Reality check?

So what is my reality check?

I was looking through my past years and months of this blog and I noticed a trend, I am injured more than I like. My self appraisal is that it's about a 65-30-5 balance, where 65% come from trauma (my clumsiness on trails), 30% from overuse (maybe insufficient cross training and too many long runs on a minimum base) and the final 5% from non running activities. What caused this self reflection, well, it's January 30th and barring a 20+ mile run tomorrow, this is one of my worse mileage totals for January ever. Since I started running (20 years ago), it is my 16th best (or worse, all depends on your perspective) mileage month for January, a grand total of 41 miles, in the summer that would be a normal week. I lost 2 1/2 weeks because of spraining my ankle yet again and it is still on the mend (it's different than before and believe it or not, these two recent sprains are the only time that I have lost time running due to sprained ankles at least sprains that occurred while running).

Can't remember if I have commented about the fact that I have been running for 20 years and to top it off it's our 30th year of living in MN. I have to admit that when I first started running, I never gave it a thought as to how long I would run or that one day I would do marathons and beyond. I can say when we moved to MN, I figured 5 years would be about as long as I thought I would be able to take the weather and now it's 30 years and I think running is part of the reason I have made it so many winters here (that and I don't think my wife would have moved from here). My running keeps me sane in the winter and gives me peace and satisfaction the rest of the year.

Ok back to my recent running, I was able to run 10 1/2 miles today and the ankle held up, I also had calf tightness from where I tore it last fall. So besides an ankle rehab, I will need to do some calf stretching too. I had hoped to really get in the mileage this week, things didn't work out early in the week so I figured it would be give the ankle a few extra days. I ran 5 1/2 with Wayne and Karen last Thursday and that as it turned out meant I got to take Friday and Saturday off as the ankle was sore the next day. I should define sore, trouble walking stairs is my primary benchmark along with 90 degree turns, if I can go up and down stairs without using the railing then it's good. I probably could have run on Saturday but I know if I had tried I would probably have only made it 4 or 5 miles and I needed (ok wanted) to run at least 9 miles. I need to get the mileage up and I knew if I ran shorter on Saturday then Sunday might be a 0.

Sorry I have to whine so much about injuries, I guess it's part of the reason I have this blog is to keep track, normally I forget such things but with so many of my posts on injuries, it's time I face reality and consider maybe doing some other sport than running, like biking, swimming or something that doesn't get me injured.

Just kidding, truth be told, after 20 years, I am hooked, I love running and even with all of my recent injuries I wouldn't trade what it does for me for anything else in the world.