No pain is a great thing!

I racewalked pain-free this morning, and it was wonderful. So wonderful that I almost don't mind too much that I got a speeding ticket, but more on that later.

This morning was a TNT workout up in Kaysville (a 30-min drive from my house). I made sure I wore my IT band strap, cinched down really tight, and my shoe inserts. I drove to the first water stop and started racewalking back toward the runners. I racewalked with the different groups of runners for a while and went back to get the walkers. After seeing everyone, I drove to the next water stop and repeated the process. At this point I'd walked about 3 miles and had no pain. So far, so good. I drove up to near the end of the course (12 miles total for full marathoners; 8 for half marathoners) to keep tabs on everyone. Then I went back to a large hill just before the first water stop, so that I could walk up it with people on their way back to the start. I walked up it three times and was a bit leery of going down again each time (since the IT band does NOT like downhills) but kept my cadence quick and my steps short going down the hills, and I was FINE. By now I had about 6.2 miles total on my Garmin.

I thought I should probably stop walking, but I really wanted to walk with some of the walkers and check in on them; I figured that since it wouldn't be a super fast pace that I'd be OK. I was going to drive back to the start first and check on the other participants, and I had one of the team captains (whose asthma was acting up because of the pollution/inversion today) in the car w/me when I got pulled over for speeding. Um, oops. Honestly, I was not in a hurry at all, and the road was a large road with a double yellow line that in MOST places I know would be a 35 mph limit. Not here. The limit was 25, and I got clocked going 38. I was chatting with the team captain and really had no idea how fast I was going. I was quite apologetic to the officer but he still issued me a ticket. He was nice, though, and in lieu of the fact that I have a clean record he marked it as going 30 in a 25 zone. Still, I have never had a ticket, and I feel pretty ashamed of myself, and was pretty annoyed, especially because it says I have to go up there to the Davis County Courthouse (NOT a short drive) to appear, probably with kids in tow (and if you read my blog regularly you know just how much fun that will be). The officer did say I might possibly be able to take care of it by mail if I call the courthouse, which I plan to do first thing on Tuesday morning (I'm assuming Monday is a holiday). Ugh. I feel pretty stupid about this.

Back to walking :). I found our walkers and parked the car and had Bev (the team captain) follow us in case my IT band started acting up. We went up that hill (my 4th time today! I felt virtuous!) and my leg was fine, and the conversation was good. I really enjoy walking with all the different team members. I was able to walk until my Garmin read 8.37 miles, at which point I could feel my leg beginning to tighten (still no pain), so I stopped and had Bev drive me back. But it was GREAT to walk so far without incident.

I am not sure what is helping the most - the new anti-inflammatory, the shoe inserts, or the IT band strap, but y'know what? I don't care which it is as long as I'm on the mend. This is the farthest I have walked w/o pain since November 16th. One caveat though - only 3.7 miles was fast enough to have my heart rate in my usual training zone; the other 4.7 miles was at a slower pace. Overall, I did an average of 13:18/mile. Still, I am very pleased. Let's hope this trend continues!!!