Shin splints

No, I haven’t had the diagnosis made by a doctor (yet, at least). Unfortunately, I’m pretty sure that I suffer from shin splints in my left shin.

I feel that I ought to report on my status here, as I’ve written so much lately about my participation in Copenhagen Marathon. I fear I might end up being a spectator this year.

Having rested my legs for two days, I went for a 3-4 km walk this evening. The only purpose was to check the status of the sore shin. I couldn’t even walk at my usual pace. Walking downhill was seriously unpleasant. *sigh*

From Wikipedia’s shin splints article:

Pain associated with MTSS is usually a recurring dull ache over the distal one-third posteromedial cortex of the tibia. In early diagnosis, individuals may experience pain at the beginning of a workout, which may go away by continued activity and then occur again at the end of the activity. As the syndrome progresses pain may stay throughout the whole training or during low intensity activity and may continue at rest. Range of motion in the ankle and foot should not cause pain.

From what I can dig up with Google, the “distal one-third posteromedial cortex of the tibia” is the lower third of the front of the shin. That’s exactly the spot where it hurts on my left leg. Furthermore, three days ago the pain would fade away after 1-2 km of running – tonight the pain was present immediately when I started walking and increased slightly during the walk.

Wholegrain experiment

So… It was a windy Thursday, a holiday, and I was hanging out at home, as I had to take care of my sore shin. A perfect day for coding, washing clothes and baking bread. This post is about the bread – the code doesn’t compile at the moment.

For a while I had been wondering whether it is possible to make a decent no-bread bread, where all of the usual white wheat flour is replaced with whole wheat flour. I usually try to make the traditional recipe a bit healthier by replacing a quarter of the white wheat flour with oatmeal, but it would be nice to “go all the way”. Finally, I had remembered to buy a bag of whole wheat flour and some yeast on a shopping trip, and that Thursday I came across it in one of my kitchen cabinets.

I decided to make a rather small bread, as it was an experiment and because – in my experience – a no-knead bread doesn’t stay fresh for very long. I don’t know whether it is because they aren’t based on sourdough or because they don’t contain dairy products, e.g. yoghurt or milk, but it certainly is one of the many baking questions I ponder upon…

I used 313 grams of whole wheat flour, 250 grams of water, one teaspoon of salt and a 1/3 teaspoon of dry yeast. The dough was allowed to raise twice. Initially eight to nine hours, then an hour and a half. White wheat flour was used to avoid having the wet dough stick to my bowl and kitchen table. I have written about no-knead bread before, but you can just google “no-knead bread” if you need instructions. I should have used a bit more water – apparently the bran and germ of a whole wheat grain absorb more water than the endosperm (what a tremendously freaky word, by the way). It would also be better to let the initial rising take 12 hours.

The resulting bread was really good. Of course, it wasn’t as light and fluffy as the white alternative, but it was still very enjoyable. I cut some slices and ate some of them alone, some with honey and some with neutral cream cheese. Yummy!

Excited but frustrated

My initial confusion with regard to attending Copenhagen Marathon has pretty much disappeared, as I now have a final plan – where to be at certain times, how to get there, what to eat, what to drink, what to bring, where to store stuff, where to take a bath, etc. I am very excited.

I have decided to start out without music in my ears, as I want to experience the marathon in the way the organizers seem to want the attendees to experience it. There is no reason for all the shouts from spectators and all the entertainment along the route, if all runners are only present in their own, closed worlds. I will bring my music player and earphones in my pocket, just in case. Maybe the psychological effect of having the opportunity to use them will be enough. It was the documentary Spirit of the Marathon that gave me the final push to make the decision. It was a very touching and enlightening documentary to watch. It might not offer a lot to runners who have already run a marathon, but it sure does to first timers like me.

I have also decided not to bring my own “sugar”. In order to get 40-60 grams of carbohydrates per hour during the marathon, I originally planned to bring glucose tablets and gels and to drink water at the refreshment stands along the route. Since, however, the stands offer Powerade energy beverages with a reasonable quantity of carbohydrates, I have to decided to drink that. It is easier than running with tablets and gels, and the marathon organizers have confirmed that it is either Powerade ION4, which has 3.9 grams of carbohydrates per 100 mL, or some other kind of Powerade with the same carbohydrate quantity. That quantity is reasonable, as it is small enough not to slow down the stomach’s absorption of water. In addition, drinking Powerade might be better than drinking water and eating glucose, as Powerade also contains some salts. Well, it sounds good, but I don’t know if it will make a noticeable difference.

Unfortunately, my left shin is sore at the moment, which is why I’m frustrated. I have probably overloaded it during the final long, training runs. I also pushed myself a bit too hard on a 10 km run on Saturday, and I shouldn’t have played around with jump squat pushup burpees. It is actually difficult to reduce your training volume after a high-volume period – to accept just slacking at home an entire evening. You want to get out there to make sure your legs still work and your fitness hasn’t been lost. I’ve just been out on a rainy 3 km run, where I had to run as slow as approx 5:20 min/km (11.25 km/h) to avoid pain in the shin. It doesn’t look good for my goal of 5:12.5 min/km (11.52 km/h) for the marathon on Sunday. No matter what, I have to listen to the shin – if I just ignore pain on Sunday, it might make me unable to run for several weeks or months. That would be worse than not finishing the marathon or not finishing it with a good time. How frustrating…

Jump Squat Pushup Burpee

If you need to wake up in the morning or get going after sitting on the couch for too long, try this one – it’ll get your blood pumping

I’m becoming more and more inspired by Crossfit and BODYROCK.tv, and I have many fitness experiments planned for after Copenhagen Marathon.

Ready to race

I did it! I ran 80% of a marathon without hitting the wall or experiencing any serious pain. It was my final long run before Copenhagen Marathon, which takes place in only 13 days – on Sunday the 20th of May at 9:30 CEST.

Specifically, I ran 34 km in 2h:57m:11s, which comes down to an average pace of 5:13 min/km. I have realized that a goal of 3h:40m for the entire marathon is more realistic than my previous goal of 3h:30m. I definitely should have begun my endurance training earlier and, in general, have trained a lot more. Mid-december, when I – in a moment of true madness – signed up for the marathon, I envisioned running approx 800 km during the upcoming 20 weeks of training. I have run 631 km to this day and will probably end at 657 km two days before the marathon. I have found it hard to motivate myself for the 22+ km runs, and too often they have been split into a number of shorter runs. Two tangible reasons come to mind:

1. You have to eat right the three-fours hours leading up to a long run to avoid abdominal cramps.
2. Afterwards you are busted and will not get anything done the rest of the day.

Of course, you can get accustomed to the former. The latter will probably vanish with more training.

My plan for the final two weeks is to do only relatively short runs, reduce or almost pause my weight training, continue not to drink alcohol, decrease my caffeine intake slightly, make sure that I get enough sleep, do carbo-loading the final two days, eat a large, whole-grain meal approx four hours before the marathon, eat two bananas and some glucose approx two hours before the marathon, and ingest 0.5-0.75 L/hour of water and 50-60 g/hour of glucose during the marathon.

I have ordered some glucose tablets and gels for the marathon. I ran the 34 km as four laps of approx 8.5 km, thereby passing my apartment three times, every time drinking 0.5 L of water with 6% glucose. That gave me an energy boost of approx 3 x 500 g x 0.06 x 4 kcal/g = 360 kcal, which isn’t much, but it probably helped me avoid hitting the wall. Actually, it’s less energy than packed in a 100 g bag of wine gums. Leading up to the 34 km run, I ate three small bananas and a pack of Dextro glucose tablets (47 g). I also carbo-loaded to some degree the two days before. The reason for my choice of glucose is that this simple carbohydrate is directly usable by the body – the brain wants glucose and the hardworking leg muscles want glycogen. The time from ingestion to impact is therefore as short as possible. Other simple carbohydrates, such as fructose, which is the main component of fruits, will have to be converted into glucose by the liver. Complex (or at least “non-simple”) carbohydrates are even slower to be absorbed, as they must first be degraded  into simple carbohydrates in the intestines. I can recommend this page about carbohydrates. Running a marathon sure isn’t the same as running a half marathon…

Besides giving this whole endeavour a dramatic touch by trimming the hair on my head to 6 mm (3 mm on the sides and back of the neck), I have trimmed my chest in order to make patches stick better and to improve the electrical impedance measurements done by my heart rate monitor. Before, patches would fall off, and the heart rate monitor would often be unreliable for the first ten minutes (until enough sweat had been built up). The reason for the kinky patches is to avoid fissure of the nipples – a typical problem for male runners on longer distances. Women have the advantage of bras. I found a package of transparent Compeed patches in a kitchen drawer and they seem to work very well. I never get blisters, so I will not need them for my feet.

I have also spent some time on compiling a rather awesome marathon playlist. It is not final yet, but after having listened to it on my 34 km run, I feel good about it. I know that I ought to run the marathon without music in my ears and enjoy the atmosphere in full, but I have always listened to music while running. It keeps me going. It drowns my annoying breath. Nevertheless, it is too late to gamble with new ideas at this stage. When weight training, metal music usually gives me the mental resources to push or pull an additional 5% – something similar is probably true for running.

After this successful, final long run, I actually feel confident about completing Copenhagen Marathon. Sure, I will be physically wasted the following days, but that was also the case for my first half marathon. Everything has a beginning.