Week 11: I spoke too soon

Last week's post was all unicorns and rainbows about how good and healthy I was feeling; I should have known it wouldn't last. Last Friday I had another massage; my legs and feet were in good shape but I had a lot of tension in my arms, neck, shoulders and back. Especially my lower back--she found some terrible knots in my sacroiliac joints that almost made me jump off the table. Even so, the next day we ran 5.5 miles with no issues, and then took two days off.

All was fine until after our run Tuesday evening. As the night progressed, I started feeling a little soreness and twinging in my right lower back, just over the SI joint. It hurt a little to bend over, and it ached to turn over in bed.  (I have had this pain before, though never while training for a marathon; it has always resolved on its own within a week or so.) Wednesday morning it was a little worse, but I stretched and iced and the pain abated. I noticed throughout the day that I felt worse after sitting for a time than I did walking around, so I decided to attempt the run. Lo and behold, I did not notice any pain at all while running! After I stopped, however, the achiness returned, albeit to a lesser degree. I continued with my stretching, icing, and foam rolling.

Wednesday night I slept much better and woke up feeling pretty good, though over the course of the day the twinginess increased. I decided to run again, as long as I had no pain while running, and again, I was fine aside from one or two twinges. We had driven to do a run with a local group, and as soon as I sat in the car, everything seized up--I felt it in my lower back, my hamstring, my hip flexor, and my inner thigh. As soon as we got home, I walked around for a few minutes, and everything relaxed and felt better. I was very glad I had Friday off, and was prepared to take the weekend off if need be.

Friday I felt better, and Saturday even better---but the pains never completely went away. I continued to ice and roll and stretch through Sunday, still unsure if I was going to do the scheduled run of 3 miles. I felt good enough by Sunday evening to take the chance; we went slow and while I did feel a twinge or two, a quick reset of my posture took care of it.

Today (Monday) I think I am improved. While my lower back and sacrum still feel sore and a little tight, I do not have twinges or tenderness over my SI joint and I am able to bend over and twist side-to-side without pain. So hopefully this is on the way out.

I have looked into causes for this; they include leg-length discrepancies, a "locking" of the joint, an over-flexibility of the joint, or a biomechanical problem with stride and form. I don't know what caused it for me, except that it wasn't necessarily anything running-related as I have had this problem before in a total couch potato phase....since the activity seems to help, I am planning to keep running through, albeit as gently as possible. I will also keep up the ice/stretching/rolling. I really hope next weeks' post will be more unicorns and less Debbie Downer (waah waah).

Our weekly stats:

Tue  6/12   3.17 miles in 30:20

Wed  6/13   3.07 miles in 31:04

Thu  6/14  3.06 miles in 31:35

Sun  6/17  3.05 miles in 31:59  (I would like to add here that Chris and our eldest son B also ran the Warrior Dash this morning, covering 13 obstacles in 3.8 miles in about 45 minutes. Then he ran 3 more miles in the evening with me, all on Father's Day. Awesome!)

Total:  12.35 miles

Thanks for reading!