First Big Run - 2024

First big run

Finally after few weeks of Physical therapy, I felt that my Achilles Tendinitis is not as painful as last month. So, I had been doing short runs of 30 mins or so whenever I did not had that pain. I heard about this Busse woods running club, who runs Busse woods every weekend. So I wanted to try them up since January. Finally got chance to run with them. I joined them on March 2nd and went for run. With my training, I had to do more than 11 miles this day, so I was planning to challenge myself for the run.  For the first 2 miles, I was just trying myself to be on zone 2 and talk with the people who were on same pace for zone 2. I was able to talk with them as well as running with them. As the miles started increasing, I found some of the people were returning back around 4 mile marker. I wanted to do the loop for Busse Woods, so I started running. I met Jay from the same group, and he was running decent pace (9 min/mile) pace. After catching up with him and talking about the race as well as the pace, I wanted to check my body if I can do little faster. I started running on 8.30min/mile pace, and Jay was already far back. I run on that pace almost for 30/40 min. I still was not feeling tired, and I think my heart rate was still on zone 2 (before 160). I was really proud of myself to run for almost an hour and still my HR to be below 160. When you run Marathon, you really need to make sure that most of the time your heart rate is on Zone 2. This will give you endurance to run the marathon on decent pace and complete it. If your heart rate goes to Zone 3, you will feel tired and your pace will decrease as the time goes on. 

I was able to complete my 12 mile in less than 1 hour 40 min. I was proud to hit that mark. My plan is to run my next half marathon (on May 5) in less than 1 hour 35 min. Since this was my first outing running outdoor, I feel that I can certainly hit that 1 hour 35 min mark on my half marathon on May 5.

What about the pain from Achilles Tendinitis ? For the last 1 mile, pain on my ankles and knees started to come back, and I was afraid if I have to stop running again for couple of weeks. But those were more sours from running that long, rather than my problem with Achilles Tendinitis. Having a good running shoes with support for your Achilles really helps. Thank you Saucony for providing these quality shoes.