Management Mode

Since the low point last week, I've put myself in management mode and I'm sure I'm not alone. I'm sure most athletes unknowingly are in a natural state of management in order to prevent injuries. I've been doing it the past three years with this glute thing, and now I have to add this bladder/pissing/nether region thing. I was feeling fit and thus, I started to play around with races in my head, specifically a half-mary in early February. To prepare, I stepped on the track to do mile repeats and when the smoke cleared, the result was 11 miles of running. Normally, my body would have no problem with this work load, but post 50-mile trail race and the pissing incident, I guess my body is more fragile and well, it complained with yet more pissing. The symptoms were more mild this time around and I was able to resume a 5-mile run by Sunday. The past weekend included some more awesome rides in near perfect weather, but I'll refrain from saying the "H" word so as to prevent the "L" word from rearing it's ugly head.

On Saturday, I rode with a former student of mine, and he reminded me that I'm old. During a climb, he was pushing the pace and I became keenly aware of his breathing, specifically how fast and hard it was. And I thought to myself, I can't recall the last time I breathed that hard. So I tried to match his breathing by increasing my effort, and well, I felt like I would pass out before I matched his breathing. I just couldn't go there breathing-wise so instead, I went there muscular-wise. I mashed those gears and slowly, his breathing diminished, not because he was slowing down, but because the old teacher was dropping his young ass, ha ha ha! I'm sure I just won the first of many battles to come. And now, speaking of management and old people, my friend Jason sent me this link looking at the aging muscles of triathletes:

Life Clues

This past weekend, I was taking a crossfit class when I told the instructor that I was a triathlete transitioning to ultra running, and he responded by saying that marathon racing destroyed his sister's heart. Yesterday, I opened the XTRI website to find a story about a 40 year-old triathlete who died suddenly after running the Pittsburgh marathon. Hmmm...is the Universe conspiring to scare me to quit on this ultra running thing? Or is it just the car phenomena, where when you buy a certain make of car, you suddenly begin to notice that specific make everywhere. Am I just looking for reasons not to run? I do believe that life gives you clues, and I've always been pretty good at picking up on the clues.

I now think the bloody piss incident was a wake-up call of sorts. I only took one week off post IMCA and I was back at it, training for the 50-miler which included crazy things like back-to-back 30+ mile runs totaling 8000+ feet of climbing. Post 50-miler, I gave myself one week off and I was back at it running crazy miles again for the Strava 100-Mile Run Challenge. I was running one afternoon and my friend Chris, who did the 50-miler as well, pulled up along side me in his car and shouted, "Kiet, you gotta give your body a break!" As I look back on my actions, I now think that I, unknowingly, was trying to make up for a disappointing triathlon season. The crazy subconscious things we do to ourselves. In my mind, the crazy and extreme miles would lead me to redemption. I was toying with the idea of racing a marathon, doing the North Face 50-mile Challenge, and yes, I was even contemplating the Leadville-100. But the bloody piss incident and the numerous life clues gave me a good slap in the face. Also, several people emailed me and the word "balance" came up a lot. There will not be a winter marathon, nor another 50-miler, and there will certainly not be a Leadville-100 for this body. What there will be is a lot of rest and recovery, which I began this past weekend with a nice trip down south where I did not swim, bike, or run. I get it now.

To update you, I did go for a run on Thanksgiving morning, and I only made it one mile before I had to turn around. I definitely injured something "down there". But I'm happy to report that each day feels better than the previous day so I'm going to just go with it. The doctor said to give it two weeks and this is the second week. With the extra time on my hands, I'm learning new forms of distractions. TRX is not a word, really?

Pissing Blood

Yep, I'm going there...don't read on if you don't want details. It was high school sectionals and my teammate Eddy was vying for an individual ticket to the state championships. I remember finishing and seeing Eddy, who was still foaming at the mouth, being escorted by two teammates because he couldn't stand on his own. As we were moving Eddy, he told us he thought he pissed his shorts, and we all looked down, and to our horror, we saw his blood stained shorts. We were all so caught up on Eddy's HK (hard-kore with a "k" because it's much harder than with a "c") factor that we didn't even bother to think this actually might be a medically serious issue. Well, Eddy turned out to be okay, and from that day, Eddy set the standard for being HK.

I've vomited during and after races, passed out, suffered from hypothermia (funny story here), had multiple IV's, and even had my entire body under ice to bring my core body temp down, but I had never peed blood...until yesterday. I did a 19-miler, to break a hundo for that damn Strava 100-Mile Run Challenge, and since it was cool day, I decided not to carry any water (foreshadowing). At about the 11-mile mark, my back started to ache but I was averaging a good pace and I really wanted to PR this run (once again, damn you Strava). The back pain got progressively worst and then I started to experience some lower abdominal pain, but both were manageable. I thought the aches and pains might be due to one primary focus I had on this run: to run with better mechanics, specifically tightening my core to increase knee lift and stability. I got back to my car and headed off to the pool for a shakedown swim. I went to take a piss and OMG, saw nothing but red, actually, it was more like a red wine color. It just kept coming and I thought the red color would soon fade but the entire duration of the piss was the same red wine color. Initially, I panicked, but this was quickly replaced by pride. After almost 25 years, I finally met the Eddy standard for being HK.

But more seriously, piss in the blood is fairly common with runners, especially after a long run. It's called hematuria and it is usually no cause for alarm, just an empty bladder being irritated by all that jarring. I'm choosing to think this is what happened with me because my second urination was all clear (pun intended). However, since then, I've had frequent urges to pee and am thinking I might have given myself some type of infection, which I guess can happen from a bleeding bladder. I'm gonna drink lots of water and cranberry juice, and if it doesn't go away in 2-3 days, time to visit the good ole doctor. Hopefully, my meeting the HK standard won't come at too heavy of a price, crossing my fingers. No pictures...were you expecting some?