Thanks, Gordon, but it is fine. Part of the purpose of this site, and this thread in particular, should be to learn from one another, including any mistakes that we may have made.
I guess I should start off by saying it is probably hard for any of us to be objective about these things and that we don't want to find fault with our own decisions and we have obviously likely already convinced ourselves of the appropriateness of those decisions at the time we made them, or we would not have made them in the first place. So take the following with that grain of salt.
As to the 4%s, I do not think they have anything to do with my issues. I don't think the front loading had anything to do with them either, but I suppose that is a closer call. I suspect that, to the extent that either of these issues could be tied to just one thing, it would be the additional work I did in the days following the 15k (a brisk 18 miles the next day, then 10 miles the day after that). Most likely though, it is just the cumulative toll of a long and high volume training cycle on a middle aged body with unique mechanics.
Looking at each issue separately:
The tendinitis is something that I originally whined about on this thread way back in the fall. It came and went, but had started creeping back up more significantly a couple of weeks before the 15k - I had actually gone and seen a podiatrist about it back at the very end of February, having set up the appointment in mid February. So neither the 4%s or the last peak mileage week leading into the 15k were the cause of that issue, although I suppose that heavy volume week itself could have been the final straw on that particular camel's back. But I don't think it was the front loading specifically (but I cannot rule that out either).
I don't know what to make of the hamstring. I have never had any hamstring issues before that I can remember. There were no hints of it at all before the 10 miler on the Monday following the 15k. It felt fine all week leading up to the race, and felt fine during the race. It felt fine on the 18 miler on the clay roads the next day, and it felt fine for 9.7 miles of the 10 miles I did on the following Monday. Right after I made the last turn on the run, about 400-500m from the end of the run, I felt a pretty significant twinge in my hamstring and hobbled back the last stretch. Ran 8 on it the next day and could tell it was not right, so I shut it down at that point and you have heard the details since. My best guess there is that one of two things happened: it was simply cumulative fatigue from a pretty arduous stretch of training, or it may have been caused as a result of my gait being off some from the tendinitis (or maybe a little from Column A and a little from Column B).
So, no as to the Vaporflys, probably not as to the front loading specifically, a less strenuous probably not as to the overall intensity of that entire week, and a fairly likely as to the cumulative stress of the training cycle and me aging.