back at it

Between my injury, travel, a brief slight cold, holidays, and unpleasant weather, I went three weeks with very little exercise. (But plenty of food.) I think I got about four runs in, and those were pitifully short and included walking breaks.

But my hiatus is over! I'm exercising again! And I feel much better.

As an update on the IT band injury: it's getting better. I had another follow-up with the running doctor on December 27, and he said I should stick with physical therapy once a week and start building my mileage back up really slowly. So I'm doing that, and I haven't felt any pain in my knee on the last several runs. My main thing now is getting used to my new running gait. Changing the gait is good because it prevents me from striking with my heel, but it's frustrating because it seriously feels like learning to run all over again. The farthest I've gone without a walking break is two miles. Two miles. I used to spend more miles than that just warming up.

Luckily my new triathlon training is giving me a chance to keep active without worrying about such low running miles. Right now I'm swimming twice a week, biking twice a week, and running three times. I got a trainer for Christmas so I can ride my bike in my apartment now, which is exciting. And today I had my first swim lesson! I've got three more to go and I'm hoping they will help with my form and efficiency.

So I'm feeling good and excited about keeping up my new workout schedule.