That is one heck of an achievement Chuck.
Well done and you must be proud of yourself… and if you aren’t you should be 
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Congrats, those conditions were definitely brutal.
congrats! you did great 
Yes, congrats - good job. And I agree for the condx the time was fine for a first competitive marathon.
Next Sunday should have been the consecrating moment after a solid training during summer with running 70+km per week. However, less than two weeks ago I had a knee injury (likely an IT band tendonitis) during a long run. I went from being able to run half-marathons without too much trouble to barely being able to run a 5K before having a sharp pain in my right knee. The pain goes away when I stop running, but it appears to come back any time I try to run a bit of distance above 5 km. I am devastated; I have to choose between going anyway and potentionally making it much worse… or straight up not doing the race and spending the next weeks/months recovering.
I went to see a physical therapist this week to get a professional’s opinion, but the conclusion the therapist came to was that I didn’t have a severe injury, so I could try to go for it and “listen to my body” and stop running if the pain was too bad. All I got was a list of stretching exercices. Overall, the decision is on me… and I’ve ultimately decided to skip the race. It’s heartbreaking and really infuriating, but I think it’s the right call since I can still do other things like rock climbing or cycling.
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For what it is worth, I think you made the right decision.
Years of ‘toughing it out’ while in the Army, left me with the knees of a 70 year old (the Doctors exact words) when I was still in my 40’s.
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Yup 100% right thing to do. There will always be more races you can run in future.
When I was young and fit I pushed everything to the max, regardless and I remember someone in the army telling me my body would be a mess by the time I was 50. Turned out they were right.
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The road to recovery is taking what feels like forever. I am gradually starting to run 3-4 times a week but with shorter distances than I am used to (5 to 7 km). It might take a few more weeks/months before I am able to do 10K runs without having any knee discomfort, but at least I’ve seen some (slow) progress during the last few weeks. 'Turns out… rehabilitation is a long and slow process.
The physiotherapist I’m consulting now is saying that it might have something to do with my right Gluteus Medius, which has gotten way too weak and causes one of my knee tendons to exacerbate the knee pain after a certain distance. A few tests have shown that indeed, one is much weaker than the other, which may have forced me to run “unbalanced” for a long time before the effects became apparent.
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Update: At long last, I have reached a big milestone after weeks of constant failures. After two weeks of doing the “run short distances but often” routine and plenty of stretching and exercices, I have finally been able to run a 10K without pain. With much discomfort, I don’t feel “solid” on my knees yet but all things considered, having no excessive pain is a huge improvement. It feels so liberating! Of course, it will take months to regain the ability to run the distances I used to be able to handle, but it’s a start.
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