My St. George Marathon weekend did not start out the way I
had planned.
First of all let me start out in June. Back in late June I notice that my left leg
would go numb after running for only about 2 miles. The numbness would start down in my toes and
work its way up. If I continued running
my entire leg would be numb. Pain would
eventually start in my left glut and the pain would slowly work its way down
until I could no longer run.
I found that if I sat down the numbness and pain would go
away in just a minute or two. It didn’t help to just walk or stand I had to
take the weight off my leg.
I took a couple of weeks and tried running again but had the
same problem. The problem seemed to get
worse I couldn’t stand in a store line without getting the numbing in my
leg. Anywhere I had to stand for a period
of time my leg would start to go numb.
I took off most of the summer. I went out and did two 10 mile runs, where I
stopped every 1-2 miles and rested my leg.
I also did four 5-mile runs. That
was the extent of my training.
During this time I went to two different Chiropractors that
said they could fix me right up. They
adjusted my back and stretched me good.
They charged me $20-30 bucks a time and it didn’t seem to do any good. I
went to a medical doctor who gave me a couple of prescriptions. I filled the prescriptions and took them
faithfully, which didn’t do any good. I
went to a physical therapist who did electric stimulation, inversion therapy,
massaging, etc. These things seemed to
work for a while, but gave no long term results. I was in the same pain when trying to stand,
walk or run.
The next step is to get an MRI I guess.
I would have just skipped the marathon but my wife was
running and we already had a condo rented and paid for.
I took Thursday and Friday off of work so we could drive
down on Thursday. Just as we were
walking out the door, around noon, I got a text from a friend at work telling
me they were having a massive layoff.
Worried, I came back in the house, turned on my computer and
started monitoring my email. About 30
minutes later my boss called me with HR on the phone and I was laid-off over
the phone on the last day of the month.
My health benefits only lasted until the end of the day.
I was just sick, we went to St. George because everything
was paid for, but it made for a miserable weekend both mentally and physically.
The Marathon (this was my 11th St. George Marathon)
I knew it was not going to be pretty. I started toward the back so if I had to stop
and sit on the road there would not be so many people to trip over me. The problem was that I could still run a 9
minute mile, being fresh at the beginning and the people around me were running
12-minute pace. I was weaving and
dodging people for miles.
I made it to mile 3, the first water stop, found a chair and
sat in it for a while, while I stretched my leg.
My next stop was at about mile 6. I stopped to stretch. A friend found me on the side of the road and
we ran for a while. It’s good thing they
don’t do drug testing at the marathon. I
had taken a 500 mg naproxen and some muscle relaxers. My friend offered me a Tylenol 3 – with codeine. I was willing to take anything at that point
to get me to the finish line. Around mile 12 a stranger gave me something for cramps.
I think the Tylenol really helped. I did have to stop many more times, but not
as often as I had thought I would. I had
to walk a lot also, because I was so out of shape.
I finished the marathon at 5 hours and 15 minutes. Compared to last year when I had 3:43. I was over an hour and 30 minutes
longer. It was also the first time being
over 5 hours. It was 45 minutes longer
than my previous worse – a few years ago when I also had an injury and wasn’t
able to train properly. But… I finished
and lived to tell about it. Now if I can
just find a job and get this problem with my leg fixed.
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