Runner Confession: Bananas

Bananas. Every runner's best friend. Jam packed with cramp-fighting potassium, easy to grab, easy to eat. Staple of the post-race recovery food tent. No matter what size the race is, you can bet there will be bananas. And sometimes, there will ONLY be bananas.

Here's my problem.

I hate them.

Bananas and I just do not get along. I can't stand even the slightest hint of banana in any of my food. If there is even the chance  that banana may be in a dessert, I generally won't touch it.




No thanks. I can smell the banana.
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Gross.
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Yeah nice try hiding that banana under the ice cream. Still not eating it.
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Just watching people eat bananas makes me feel gaggy. It's not just that I don't like the taste - for some strange reason, eating bananas results in stabbing pains in my lower back. Perhaps I'm not good at digesting potassium? I don't know. But I can tell you that laying on a couch whimpering in pain is a good enough deterrent to eating bananas.

So what is a runner who hates bananas supposed to do? Based on the 5834582 mentions of bananas as the perfect post-workout food in just about every running or fitness magazine or blog I read, this is akin to a fish hating water.

Never fear - Runner's World to the rescue! According to this great article with a funny title (Mmm, Potassium), there are many excellent alternative sources of potassium including:

Apricots
Avocados
Cantaloupe
Honeydew
Kiwi
Lima beans
Milk
Oranges
Prunes
Spinach
Tomatoes
Meats, poultry, fish

I can get down with avocados (guacamole!), kiwi, milk, spinach, and tomatoes.

BUT being the Scotch-Irish girl that I am, my vote for best alternative source of potassium goes to:

Yes, the lowly potato!

Further digging (punny!) into the Runner's World archive led me to the "One Potato, Two Potatoes" article which raises the potato's status to nutritional powerhouse. And I quote:

"The potato is a nutritional powerhouse," said sports dietitian Jennifer Hutchinson of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. "In addition to being an excellent source of carbohydrate, a potato contains 45 percent of the daily requirement for vitamin C, and more potassium than a banana. If you eat it with the skin on, it's a terrific source of dietary fiber. A fresh potato contains no fat or cholesterol, and has only 100 calories."

Sadly, french fries and potato chips don't count as potatoes. The best route is to eat a baked potato with the skin.

Nice to know that my customary night-before-a-race baked potato has been a smart move all this time.  

And the Verdict Is...

... a weak left posterior tibialis, most likely caused by a strain from competing in the Maymont 8 Miler last September.

Or so says my new best friend, Steve-the-physical-therapist-who-specializes-in-running-injuries.

So what the heck is the posterior tibialis muscle?

Yoinked from Wikipedia

It's that one, that goes from your tibia, wraps around the ankle, and attaches at the top of the inner arch. Steve thinks that I strained it during the Maymont 8 Miler last September and then because I never officially treated it it just gets aggravated once in a while. Also not helping matters is the fact that my feet are too flexible (I never knew there was such as thing as too flexible), so the muscles in my lower leg and ankle have to work harder to keep my feet stable.

Usually I'm pretty skeptical of doctors, especially orthopedists and physical therapists. My feeling (which is probably - ok likely - 100% wrong) is that they just take a guess as to what the problem is and hope that they are right, con you into hours of therapy, and then nothing gets better and you are out a lot of time, sleep, and money. But to me this diagnosis makes perfect sense and explains my ankle pain and arch pain. 

The good news: I'm not truly injured, just a little weak in the left ankle.

The hour and a half of questioning, running up and down halls, weird stretches, and attempts to bring me into alignment (fruitless, since I'm naturally crooked) also led Steve to the following:

• My foot strikes per minute are a little on the low side and that I am not a terrible heel striker, but do tend to land there more often than not.
• I did better than most of the runners that he sees on the core strength and flexibility tests (thank you, yoga). In fact, for a few minutes he did additional tests to see if I had hypermobility because I was able to a few of the Beighton Score tasks. I only scored a 3, so I'm not hypermobile. But I could have told you that - the only reason I am reasonably flexible at all is because of 4 years of yoga.
• My basic running mechanics are fine (yay).
• The scoliosis doesn't seem to really be causing that much trouble. It is why my left side is a little out of whack but it's nothing that will really mess me up.

Strangely enough, I kind of enjoyed this battery of tests and had a good time quizzing Steve on what each weird thing he was making me do measured. Despite my dislike of doctors and propensity to faint around needles or at the prospect of medical procedures in general, I have always been highly intrigued by anatomy and physiology. I took biology and anatomy courses in high school and college and delight in learning about various disorders and conditions via WebMD and Wikipedia, so I have a pretty good basic knowledge and am always fascinated by doctor visits and how they reach diagnosis. I'm sure I annoy the hell out of my doctors with my attempts at self-diagnosis and overly-informed-learning-toward-hypochondriac-type-questions.

Anyhow, so what does this mean for my running obsession and marathon dreams?

First, I have to go do physical therapy twice a week for four weeks with Steve... which is why he is my new best friend. Not really. No offense to Steve, but I hate physical therapy and am not looking forward to it. I hate paying the copay (I know I know, I should be thankful that I have good health insurance and don't have to pay that much). I hate having to wake up early to go there first thing in the morning so I don't miss work. I hate the boring strength exercise that I'm supposed to do twice a day.

Basically, this is how I feel about having to spend a bunch of time at the sports medicine office:

Actually, Steve is pretty cool and a runner himself, so I enjoyed "talking shop" with him during the sonogram therapy and ice therapy portions of my visit. And I know that taking care of this weakness now will prevent big problems down the road (hopefully), so it will be worth it.

Second, for the next few weeks I am relegated to maintaining my current mileage (15-20 miles per week); and that mileage has to be flat. Read: no more trail runs or hills. Period. So much for my brief love affair with trail runs.

Third, I have to cut out the heel striking and up my foot strikes per minute to somewhere between 170-180. To achieve this, I got permission from Steve to go shoe shopping and finally pull the trigger on the purchase of a pair of Brooks PureCadence. He's a big fan of the more natural running shoes and when I asked "How do you feel about the Brooks Pure line?" he immediately said, "I love them!"

Well, there's nothing I love more than an excuse to buy some running gear, so I immediately ordered up a pair in the snazzy teal color. Steve claims that the very low Heel-Toe Offset of 4.0 mm on these shoes will help encourage me to start moving my strikes from the heel to mid foot.

To increase my foot strikes per minute, Steve encouraged me to check out Jogtunes and download some songs with at least 180 bpm and then make sure I am running in time to the music. Yay - more medically necessary shopping! And my inner band geek also loves the fact that I've been directed to run in step to music.

Fourth, right now this is nbd (no big deal - I learned that one from BFF. Thanks for keeping me current). By taking preventative measures now, marathon training and running a marathon should be totally fine unless some other muscle, joint, or ligament decides to take a crap on me.

So that's what's up. Yay medical science.

Whose Bright Idea Was This?

After Run Like a Girl earlier this month and the trail running issue of Runner's World, I've become a little bit obsessed with trail running.

There is a great system of trails in Richmond, specifically the James River Park System trails. I have been wanting to give these a try for ages, but didn't want to go by myself - mainly because I was afraid I'd get lost but also because of course trail running by yourself isn't always the best idea for safety reasons. With his OMK, I didn't want to ask Prabir to join me and possibly aggrevate the injury more.

Luckily, through the RLaG club and Richmond Road Runners, I have connected with some Prair-replacements additional running buddies. A dude named Greg and I have a similar schedule (the earlier after work the better, 8-9 min mile depending), so we've run a few times since the formal RLaG group switched to 6:15 pm start times. Luckily, Greg also knows about a zillion good running routes in Richmond, including the trail system. So we teamed up last week and did 5.5 miles. I had expected to be completely wiped afterwards, but actually felt pretty good.

Remembering that run, I was feeling confident last night and had asked Greg if he would mind running the entire loop with me (about 7 miles give or take). He agreed, so after meeting at the Children's Farm entrance at Maymont and saying hi to the peacock:

...we ran to the Nature Center, picked up Siri, and hit the North Bank trail.

When we started, a little rain shower had hit our area. Just enough rain to be refreshing. And the first half of the North Bank trail isn't so terrible. At first it's very steep until you get down to the river, and from there it's not so bad. We crossed over the James River at the Nickel Bridge, which is kind of unpleasant because you are running on a small paved footpath alongside a double lane bridge where traffic is moving at 45-50 mph.

The Buttermilk Trail is the section south of the river. It is not as steep as the North Bank side, but there are some pretty "scary" moments where you are running very high up with a sheer drop to one side. I always feel perfectly fine/safe on the trail, but when it's been raining it can be a little bit nerve wracking.

As we came to a small parking area called Reedy Creek, we took a break. We had gone about 3 miles and all of us were completely drenched from a combination of rain and sweat. After a minute of stretching and wiping the sweat from our faces, we were off again.

During the second leg of Buttermilk, I started to feel great and started to reflect on the things that I love about trail running:

• Roots, rocks, uneven footing, branches, and all manner of obstacles require you to pay attention and engage your brain constantly. You don't have time to think about how bored you are, which forces you to also...
• Slow down your pace. At some points on this run, particular the "descent" to the river, there are extremely steep inclines and at some points rocky areas of the path that you have to navigate. You naturally slow down, which generally means you can run further and somehow also means...
• That you don't realize how far you've run. Trail running is certainly more demanding than just a flat course, but somehow it is easier to forget how far you've gone. I think it's a combination of engaging the brain and the slower pace.
• The views! With this system of trails you get some absolutely fabulous, scenic views of Richmond. I wish I had had my iPhone with me to snap a few photos.

All was good with the world as we crossed back over the Lee Bridge and once again grabbed the North Bank trail. Then, I started to remember why I don't like trail running. The further we ran, the more I realized that this was the same route that the Maymont 8 Miler employs... because it started to bring back some bad memories. This particular portion of the North Bank Trail is tough. It's very steep for what seems like forever and twists and folds back on itself many times. Just when you think you are headed up and out, there is a 90 degree turn and you find yourself running in the wrong direction.

To distract ourselves, Siri, Greg, and I started to talk about food - what delicious treat we were going to reward ourselves with for completing this killer run. We talked about Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Stella's, ice cream with strawberries, Sweet Frog frozen yogurt, milkshakes, salmon, pasta... so many delicious things. Eventually I had to say, "We gotta stop this! I'm starving!!"

As we wound around the seemingly endless trail, Greg said, "Remind whose bright idea this was again?"

"Mine," I admitted. "You can beat me up when we're finished. Just make sure you leave me in a parking lot where I'm easily found. Oh, and please just give me my water bottle."

Finally, we reached the parking lot and end of the trail, just in time for the clouds to break up and the sun to start beating down on us. We all stopped for a minute. My shirt was absolute soaked with sweat, my ankle hurt, but I felt accomplished. Much like this:

I'm the KING OF THE WORLD.

But I refrained from a Leo-like outburst.

Siri and I pushed it back to the gates of Maymont, where we parted, then Greg and I cut through the park and back to our cars.

Here's what our route looked like, and our splits:

See what I mean about a slower pace? A full 1:40 slower than usual, but I swear we were working 50% harder.

As soon as I got home I took a shower, ate dinner, and then moved on quickly to the dessert that I had been craving since mile 6:

Vanilla Bean Ice Cream and Oreos - get in my belly!

I was so wiped that I went to bed at 9:30 and was out in a matter of minutes.

I was expecting my left ankle and calves to be screaming at me this morning, but amazingly my ankle is only a little bit sore and everything else is fine. I credit my beloved compression socks, which I put on after my shower and wore all night. Compression socks = LOVE.

This morning I had my appointment with the "Running Therapist." I have a lot to share about that (later entry), but one thing is that he has banned me from trail running for the next few months, so no more adventures for a while. That makes me very sad because while last night was challenging and very hard, it was also a lot of fun. Instead I'm relegated to FLAT, BORING roads for a while.

So go run a trail for me.