When I hurt my foot earlier this year, I got out of the habit of writing weekly recaps of my training for the Rock N Roll DC Half Marathon. There's not a whole lot to write about when you're stuck in a walking boot.

But since the boot came off a few weeks ago, I've been slowly and steadily building my running back up. It hasn't been easy, and I will admit, it's definitely disheartening to have my training be such a struggle these days after it started out so strong in early January.



But at this point, pending some sort of freak injury between now and race day, I will be able to run the half marathon. Judging by how my long runs have been going lately, I imagine the last four to five miles will be a challenge, and I'll probably be relying pretty heavily on my walk breaks, but I keep reminding myself that after my foot injury my goal was just to get myself to the start line -- anything after that was just icing on the cake.

And that I will be able to do.

Over the weekend, I did my longest run of this training cycle, a challenging 9 miles along the water. It was unusually warm for February so I ran in shorts and carried water, which I drained only slightly past the half way point of the run.



My leg muscles were the least sore the day after this long run than they have been in weeks, so I'm taking at as a hopeful sign. I also basically bathed them in Icy Hot post-run, which could have helped too.

I have one more long run of ten miles to do this weekend, and then I will have a week of taper leading up to race day. And then that will be that. I wish I were feeling a little more excited about the race, but maybe that will come next week, once all my training is officially in the books.

So remember how last week I said I was going to simulate all my runs on the elliptical and see how things went with my foot?

I started out last Monday with all the best intentions -- in fact, I tortured myself with 45 minutes on the elliptical that night. It was double-y depressing because we had some gorgeous weather here in DC, but instead of being outside, I was stuck in a basement on an elliptical.



To reward myself for surviving 45 minutes on the machine from hell, I snuck over to the treadmill to test out my foot. Good news, I ran five pain-free minutes! I immediately hopped off the treadmill and was in a much better mood because that's some good progress.

Wednesday's workout rolled along, and I dragged myself to the gym, got on the elliptical and survived for exactly 8 minutes and 32 seconds before I wanted to blow my brains out. I just couldn't make myself stay on that thing for the remainder of the workout.

So I snuck over to the treadmill again and ran for five minutes and then walked for a minute. Then I ran for another five minutes and walked for another minute. My foot felt totally fine. Zero pain!

So I repeated my run/walk sequence for another couple rounds, rounding things out with 25 minutes of run time. No pain, everything felt great. I practically skipped out of the gym.

I did my regularly schedule cross-training on Friday and was making big plans to do my first outside run on Saturday since my injury.

Since my foot seemed pretty healed, and I had stopped wearing the walking boot completely, I wanted to see how the rest of my body held up to some distance after a couple weeks off. I set out to do seven miles, with plenty of options to bail if things took a turn for the worst and with a plan to mix in some walking as necessary.



Everything felt really awesome until maybe mile 4. Then I could feel my form getting wonky because my legs were tired. I stopped and walked for a bit to loosen things up, and when I started running again, I felt pretty good. I was able to finish the last three miles following my run one mile, walk one minute combo.

The next day my legs were definitely stiff and a little sore, but my foot didn't hurt at all.

So here's where things stand when it comes to the half marathon. We are officially 30 days from race day. I just ran more than half the race distance, and if I increase my long run by one mile each week between now and race day (which puts me back on track with my training plan), I will be able to start the race.

The only other major adjustment I'm making is to switch my Tuesday workouts from a run to cross-training. My training plan called for either and I had been doing a short recovery run, but I think it will be smarter to stick with cross-training.

So that's where we are. I'm definitely more optimistic that I'll be able to run the half, but we'll see how things go the next couple of weeks.

Well after two weeks in a walking boot, things seem to be getting moderately better on the foot front.



Last week, I had orders from the doctor to try walking around my house without the boot on. I tried it out first on Wednesday and did not have a good experience. There was still more pain than I thought there should be, and of course, that made me really question whether or not I'd be able to do the half marathon in March.

But then by Friday, things seemed to be a little bit better. I was able to walk around my house bootless without too much pain. So I got ambitious and decided to try my luck on the elliptical.

Shockingly, it went really well. I was able to do about 25 minutes pain-free in my pretty new running shoes (which ironically arrived at my house the same day my mom mailed my walking boot back).



I'm still wearing the boot when I have to walk long distances or when I know I will be on my feet a lot (like to commute to work or run to meetings in the office), but when I'm home, I'm largely going boot-free.

And last night, I went to a Super Bowl party without my boot on and was totally fine. (To be fair, I did not walk to the party, and I spent most of the game sitting on the sofa, so it's not like I was on my foot a whole lot anyway, but man it was just nice to be out of the house in a regular pair of shoes).

So per the doctor's orders, now that I can walk around at home without the boot, I'm going to try to amp up my cross-training to see if I can keep my cardio endurance at a reasonable rate for the next two weeks. I have my follow-up appointment at the doctor two weeks from today, and if all goes well, and I'm hoping to get the all clear to start running again.

So as of now, we're just over a month out from the half. When I (hopefully) get clearance from the doctor to run, we'll be two weeks out. Truthfully, I don't know if the race is realistic or not.

I think if I can maintain and build my endurance these next two weeks, there's a possibility I can still run. But so much of that will depend on how things go starting after my doctor's appointment. I don't know how my foot will react to jumping back into running. Maybe it will be totally fine, maybe it won't. It's all kind of a giant question mark -- which is of course driving me nuts because I'm not really a fan of uncertainty.

I'd like to be able to make it to the start line on race day though -- even if I won't have a perfect race. I don't mind if I finish super slow or need to walk a ton. I'd be willing to do all that. What I don't want is to get hurt running the race.

So that's where things stand right now. My plan is to do what I can to get myself to the start line -- and then I guess we'll just have to see how things for from there.