For those who haven't followed my illness saga this year, I was diagnosed with "severe persistent asthma with exacerbation" and then developed nasal polyps that completely blocked breathing through my nose and had to be surgically removed - but I also had to have a deviated septum repaired in order to get to the polyps.
I ran what I could when I could.
I was given the go-ahead for "light exercise" this past weekend, so Sunday I ran my first run in two weeks: 2.5 miles in 20:14. I had to stop because of wheezing, so I don't have the medications nailed down yet - and won't for a while, as I have steroid implants in my sinuses for the next 5-6 weeks, then go through a protocol to determine what meds I need.
But, here's my running plan:
5 days running per week, aiming at 7-8.5 miles at 8-8:15/mile each time, with one (or two) hard run(s) each week of hill repeats. I'm running as many times up a short steep hill as possible (say 12-16 times the Ramsey Hill, which is 0.2156 miles long and 117 feet high). Then I'll switch to long hill repeats (Ohio Street, 0.4345 miles and 174 feet of climb, 6-8 repeats). Then I'll switch back to the shorter hill, but try to run the uphills at 1 mile race equivalent effort. Then I'll switch back to the long hill, working the uphills as 5K (or faster) efforts. At this point, I should be in racing condition and am aiming for an indoor mile under 5:30 and an outdoor 5K under 19, both of which would put me in the top 10 for my age class in Minnesota. These age-grade to 81.75% and 82.26%, which would match my bests in the 1980's.
Improved
21 hours ago
1 comment:
Heck of a year!
Hope you plan to ease into that training plan so as to avoid another illness/injury.
Getting your asthma under control can be a process (mine seems to morph from time to time, and exposure to allergens). It's amazing how good I feel when it is fully under control.
Also might want to be steroid free prior to really pushing things. In my experience I feel pretty great on steroids and may push a bit harder then my condition might otherwise have allowed (probably why they are banned, eh?). Though the one time I raced while on prednisone I was also on a high dose antibiotic, both of which I started less then 24 hours prior to the race. I coughed my way through that race, so not sure it really aided my performance any. But it sure let all the other runners know where I was! :-)
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