The 12.3 mile run yesterday tore me up and I’m sore.  This is not one of those “I’m going to have to sit on the couch and lick my wounds” days though, as I was afraid it might be.  My hips are a little sore (I explained the reason for that here – I tired out and resorted to plodding to make it to the finish line), and my calves are just a little tender but that is to be expected with running that distance for the first time in quite a while.  In any event, it’s no rest for the wicked, Pete and I are taking the kids to the pool this afternoon.

I’ll be doing my stretches this morning to loosen up my hamstrings.  My hamstrings are a big deal.  I have written at great length about them, they affect everything for me and I know from previous experiences that the more care I take to keep them loose now, the better – and if I don’t, I will almost certainly be faced with a week or two off after my run next week.  Also, I think I’ll skip the hot tub and stick to the pool to keep the swelling down from yesterday’s effort – I don’t know if there’s anything to that, but it makes sense to me.  I can tell you this, if I do any swimming it will be slow.

I did well yesterday to eat my carbs after the run for glycogen replacement so I’m good there but what I forgot to write about was my preparatory breakfast.  I ate well about an hour and a half before I started running.  I had a double (maybe triple – I don’t measure) serving of Kashi Go Lean Cinnamon Crumble with a few cups of whole milk and a banana.  Generally I’m not big on breakfast, though I know I should be, unless I’ve got a big effort day.  About the cereal, quickly…I am not a big fan of the Kashi cereals, they’re usually a little to blah for me, but the Cinnamon Crumble is fantastic.  Just enough sweet to work with the twigs and nuts.  With the milk, I am acutely aware of the argument for reduced fat milk, but when your cholesterol levels are better than perfect (at my age), 2% or worse, skim (aka milk water) is unnecessary.  Besides, with the lack of sun in a Michigan during the winter months, Vitamin D is a must.  In addition, I had my usual 2 cups of coffee in the morning and two cups at the running club – I’ve read good things and bad about coffee, and even if all of the good is false and all of the bad is true, I won’t be giving it up any time soon.  There are some things I’m just not going to give up and that’s one.  In any event, during the run, I did not find myself hungry at any point so I’m going to say I did it right.

To wrap this up, I spoke with my buddy Big Steve yesterday and he decided he’s going to look into doing the half IM with me in September which would be really fun.  English Pete is talking about coming down too for support, so that would put all of our families down there for the weekend.  It couldn’t turn out any better than that, a good time for sure.

UPDATE:  The stretches worked as usual.  I feel a lot better.  Still stiff on standing up, but nothing a little swim won’t help.  I only did the two that stretched the hamstrings by the way.