One Month Until the Run and Not Having Fun

Today marks exactly one month until the Gold Coast Marathon.  I can't believe how quickly the year is flying by!  Race day will be here in no time - on one hand, I just want it to be here already and on the other, I wish I had more time.

Preparations are practically at a stand-still.  It's not good news on the shin splints.

When I self-diagnosed last week, I had in my mind that I might be off training for a week.  I could handle that.  I would only miss a week, which was inconvenient, but no big deal, as I was pretty much a week ahead with my training anyway.  When a week passed and the pain was no better, I went and saw Doug James, who's a physio and podiatrist at Intraining.  He was excellent - very thorough, very knowledgeable and very kind, and I would highly recommend him to anyone.

Basically, I have a fairly bad case of medial tibial stress syndrome (MTSS), but it doesn't seem to be the extreme end, which is basically stress fractures and would definitely mean no marathon.

The good news is that there is still a fair chance they will heal up in time and I will be able to run the marathon.  The bad news is, I'm still not able to run for about another 10-14 days, and the timing is really cutting it fine.

In my favour, my training and preparation up until now has been super consistent and thorough, and I've done up to 32km, which is the maximum a lot of people do before a marathon anyway (even though my plan was to get to 36km).  But I am a bit concerned about losing fitness - so I'm keeping up with the cycling (which is amazingly pain-free!) and am keen to try some deep water running, which is meant to be an excellent low-impact substitute.

This is not where I want to be one month out and it's driving me pretty crazy.  I'm pretty upset about it at times, but very rational at other times - and if the Gold Coast doesn't happen, there are heaps of other marathons I can do.  I'm so disappointed that after 16 months of running without any injuries, this has happened just weeks out from such a huge goal, which I've been so focussed on for so long.

I am still icing, stretching and massaging - fingers crossed the pain goes away in the next week and I can get back out there.  I don't think I'll get any more long runs in, considering marathoners generally taper for the 2-3 weeks before the race, but at this stage, I'll just be super excited to be back running at all.

I appreciate all the support and advice and words of wisdom I've gotten from so many people - it means so much.  My training may have taken a bit of a diversion, but I WILL be a marathon runner!