Breaking the rules

This morning's short run circumnavigated Terrigal Lagoon

A common saying among runners is "listen to your body", but I've never been a great believer in this credo.  Whenever you are training hard and near the edge, you will frequently be tired and have chronic low-level injuries and other niggles.  If you didn't train on the days when these were issues, you would not be as fit.  It would be too easy to rationalise missing sessions.

These days, I almost always struggle for the first 4-5km of a run before I start to feel human, so it is important not to listen to my body or I would rarely run.  Instead, I always know what I'm going to be doing each day for about two weeks ahead, and more importantly, exactly what I am doing the next day when I go to bed.  If you are undecided, it's too easy to change your mind when you get up because of the weather, or someone else's training plan, or some niggle or fatigue

The entrance to Terrigal Lagoon

Having said all of that, today was a day when I broke my own rule.  I set out to run my scheduled 22km but after one kilometre my injured heel still felt warm and somewhat sensitive, though improved over yesterday, and much better than three days ago.  Even though I felt I could have run the distance without setting myself back, I began rationalising.  I have a 42km trail run planned for Sunday to scope out a new trail run for Trotters, and the three days before that were intended to be relatively easy.  If I took it easy today, I would only be missing one quality training session, and then have another three days for the heel to get even better before Sunday.  And the reality is that missing one quality session ten weeks before my target race (Bogong to Hotham) does not matter in the scheme of things.

So I cut my run to 6.5km, have felt guilty all day, and remain fearful that the injury is worse than I hope.  It's affecting my mood, but if I can get through Sunday's 42km "no pressure" trail run comfortably, optimism will return.