Two days off did wonders!! On Tuesday Meg and I went in for our cortisone shots in our left feet....man those things are painful. I must admit that this doc is really good at taking his time with the injection and keeping the pain to a minimum. He is a former collegiate track middle distance runner and really relates well to the things Meg and I are going through. My injection continued to hurt worse than normal on Wednesday morning so I took the day off. Part of the reason I took the day off was because we just got our new computer from Dell and I spent half the night setting it up and getting it up and running. Foot continued to ache on Thursday as well and I took that day off too just as a precaution. Needless to say I was ready to run again today and it was a great run. The first thing I noticed was I felt none of the usual little pains (other than a very small ache in my cortisone foot). The back and hip are feeling better and my breathing and heart rate were very much under control. I was very comfortable for the first six miles. Meg ended her run at six and I continued on to do 8....kinda to make up for the two missed days a little bit and kinda because I felt so good. I decided to step up the pace for the last two miles to sub 8:00/mile and was very surprised at the ease with which I was able to run sub 8. After getting back to running over the past four weeks I think my fitness is about back to where it was before my back and hip injuries that started at the beginning of August. I wish I had another couple of months to train for St. George but I will have to be satisfied with being healthy and able to attempt the marathon at all. I feel so much more prepared and healthy this year compared to last year when I was suffering from shin splints/stress fractures and nagging knee pains for the entire 26.2. I am excited to see what I can do even it is going to fall short of my original goal of 3:15. I will be satisfied with a sub 4 and would like to attempt to push it closer to 3:30 but that may be a little far fetched. Great weather this morning. Temps were 65 and there was basically no wind. Too bad St. George will be at least 20 degrees colder than that at the start. | 