Sick & a trail series

Luke got sick on Monday night; sore throat and stuffy nose. So he missed out on my birthday on Tuesday. :-( But I ended up getting sick on Wednesday night and took off Thursday from work; just a stuffy nose & a "hot" throat, no soreness. Luckily, I only took that one day off; Luke ended up taking Tuesday & Wednesday off work. I think that means my immune system is stronger. :-) Yay, finally something that's better than him! And I can blame him for getting me sick since I got sick after him.

But unfortunately, in a week will be the start of a series of trail races in Rock Cut. 4 months, 4 races, a race a month, 5k, 10k, 15k and 20k. December = 5k. January = 10k. February = 15k. March = 20k. Luke's first race ever was this past January and the 10k. Thigh deep snow in some places he said. So he has wanted to run the whole series this time around.

My plan for the trail series was to join him for the 5k and maybe the 10k in the run and then cheer him on for the 15k and 20k. However, then I found out that the first race, the 5k, popped up the weekend that we were going to take Friday off and go down to my family in southern Illinois. His first time meeting them. But also the same weekend his sister is flying into town. So me being the best girlfriend EVER, told him to stay in town, run the race and hang out with his sister. I knew how much running the full series will mean to him not to mention seeing his sister (who lives in San Francisco). He's feeling really guilty about it but after our run on Thanksgiving weekend, I was feeling bad that I wasn't going to be there to support him and he thought I was crazy for even thinking like that.

I might run the 10k in January. Depending on the weather of course. :-) I'm not stupid. I'll sign up race day and not worry about it. I'll have to get a lot more experience on the trails first as well. Plus, if it was held over Martin Luther King Jr. weekend last year, I remember it being bitterly cold because my car wouldn't start two different days that weekend!! I also want to run on the trails a few more time before diving in to this race. I need the experience.

Now Luke hasn't run all this week, though he did go to the gym on Monday night. We were talking last night on the phone (haven't seen each other since Sunday night) and I think this weekend, with the snow on the ground and it being about 20's & 30's again, we're gonna try to run in Rock Cut on the trails. I gotta test out my new trail shoes too! We may walk more than run because of our colds. Who knows. And I haven't ran since our runs last weekend in Madison. So everything should be interesting for us.

There's a table in Jeff Galloway's book that has an estimation of what you can expect after taking time off for a sickness or injury:

Rest Time Without Any Exercise	Estimated % of Conditioning Lost
1-5 days	0-1%
7 days	10%
14 days	35%

If that's the case then the past couple of weeks I should have lost 10% each time, because it seems like I only run on the weekends now. But I've been fine, running a 10k and not feeling really winded. Soon I'll have to get that distance longer again, as I need to keep a good base for Spring Marathon Training that begins at the end of January!

When you get sick, how do you determine when you can go out and run again?Wait until the fever's gone, no more coughing, or when everything is gone & out of your system? I usually get something with a cough so I try to wait until the cough is almost gone before I try to run again.

Categories: Rock Cut Trail Series, sick