My 50 race 2012 Challenge (A Long Run) is half over.  Overall it has been a very good six months.  I have completed 27 races so far and I am averaging 6:56/mile for my first 173 miles.  I have 177 miles to go.  Several of my up coming races are  half marathons.  I love this distance and I am planning on being real close to 7 minutes/mile or under on each of them.

It is ironic that 13 days before the start of my journey I fell and really messed up my knee and opened up a hole in my head that took over 60 stitches to close.  Jennifer the plastic surgeon on call at El Camino did an amazing job of sewing me up that December 18 afternoon.  In fact the scar right above my eyebrow is hardly noticeable now.  However, it took over a month for me to be able to bend my left knee completely. 

My first race January 1st was one of the hardest of the year.  I could not take a fall stride.  I hit the mile at 7:49 in the DSE 5k race in San Francisco and that was all I could do.  Somehow I was able to pick up the pace and finished in 22:19.  I was able to gut it out the last two miles.   But my goal for this challenge is to average under 7 minutes per mile.  To do this I need to run 5k's under 21 minutes, which I have been doing mostly.

Six months to the day (yesterday) I fell again.  But this time it was different.  I broke the fall and I rolled.  In December I hit my knee and then my head without breaking the fall.  Still not sure what happened that Sunday morning last December.  I was not running as fast yesterday and I almost didn't go down.  But I did, however nothing like before.  My right hip and left wrist is what hit first.  I should be 95% by Wednesday which is my next race.  But I was not ready to race this morning.  I can run easy and I am sure I could have somehow ran as good as what I did January 1st but I am not going to reach my goal running 5k's over 22 minutes. 

What is ironic is that I started off this challenge with a fall and doing a DSE 5k afterwords (but I did have several days to recover) and six months later I fall again and then canceled running a DSE 5k.  This is not a big thing, but I did have to cancel a race because of it.     

I want to thank everyone who has helped me these first six months.  You guys make this all worthwhile. 

Good attitude Bob, and I like the Rock The Parkway shirt!
Bruce Gilbert 7/5/12 9:19 am

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4pm Update: My hip is not good and now my wrist is really bothering me too.  I have to cancel the race in the morning...I have done 27 in the first six months so I did have a little buffer.  Just did not want to dig into that yet...but racing sub 6:45 pace just is not in the cards....however I do hope I will be able to do a slow training run in the morning...

I can not believe how things can happen so quickly.  This morning Mike and I were running two miles over to the Los Altos Ride and Stride Fitness Festible.  Catherine was in the car taking some photos along the way since today is the half way point of our challenge.  All of a sudden I trip over my feet and start to fall.  Unlike my fall of December 18, this time everything was in slow motion.  We were only running about 9:30/mile pace and I almost stayed on my feet.  But I didn't. 

After Michael helped me up, Catherine drove over to the Fitness Fair in Los Altos.  We followed on foot, running and walking the mile and a half there.  My hip had already tighen up and it was not feeling good at all.  I guess I hit there first.  The blunt of the problem is my hip.  As you can see from the photo of my knee after we cleaned it up, that is not bad at all.  At the Fitness Fair Asha-Rose was there from Shawsu Workout. 

Asha-Rose has been a massage therapist for over 20 years.  She worked on me for about twenty minutes.  Mike and I then walked home after having lunch at Burger Town.  Burger Town is where Mike and I finalized our plans for this challenge last December.  They have the best burgers around.  We like the guys and we always treat ourselves after a long run.  After I got home I took two Tylenols.  I am not sure about tomorrow's 5k race.   My hip is not good.  It is not terrible but it would be hard to race at any pace right now.  But I don't like making plans and not following through.  I am ahead of schedule but I have some tough races coming up and I want to go into them with a buffer.

Bad break...no pun intended.
Richard Stiller 6/30/12 8:38 pm

This was a very strang fall...it just should not have happened!
Bob Anderson 6/30/12 9:14 pm

Bob, I hope that you can make the best of the situation, and come back strong next week.
Gary Funck 6/30/12 9:44 pm

Bob...How is the body feeling this morning? I hope you are ok.
Lisa Anderson-Wall 7/2/12 9:25 am

I fell a little beat up...but nothing like before. I was able to run six miles easy yesterday...it is my wrist that hurts the most...
Bob Anderson 7/2/12 9:36 am

A friend of mine uses arnica, for sprains, etc. Here's an NYT blurb on it: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/17/the-alternative-medicine-cabinet-arnica/ disclaimer: I've never tried it, and recommend that you research the possible side-effects/warnings if you plan on trying it.
Gary Funck 7/2/12 9:50 am

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