Sore calves and no time to rest them!

[Snail_Male]

My C25K got out of hand and now I'm due to run the London Marathon on Oct 3rd and the training hurts. Mid fifties and 3 stone overweight, in April 2020 I felt very much in COVID's cross-hair sights. I started the C25K and found the virus chasing me was a great motivator. I just kept telling myself, every step is another win, every mile in the legs makes the next one easier.

I was so motivated that 3 months in I did my first 21K. It was very slow, but with no running background I was a Half-marathoner in 3 months flat. But after Christmas a combination of niggles, weather and whatever saw my running quickly wither. By May I was doing nothing again beyond walking the dog.

Still, I'd done it once right? So, full of YOLO spirit and a great desire to help MapAction, the charity I'm running for, I signed up for the London Marathon! But the training really hurts! (Yes, I know, duh!) But I'll be 56 when it comes around and a lifetime of football is haunting my knees. I've also managed to keep at least 1.5 of those extra 3 stones I started out with, which doesn't help, but I LOVE FOOD!

However I suspect the real challenge is that when I agreed to take the Marathon place there were only 15 weeks to go. I've been following a Hal Higdon novice programme, but it is an 18 week programme. I c chopped 3 weeks out and I am pretty much sticking to the distances.

But last night for the first time I was due to go and run 13k and my calves were so sore that I only managed 7k before waddling painfully home. I'm going to go back out again tonight and try for another 5k as per the programme but am very worried that it will be as sore again, because I have no time to mess around with this schedule when the race is in 8 weeks, and the furthest I have run is 24km.

Any tips on nursing sore calves gratefully accepted!

On the bright side I did bump into this litter critter a couple of times on the same run. He/she looks nothing like me.

[GoGo_JoJo Ultramarathon]

Make sure your hydration is bang on. Muscles require oxygen and water to operate well.

Self, or if you can afford it, professional massage really does help.

Pickle juice can help if it's more of a cramping feel than a muscle stiffness issue.

Personally I'd skip the 5k and allocate that time to caring for your calves instead and do a longer session next.

[Snail_Male Marathon in reply to GoGo_JoJo]

That's all really helpful, thanks. I'd never heard of the pickle juice idea before, but just googled it and it sounds like its worth a try. Also I love savory stuff so win-win! I will try the 5k because sometimes I have one bad run and then a good one with no indication of which it will be, but if it gets sore I'll just walk home.

[misswobble Marathon in reply to Snail_Male]

Pickle juice from those jars of cornichons is lovely! Dill 😋. Good for the gut too

It makes good bread too! I love food but you can eat well and still lose weight, and keep it off through running 😃👍

Good luck with the training 🙂

[Snail_Male Marathon]

Thanks! Will try it tonight!

[linda9389 Administrator Marathon]

Welcome to the forum! Some great achievements there. I agree with JoJo, skip some of the short runs, give the muscles in your calves time to recover. I trained for my one and only marathon in just 5 weeks (starting from HM distance). It wasn't pretty and I adopted a run/walk approach as there wasn't time for anything else. I concentrated on getting two or three long training runs into that time (only going as far as 32k in training). It certainly wasn't fast, but it made it doable. If you keep punishing the calves and end up with a full on injury there will be no marathon - better a slower one with slightly fewer training runs. You're already at 24k and still have 8 weeks, a short period of recovery now will pay dividends later. Plans are made to be adapted. Good luck.

[Snail_Male Marathon in reply to linda9389]

Brilliant! That makes me feel much better. Do you think maybe a couple of e.g 4 mile runs each week and one long one? No consecutive days runs.

[linda9389 Administrator Marathon in reply to Snail_Male]

I would probably make a plan with the number of weeks left. I would put a really long run every other week, maybe alternating with a 16k as the long run on the alternate week. I would put another one or two other runs in per week - one easy recovery run after the long run, of between 30 mins and an hour, and one harder run - hills or speed perhaps, again fairly short (although if the calves were still an issue I'd keep this as an easy run too). But that's just me, I don't like to have high weekly mileage every week and I like at least one rest day between runs!

I'd work backwards from race day. For the long runs I'd probably 'start' with a 32k three weeks before the event, then count backwards and see what I could fit in - they may be in 2k increments or 4k or whatever it would need to fit the weeks available.

Whatever you plan, the main thing is to be prepared to be flexible!

[Snail_Male Marathon in reply to linda9389]

Great, thanks so much. I will plan like that and see how it goes.

[Snail_Male Marathon]

Huge thanks to all who advised me on the above situation. I reduced the number of runs and concentrated on one long and one short per week, and a good two weeks of tapering. It worked!