Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Blister Cures & Blister Makers

I started to write this blog with a little pointer that I learned the HARD way. I downloaded the following pictures taken just hours after I finished my first marathon last year. You can see from the picture that I had wrapped my toes to keep them from blistering. It might have done the trick, had I not done something else that was INCREDIBLY STUPID.

I went to the Running Store and bought a new pair of socks the day before the big run. There was some smooth talking kid in there who steered me into the store's own brand of fancy colored and high tech looking socks. I remember telling him that I only run in dual layer socks and he assuring me the pair he sold me were dual layer.

Well, I had butterflies in my stomach and could barely sleep, but knew I would do good with my new socks!




And there you see the result of changing something up the day before your marathon. So fitting, I remember about mile 18 hearing the Annie Lennox song, "Walking on Broken Glass" come on my iPod. My feet felt like they were on fire, but I had no idea they were actually bleeding into the dermal layer. Oh and by the way, I lost 7 toenails by the time I finished that marathon last year.

LESSON: Never change anything that is working for you before a big run! NEVER!

The pics above show the damage. And upon further inspection, the socks the 19 year old sold me were not dual layer socks. They were pretty, but they were not the dual layers that I had become used to and that kept my blistering to a minimum.

So the original reason I wanted to write this blog was to reach out to you if you are experiencing repeated blisters on your toes. I have a little added problem that the #4 and #5 toes on each foot have been surgically fused. I was born with them curved under and it was a mess to run on curved under toes. I had a horribly painful surgery at 30 that straightened them out - only problem is they don't bend anymore. So they are prone to blister.

So after last year's experience, I decided to experiment this year with Silicone Toe Caps. You just place them over the complaining toes and they are actually protecting my toes from blisters! So far, 273 miles and not a single toe blister! Here's what they look like:



I will never go on a run again without my toe caps. No blisters, no damaged toenails!


Here is a little picture of my foot from today- no damaged toenails, no blisters!

So that was what this blog was going to be all about. Silicone toe caps and how they can prevent blisters. But events of the week went from good to BAD to WORSE to well, ok I guess, and so the blister chapter had to be expanded.

Back to the fused toes. All is ok except for toe #4 on the left foot. It was actually fused incorrectly, pointing down instead of straight out. So every time my left foot strikes the ground, the #4 toe actually hits first and because it does not bend, it takes a lot of force. It is always somewhat swollen and tender, but I have just lived with it. This year I decided to go see a Podiatrist to see if there were any options to ease the pain in #4 Left.

I saw a guy who immediately prescribed orthotics to lift the balls of my feet and get that toe out of the way when that foot hit the ground. I was freaking out due to my previous experience with just changing the socks in my running shoes. He assured me I would be so much happier and comfortable with custom orthotics. The thought sounded so good... a 16 mile run coming up and reduced pain...?! Who wouldn't have signed up? But I was serious with him that changing something so drastic could only result in sure disaster. He reassured me and off to the orthotic lab I went.

They plastered my feet and 3 weeks later I had my custom orthotics. Eager, I put them in my shoes and walked around for one hour the first day. Awesome! No toe pain! It had been 18 years of constant pain. Day two, 2 hours of walking around... my heart was soaring. Day three, I could not help myself. I took them for a little easy 4 mile run - 44 minutes.

Mile One - I was singing out loud! My heart was full of joy and I was running with NO PAIN! I was as happy as I have been in a long time! I could hardly wait for Saturday and my 16 mile run! Why did I wait so long to consider orthotics????!!!

Mile 1.5 - The left foot was still feeling great, but something funny was starting on the right foot (the one that didn't hurt). A little hot spot on my arch and I figured I had a wrinkle in my sock or something. I pulled on my sock and figured I straightened it all out.

Mile 2 - At my turn around spot, I stopped and took my shoe off for an inspection. There it was, a big blister had already formed on my arch, right at a corner of the damn orthotic!

Mile 3 - Hobbling and increasing pain.

Mile 4 - Intermittent walking and crying right out loud.

I was hysterical by the time I got home. I was SO DAMN MAD at myself for thinking something like this would not happen. Here I was on an easy 4 mile run. Now I have a hole in the bottom of my foot. There is NO WAY IN HELL I was going to make my 16 mile run on Saturday. I figured it would take 2 weeks for the blister to heal and then I would be completely out of shape and back to my 10 or 12 mile distance. All in all I just knew this little orthotic experience put me back at least a full month in my training!

So back to the above Lesson: Changes can cause you great pain and havoc. Be careful when you make changes. Even in the care and direction of a foot doctor - intuitively I knew the orthotics would hurt me. But, I ran in them anyway.

Friday I did not run. Saturday, I could not stand it, I got up and wrapped the hell out of my foot with bandages and put on the running shoes. I set out for my 16 mile run and made it to 15. Just so happened the Loving Husband drove by at 15.01 and I saw him and threw in the towel. Jumped in the truck with a throbbing foot and headed home for ice.

So, I am not set back as much as I figured on Thursday, but I am still upset about the orthotic experience. The foot doc and I are going to have a big talk about this sometime soon, but for now...until I heal, I will be running in bandages.

Sunday, October 12, 2008

12 weeks, 10 pounds????

I have been training now, faithfully for 12 weeks. Early on I was really watching my calorie intake and by week 6, I had lost 8 pounds. Then nothing. By week 12, I had lost 10 pounds. So if I had been a little more careful on the calorie intake, I would have been rejoicing in a minimum of 12 pound loss and perhaps as high as 24 pound loss if you go by the rule of no more than 2 pounds per week.

So there is only one culprit. Eating too many calories. When you run high miles, you get hungry! And you have to watch it, or you get in the kind of slump I am in.

So I have a challenge for all of you. This post is going to be full of your comments because each of you is tasked with putting together a yummy, filling, good for you, 300 calorie meal. This will work for Breakfast and lunch. You may also put together a 600 calorie meal for dinner. The goal is to keep your days at an average 1200 calorie intake. I have been slacking and so my weight loss is very slow. If we are purposeful in our eating habits - weight loss is a no-brainer.

OK, I am going first:

Breakfast: Dry Cereal - OPTIMUM REBOUND by Nature's Path, 3/4 Cup (190 calories) - add - 3/4 Cup Nonfat Plain Yogurt (90 calories), stir it all together and it is quick, filling and good for you: TOTAL CALORIES: 280

Lunch: Fat Free Cottage Cheese, 1 cup (160 calories), add 1/2 cucumber sliced (12 calories), add 1/2 cup Sugar Snap Peas (30 calories), add one diced Tomato (26 calories), add 1 sliced Green Onion (8 calories), add 2 tablespoons GIRARDS Light Champagne Dressing (60 calories) and stir all this together. (Fat free cottage cheese tastes just like the real stuff to me by the way). This is one of my all time favorite meals, I can eat it any time of the day. TOTAL CALORIES: 296

Lunch: Lean Cusine Steak, Cheddar and Mushroom Panini - This is really really really good. I love these things! They are filling and you get to chomp down on bread. Best news: TOTAL CALORIES: 320

Dinner: Beef Tenderloin Filet, 4 0z (that's a decent size!), broiled or bbq'd (260 calories), this is for lean meat, obviously a fatty piece will have higher calories and fat content. I chose the Tenderloin as it is my favorite cut of meat, but also it has the least calorie count in the Ribeye, NY Strip, T-Bone, Porterhouse category. 1 Red Potato, boiled with skin and 1 pat butter (99+36=135 calories), 8 spears of Asparagus with lemon juice squeezed on top (26+5=31 calories), Mixed salad with tomatos and 1/4 diced avocado plus 2 tsps Girards Light dressing (5+26+75+60=166 calories). Okay let's add that up: TOTAL CALORIES: 592

Wine: 4oz-90 calories! YIKES!!! (I am guessing my glass holds more than 4 oz...!)

So you see... this is very do-able!!! We just need to be very conscious of the effort of putting together a meal and not going for the second helpings. So with that being said... I am putting you all to the task of creating a good tasting meal that falls in the right calorie range and posting it as a comment! The more original you get, the better we all eat! Go for it and don't be shy. I have at least 10 more pounds to lose!!!!!! : )

Running update: Saturday Morning, 72 degrees (nice 20 degree drop here in the desert!), ran a great 8, with an 11 minute mile pace. Getting stronger and faster!

It was said that Sweet Nicki might do double digits this weekend...! Nicki!!! Tell us, did you go for it?! We need an update from you!

Sunday, October 5, 2008

Big Wind, Big Scare, Short Delay, Big Run

Friday in Paradise turned into Friday Fright Night.

The story is long so I will try to minimize details, but a delightful day of fishing on the Sea of Cortez ended with not being able to pull the boat out of the water because Arturo's Boat Launcher was broken. Loving Man does not like to leave his much adored fishing boat in the water at night because you never know... But due to Arturo's problema, he had to anchor his boat at sea and swim ashore. Being the smart Loving Man that he is, he threw an extra anchor overboard and tied to it with a second rope. Just to be double sure his boat would not break free.

Me... I am just excited because I am looking forward to a good night's sleep and a great 14 mile run early the next day...

Fast forward to 2:00 am. Big wind storm. BIG WIND. BIG Darkness. Big-Time-Frantic Loving Man. Many trips to the ocean edge with the spotlight to see if boat is still secure and watch BIG WAVES tossing about BIG Boat as if it were a small toy. BIG FEAR of loss of Expensive and much Adored Boat. Big Lumps in stomach. Lot's of pacing until the sun broke and Loving Man and a pal put on life vests and dove in for a swim in BIG WAVES to get to BIG BOAT that is being tossed about BIG TIME. Finally aboard, they were able to get the boat to different facing beach where the Westerly Winds were not making the water so rough. They dropped anchor(s), swam to shore and got Arturo out of bed to weld the dang driveshaft on the Launcher and get the boat back on the trailer and on shore safely. All I can say about all of that, was I feared for Loving Man's life when he jumped in to swim out to that boat. And because he is a smart loving man, those 2 anchor lines saved his boat from heading out to sea... or into the rocks. One of those anchors ended up becoming unsecured during the night. CRAZY!

And there was no way I could slip away from all this excitement and do my Big Run!!!!! : (

So - like all well made plans - I had to re-organize. Big Run was delayed until Sunday. Which turned out to be ideal, because all of the BIG WIND on Friday and Saturday, dropped the temperature and humidity! So I departed this morning at 6 am under cloudy skies with 76 degrees and 35% humidity! At Sea Level!

Had the best run of all of my training days to date! Ran a good pace (for me) - 12 minute mile average, heart rate averaged 144, and not a single car passed me until mile 13.5. My dirt road heads out from the edge of the ocean through pretty desert coastal mountains. While it is an up and down type of run, it probably climbs a net 600+ feet in elevation out to mile 7. So it's uphill for the most part out and downhill for the most part home. I felt great.

And guess what? I just ran a little farther than a half-marathon! Two short months ago I could barely walk/run 2 miles. Today I ran 14 and my legs are getting strong. I could feel the quads and hamstrings pull me up and down those hills. It's great to feel your body working. It's great to realize that following a training schedule actually does what it promises - delivers you to higher levels of fitness. Muscles, ligaments, tendons, heart, lungs - everything is working better than it was in August.

All of that and Loving Man lives to fish aboard his beloved boat another day! What a great Sunday!


Here is the view at the 7 mile turn around~


Here is a bit of the magnificent Sonoran Desert along side my running road~


Click on the pic and make out the light house way down right by the water - that's the finish!


40 miles of dirt road - just think how much running can be done down here!

Friday, October 3, 2008

Fresh Fish Chowder & Marinated Bee Salad

For me, nothing is better than a Friday evening... slowing down the pace of the work week. Cooking something good for dinner and enjoying a glass of big red wine. If you can do that with an ocean breeze and a view of the sea... well, that's about as good as it gets.

For those of you that know me well, that means that Loving Man & I (and the wee perros), have escaped the Phoenix environment and woke up next to the Sea of Cortez at our little Rock House bungalow. The 7 hour drive is daunting to some, but the decompression when I cross the border and the delight of the last 40 miles (all dirt road in the middle of the best display of the Sonoran desert) bring me to a simple life with peace and wonder. The Sea of Cortez never fails to make me feel like a child - delivering dolphins and sea creatures and magnificent sunrises and sunsets. The quiet of a village with no electricity is something rare and something very good for the soul.

That forty mile dirt road is my destination tomorrow. I depart at 5:30 am for a 14. Nothing like running at sea level - my heart rates are a full 10 beats per minute slower - that and a view of the sea is about as good as it gets for a runner - considering no traffic, no tourists, just a desert meets the sea view in every direction.

So let's talk about making dinner. When you start to run long distances, you start to become aware that meals are fuel and there are good fuels and bad fuels and when you train, you need far more of the good than the bad.

Runners need protein. Absolutely essential for recovery of the muscle damage that is the result of every run. My buddy and e-Trainer, (GDC), has told me that after a work out you should ingest protein within 20 minutes. And everyone has heard of Carb-loading. What a mixed bag Carb-loading is! Yes we need carbs for long runs and there are ways to pack them in before a run, but don't be dumb. There are good carbs and bad carbs. Good carbs will keep you feeling good and trim. Lean proteins will keep you feeling good and trim. So skip the fat and the simple sugars whenever you can and concentrate on fuel=performance. Eat only what you need and eat fresh, lean meals. I also like the idea that one glass of red wine is good for your heart - because I love big smelly red wines! : ) But one thing I have learned... more than one glass and I feel like junk and my runs are miserable. So I stick with one. Ok, it is a big one, but just one!!!!

Tonight I have made a stock of broth and celery and onion and garlic and potato. Soon I will add some sherry and milk. And when Loving Man comes ashore, I will finish it off with cubes of fresh fish, cilantro and we will enjoy a yummy fresh fish and vegetable chowder.

And that leads me to my new friend Joanie. You can't help but immediately love Joanie! She is from BAWSTON and has a great big personality that draws everyone in the room to her. She is one of you quiet readers of the the 50isthenew30Runners that read but don't comment! Trust me, she has many in-person comments for me regarding my postings... maybe one day she will overcome her fear of blog-commenting and add her personal experiences on the SPANDEX post! Just to make you all step up to the plate - please comment and tell her she MUST NOW SHARE!!!! I promise, you will be laughing as hard as I was when she told me her stories!

Anyway - Joanie is walking and she is walking crazy miles. Like 5 and 6 mile walks out there in the Arizona Sun. She is liking her change of venue... Boston is so far from Phoenix in so many ways. But Joanie now works for some of the finest docs on this planet - in the awesome area of Endovascular Neuro Research. She coordinates all of their Research Studies - talk about working on the next frontier! And Joanie has bought into our club and has been doing some of the things all of us are doing to reach a healthier place and achieve distances never thought possible.

So Joanie is emailing me as we are driving to Mexico. The iPhone does not let me down and I am connected even south of the border! Joanie is angry with me for suggesting a great quickie restaurant close by her new employment. Seems she ordered an otherwise delightful salad and as she is eating her healthy lunch she finds a bee marinating in her dressing on the tip of her fork! Or as Joanie would say, on the tip of her fawk. ( I know I am going straight to hell for telling this story, but I could not resist!!!) So she tells me how she immediately informed the servers of this insect incident, (I am sure the Boston personality shown thru in great color), and if you can imagine... they did not throw out the entire serving pan of that salad! She was very upset that her decision to eat healthy had cumulated with a Bee embalmed by vinegarette on her fork (fawk). Clearly this would have never happened if she wasn't eating such garden items!

I tried to calm her with my suppositions that bees have medicinal qualities (royal bee jelly?) I am sure I have read that somewhere! Well, bees collect pollen and bees make honey and my guess is those things are good for you... So eating a salad with a marinated bee can't be all that bad... right?!!! She wasn't buying it. I was glad I was heading south on this day...!

Well - the Loving man has returned. It is time to add the fish to the chowder. I must sign off because the little solar powered kitchen is smelling so good... I can't wait to eat. It's time for fish chowder and fresh tortillas... and a good night's sleep for tomorrow's big run. I'll let you know how it goes.

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Being smart & saving $!!!

There are benefits to following this blog! Not only are you learning some cool facts and doing something good for yourself... you now have the opportunity to SAVE MONEY!!!

It is smart I guess to run with some ID when you are out there on the streets of this crazy world. If you are like me and you put your Driver's License in your pocket, chances are it is in the washing machine when you are searching through your wallet at the airport to get your boarding pass. I know of at least one of my running friends that has also done that, so my guess is this is one of those little hassle factors of running.

Hassle solved! Go to www.RoadID.com and you will find all kinds of cool ID's that you can customize to put contact phone numbers, words of inspiration, cute etchings - and they come in all kind of formats. Necklace (that's what I got), bracelets, anklets, etc. I have my loving husband and my little brother and their cell phone numbers listed on mine. Plus a cool daisy. Here is the best news: It is a nice father/son company with a great story and they are really friendly and funny when you place an order. They also told gave me a COUPON ID so that I could pass it out to my friends for a little discount! How about that?! A whole buck off!

So here it is: ThanksCj409143 Get yourself a comfortable ID with lots more info than your Driver's License and leave that in your wallet where it belongs!

And tell Ed that CJ sent ya!