills in on Sunday; still would like to establish a pattern of doing them twice/week; I need to build in the extra time.

@KP--Old Guy II does rowing machine, wonder if that might help. Care to pipe in OGII?

@Hoser, Eh--First, welcome to the thread! Other than the ice hockey, you sound a lot like me, too. I think that you should have no troubles reaching your goals--mindful persistence would be my terse advice. If 5k is your main objective, I personally, wouldn't go long every week (maybe every other week). I would substitute a progression run (or tempo) late in the week and give up on the second rest day afterward. I don't have a feel for how the hockey would play into all of this, though. That's something that you'll have to gauge.

@Mike and Dave--nice races! I know 6:00/mile feels slow to you, Dave, but cold (and coming off a cold) and rainy and unmotivated, seems like it ended up a pretty good day.

@AlanB--there are so many variables one year to the next. Who really knows. Not going out as fast might be a small part, but there are so many other factors to consider--weather, weight, race preparation, etc. (not to mention being a year older)--that I'd be hard pressed to pin it on one thing. Also, I've found that unlike in longer races where I really struggle if I go out too hard, with a 5k it almost always evens out. Certainly I feel better about it if I go out slower and bring it home, but from my experience, if I go out fast and wilt in the third mile, or go out easy and run hard the third mile, there's very little difference in the time (after all, for a 5k, the first mile is already 1/3rd of the race.)

Been wondering how Spikez and Co-57 are doing.

OK, that's more than a mouthful for this week. Hope you've all had good weeks!

All the Best!

KP,

Over the past 2-3 years, I've had a few run-ins with hamstring/glute issues. Until this last time, it was more of a hassle than a big problem, but this last time things came to a head while marathon training back in mid-November.

To make a long, uninteresting story short, I'm just now, six months later, back enough that I'm doing light workouts. And that's not six months of sitting on my ass either, it's been six months of trying different things, getting different treatments, stretches, exercises, you name it.

It sounds like you're already doing the obvious stuff, and I realize my injury probably has slightly different origins than yours, but here are the things that have been helping me that were less obvious.

1. Treating further away from the injury area, in both directions. We had already been treating low back, glute, and high hamstring, but we extended my acupuncture the rest of the way up my back, and we found that my upper back was super tight.

2. Checking/treating for neural tension. You can have your PT help you with this, or you can google it. It's super simple to check and to treat. I know sometimes things like this in the PT world have a flavor-of-the-month vibe that can make you wonder if it's more of a placebo effect, but the combination of this and item #1 above made a huge, very fast impact on my recovery. I still had a long way to go after starting these two things, but I felt like I wasn't even starting to heal until this point. Within a few days I felt like someone had cut a restrictive cord all along my backside.

3. Calves! I have never really had a calf injury, but mine are always tight, most likely because they are doing a disproportionate amount of work when I run. I stretch and roll them every day, but it has never seemed to help much. I read recently in my new yoga book that some of this tightness can actually be attributed to fluid building up in dense calf tissues, and that the best way to treat that is dynamic stretching focused on your calves. I noticed a small but immediate difference when I started doing this type of thing.

I'm doing a whole bunch of other stuff too, but those three things are new this time around.

Nice week lucKY.

KP, I'm an idiot about injuries but I do hear smarter people than me going on and on about ART working for these issues.

Mon = 80 min medium, trail

Tue = Rest

Wed = 81 min hard, Mt Rogers, mostly at 5500 feet

Thu = 82, min medium hard, trail

Fri = Rest

Sat = 80 min super easy hike with youngest son, new trail

Sun = 84 min easy, road

This was vacation week. I planned it to be a down week but it ended up being basically a trail week with some hard running in the mountains M, W, and Th. I had planned to slow down the minute increase but my legs continue to feel strong so I just kept adding minutes.

The highlight was running Virginia's highest peak, Mt. Rogers. Last year I could not imagine running this super-rocky trail but I think I've figured out how to do it safely without a fall or twisted ankle. The wild ponies were out in the upper alpine meadows making it feel like I was in Wyoming. All in all, a great week!

Have a good one folks!

KP wrote:

Hello Masters Mates.

... Mine has been left side gluteus min/medius which tends to feel like a hamstring strain from the belly to the poplitius back of the knee....

l2B wrote:

@KP--Old Guy II does rowing machine, wonder if that might help. Care to pipe in OGII?

First, I made a little progress on my runners' knee this week. 24 miles for the week with 4 miles continuous running on Friday and this AM. So far no greater problem with the knee after that.

KP, I think that I have had something similar on and off for years, but rarely so bad that it has affected my running. I currently had some pain deep in/under my left side gluteus. My best self-diagnosis is some tendonitis at an upper hamstring attachment point, rather than Piriformis. It seems to get a bit worse with increasing mileage or intensity and then settle down after a while when I reach a steady-state training level.

As for my consistent use of a rowing machine (20 mins almost every day) I think that it is good for range of motion and core strength, but I don't know if it helps my hamstring(?) problem much. My gluteus area definitely hurts more noticeably while I am rowing.

My current theory for running injury treatment/prevention is that strength training becomes more critical for almost all of us after age 55. Core work, squats, lunges, box step ups/jumps, etc. are necessary to keep all the muscle groups strong and in balance. I found that after my runners knee flare-up in my right leg, that I was barely able to step up a normal step solely using my right leg. I was primarily using a push off from my left leg to go up. This was from favoring my right leg after straining my right calf at XC Nationals in Dec. I had lost so much strength that it finally affected my patella tracking. I have substantially improved that strength in the last 3 weeks with body weight exercises and am going to move up to doing squats and lunges 2-3x/wk with 25kg weights starting this week. I eventually will report on how that goes.

As for ART as a treatment I have had mixed experience. About 10 years ago I was having some ankle/achilles problems that were not going away. I got a recommendation for a good ART practitioner who worked with several local pro athletes. A couple of treatments with him were like a miracle for improvement of my ankle problems. I saw him again about a year later for a hamstring problem and the treatments didn't seem to have any effect. My conclusion was that ART can be very good for treating joint-focused problems where proper alignment of all the moving parts is the issue, but not so useful where connective tissue inflammation or strength imbalance is the major aspect of the problem.

Over all, I think we need persistence (which Masters tend to have plenty of) and common sense and patience (which we tend to be short on) to work through injuries so we can maintain as much fitness as possible while the healing process takes its normal course.

Good and healthy running to all!

Week 259: 3 hours 7 minutes in 3 runs.

Thu - 30 min easy

Sat - 2 hr 7 min slow (about 11 miles)

Sun - 30 min easy

A bit of a setback this week with the rib. Not sure what I did wrong but on Monday night I could not get comfortable at all. Went for acupuncture on Tuesday and it is feeling much better.

Today the weather was so nice I wanted to do another long run! Managed to talk myself out of it. On my run I was trying to compose some advice to KP, but what I came up with was no better than what you would find in a fortune cookie. Glad to see others had something relevant to say.

Mon. 9 km mountain bike ride with 120 m. climb, dropped bike in the scrub changed shoes then ran 4 km on the steep trails 41 mins with 310 m of elevation gain then 5 km return ride.

Tue. 8.4 km run with the first 4 km on steep terrain inc one section of extremely steep untracked spur line. Last 4.4 pretty fast terrain mostly downhill. All up 300 m of elevation gain. Time 1.00 with last 3 km in 14.37.

Also a 33 min kayak session on the river.

Wed. 16.4 km run 670 m of elevation gain, 1 h 54 min

Thu. 27 km on the mountain bike mostly in the dark 340 m of elevation gain. One rough steep 11 min climb then 4 7 min climbs on a dead end bitumen road in the dark.

Fri. 33 min kayak on the river.

28 min run inc some drills, strides and a 10 min goal post shuttle.

Sat. Easy morning mountain bike ride 13 km 48 min.

Afternoon club 8 km forest handicap race. Hilly. For the first time this year I found a good rhythm early. I was on my own from 1.5 to 5.5 km then started running past the front markers. I hit the front with 1 km to go but got run down by 2 much faster backmarkers on the last uphill. 36.40 which was pleasing. Fastest time was high 31s and he can run 29 on the flat. Also 3 km jog pre race and 4 km post race.

Sun. Morning club 6.5 km forest handicap race, hillier than yesterday's.

The legs felt tight during my 4 km warmup but were fine once racing.

The first 3 km is mostly uphill and again I found that rhythm. I was already passing frontmarkers before halfway. I absolutely buried myself on the 900 metre climb to the last km marker and passed Rhonda the front marker. The last km was hard work knowing faster runners were trying to run me down. I managed to hang on by 16 secs. 29.30. Fastest time was mid 22s by a 3.50 1500 guy. I could barely muster a jog post race.

Well KP I have managed more than 30 days injury free but it has come at a cost. I am 20 plus secs a km slower in my races than I think I should be.

45 miles. Most miles in a week this year by a healthy margin.

Bookended a brisk 8 last Sunday with my long of the year, 9.5, on Saturday. Just outside my door I met a young guy that was on mile 18 of a 22 miler. I ran with him for his last 4. He's running in Grandmas in a couple weeks. Was 1/3 around the local lake and decided to complete the circuit before heading back and without planning it got in my longest run of the year. I was inspired by the guy out running for 3 hours plus.

Somehow managed to run everyday with a 3/6 double on Tuesday.

As you might expect, on my easy 4 today something creaked in my left knee for a few strides and overall the knee feels a little funky.

Business trip to Baltimore on Monday and Tuesday so I probably won't be scaring 45 miles again this week; added bonus I can recover from the pretty hard week and 'taper' for a race. That is a joke.

Planning to do a trail 10k race on Wednesday. First time running a 10k in decades; literally since '82. The course doesn't have significant elevation change but there are innumerable tiny hills, moguls almost, that just strip your momentum. Prior winning times are 39 high minutes, with a 50+ coming in second. Looking for a top 6 in 50+, but really not sure what the moguls are going to do to me. It's a common training course for me and I rarely (if ever) run it below 9 per mile so my goal of 8 per mile might be pure fantasy. I'll coach myself to start with an 8:20 mile. However, I'm not very coach able.

Cheers

Ken

Massive appreciation for all the kind thoughts of my left ass injury. Gotta say yours made me laugh Alan. Seriously... I'm going to get super vigilant on this one as I'm running out of training time for GrandRapids Outdoor Nats. Promise to keep the posting progress going.

KP

lucKY2b wrote:

@Mike and Dave--nice races! I know 6:00/mile feels slow to you, Dave, but cold (and coming off a cold) and rainy and unmotivated, seems like it ended up a pretty good day.

Trust me on this one...6:00/mile doesn't feel slow. I think as I'm approaching and actually looking over that cliff that's looming ahead, 6:00 pace is the new 5:30 pace!

KP... keep on venting. If you can't complain about your woes here, where can you? Sorry but I don't have any advice for you though...

My week went ok...Seems like I was running tired and ragged most days. I did get my miles back up to almost 58.3 which may have contributed to the fatigue.

Looking at my week... Did 10.5 Tuesday; first 6 @ 7:48, last 4.5 around 7:00. Thursday was 5x3/4 w/2 min jog rest...CV'ish pace about 4:25. Saturday was 13 alternating 7:45's and 6:45's. Felt fine thru 10 but within minutes crashed hard on this run... the last few miles felt totally depleted, drained, dehydrated and demoralized. I thought I was properly fueled and ready to go but I apparently I wasn't...

The encouraging thing is I'm coming up on 2 consecutive months of no running injuries. I can only hope this continues...

This week I'm shooting for 63 miles...4xmile reps on Thursday, long hilly run in Northern MI Saturday.

Have a good week,

Dave

Thanks for the welcome to the thread. Hope I can maintain my motivation and get back into things gradually.

Week Two of current phase:

Mon 4 miles easy

Tues 8 x 400m @ 5k goal pace (c.6:28/mile) with 250m jog between

Wed 3.5 miles easy--legs really tired

Thurs rest

Friday 5 miles easy (early meeting and tired legs meant no hockey)

Sat rest

Sun 6.5 miles @ 8:22/mile. Felt good--easy/medium pace

25 miles total. Probably my highest week in a couple of decades. First speed workout in a couple of decades as well. This week I'll cut the miles back a little, tempo Tuesday instead of intervals and hockey Friday, which will meant high-intensity cross training but fewer miles.

I'm following a really basic Hal Higdon training plan for 5k but ideally I'd like to run some 10ks and maybe a half marathon next spring. We'll see.

Does anyone have an opinion of the accuracy of the McMillan Calculator for training times based on race results and such (https://www.mcmillanrunning.com/)?

I look to be in about 22:00 shape for a 5k right now (will race 6/11 if all goes well) and I'm using the McMillan guidelines for vLT for tempos, vVO2 for shorter intervals, and planning to follow the estimated paces for training runs, all subject to how I'm feeling. Has anyone used these before?

Thanks,

Andy

lucKY2b wrote:

Been wondering how Spikez and Co-57 are doing.

All the Best!

Another year older for me and struggling a bit. Last year mostly went well, began and ended great, but had some ups and downs and fatigue in the middle of the year.

After Club Cross in December I took a 2 week break and ramped it up, hoping to do 10-15% more volume than last year. That went okay for a couple of months but my race times fell off fairly significantly (15 to 20 sec per mile, on the same courses). I hit rock bottom with a 7K in early March (6:36/mile), hitting what may have been an all time personal worst. The catcher was not recovering from races or workouts, even when I cut back for a few days.

So after a few months of procrastination I got a blood test in April. It came up pre-diabetic, and very high cholesterol which was sort of surprising sort of not (family history). My diet has been pretty good but not perfect. But I've cut out about all the stuff that are not that great (weekly pizza, daily sesame bagels, almost all red meat, cheese) and replaced that with oatmeal, salmon, whole grain everything, and nuts. Hoping not to go on meds, and the doctor's are giving 3 months of dietary adjustments before making any further recommendations.

Have been feeling much better over the past month, have lost 3-4 lbs, and have not been as fatigued. Recent workouts have gone pretty well. So I did a 5K test-sharpening effort this weekend in prep for Bolder Boulder. Could only manage 6:07 pace. The good news is that it's not worse than over the past year, but based on recent workouts I was hoping for 6:00 or under. No speed, even on the downhill sections I couldn't hold sub 6.

So that's about it for an update.

Greetings from Sunny England!

I've missed posting due to being the group leader for my department's Maymester trip to the Liverpool/Manchester area. In addition to leading the trip, I'm teaching a semester-long course in a two-week time period on a topic totally unrelated to my field. Almost every spare moment of my time has been spent learning about the textile industry and organizing lectures.

I have managed to get in some running in the cool (50's), windy weather and I've run a few times with the local running club. We just returned from a weekend in London where I ran in the mornings through Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens before they got too crowded. Almost everyone asks us what we think about the U.S. election and the hot local topic is the upcoming decision about whether or not to leave the E.U.

My mileage has been down (35-40) and I haven't done any speed work but I've been nursing something going on with my ankles (I can't raise my hand for 30 days injury free). My right ankle had bothered me for the last few months and I had begun PT exercises to strengthen it. Last week, that ankle felt great but now I've goofed up my left one! It's always something!!!

Hoser,eh - I have found the McMillan tables to be accurate for me.

KP - I found that dry needling, a stand-up desk, and lots of hip exercises helped me to heal. Stretching did more harm than good for me.

OGII - I'm with you in thinking that strength training is important. I'm just bad about keeping up with the exercises since I'd much rather be out running.

We're off to the Lake District for a hike tomorrow and then back to the States on Wednesday!

KP- After struggling with nagging niggles for the last 9 years (I'm four years your elder) I am enjoying my most nigglefree Spring in at least that long. Some things I think I am doing diffrent/right (in addition to the bodywork you mention, etc) is 1) I started sleeping flat on my back (due to a similar painful rib as the other poster), with a small pillow under my knees and a twoel under my neck for support instead of a pillow. I've had a number of issues tied to a tight back and this seems to help a lot.

2) I do the triangle and reverse triangel yoga pose relgiously, which really opens up the hips, relaxes the glute-hamstring area and improves my posture. I feel like it really is magic for posterior chain issues.

3) I have transitioned to a low-carb/high-fat diet (yes no beer...well maybe one a week) with intermittent fasting, also with supplements to combat a number of things, especially systemic inflammation. My allergies of two decades are virtually gone and aches and pains generally have abated or disappeared. It also allowed me to get down to fighting leanness without hunger or real effort to do so.

I didn't see you mention shoe rotation between cushioned/minimalist models, that often helps me work around smaller niggles as well.

Well, the KCCC 1/2 was Saturday, and was wonderful weather. My lack of long runs (only 10 and 11 in the last couple months), had me insecure and cautious, so on a tough course, I took it with respect. Ran 2:02:12, for 4th in the 65+. Third place was 1:45, so felt good about what I did, plus I ran equal, to even slightly negative splits (given that my Garmin measured the certified course as being 13.06 miles, and I checked my watch at 6.55 as 1:01:57). Slowest time of 4 on this course, but I felt good enough to run my last mile as the equal to fastest mile. Now to recover, and try to get my piriformis healed, too. Yes, slower and still sore hammies for the last couple weeks! What a birthday present that has been. KCCC 1 mile on June 7, lace 'em up!