Glancing back through my training log it strikes me that I have spent November and December intercoursing the penguin, as we used to quip at Live Update Guy.
This isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
In the Before-Time, when I was still racing cyclocross, September through December felt like one big pile of miles, perhaps because it was.
In my Golden Years, the glide from summer through autumn into winter seems better suited to a gradual change of pace. Trail runs, hikes, short rides; that sort of thing. Shake the old brain-box like a dice cup, see what comes rattling out, seven, 11, or snake-eyes.
This year the numbers told me I was getting slightly carried away for a geezer who wasn’t training for anything other than staying on the sunny side of the sod. I was grinding out weeks of 100, 120, even 150 miles. Which can be fun. But it burns an awful lot of daylight for a cat wrangler-slash-cook-slash-blogger who Frankensteined his dead podcast back to life around Halloween for no discernible reason. And come November I was starting to feel rode hard and put away wet.
So I backed off. A lot. Maybe too much. Running three or four days a week, doing a leisurely hour here and there on the bike, mostly on trails. At first it was nice to ease off the accelerator, but after a while this old endorphin junkie was jonesin’ for his fix.
This past week I did three short trail runs — but I also managed four rides, including a pair of back-to-back two-hour outings on my Soma Saga touring bikes, which had been dangling dolefully on their hooks for far too long. They’re stout and sturdy, with fenders and rear racks, and I’m not inclined to do anything wild with ’em; just turn the pedals over until I get tired of it.
A ride of two hours or better not only refills the endorphin tank — it puts the Voices in my head to sleep for a spell, same as a car ride does a crying infant. It’s another welcome change of pace to have only the one murmuring to itself in there as the year winds down.
Mad Blog Media 
Ah, a Soma Saga is certainly the bike to go out on and get lost in the “zone” for a couple of hours. And, when you get back nothing hurts. ‘Tis a lucky man indeed that has two Sagas. Right now I am nursing a suspected plantar facia injury in my right foot. I can’t even go for a walk for the next few days. But, I remember how it hurt when plantar faciitis (SP?) hit me 35 years ago, and I ain’t ready for an instant replay.
Ow wow yow zow. I feel your pain. I felt it when it was my pain, too.
I don’t remember whether my heel issue was officially diagnosed as plantar fasciitis, but I took it to a podiatrist, who recommended expensive custom orthotics. I tried ’em, thought the cure nearly as intolerable as the ailment, and went back to Superfeet insoles (orange). I also dialed back the running for a while, and eventually the problem eased up.
I suspect that my issue was the result of so much cyclocross training and racing in MTB shoes. Lots of dismounts at speed and running uphill on uneven surfaces in bad weather, wearing a perfectly rideable bike over one shoulder.
Here’s hoping your PF clears up without further intervention by the whitecoats.
Ah POB I feels for ya with the PF. It’s such a piddly, downstream injury that you cannot see, cannot figure out from whence it came, yet is painful as hell. I ditched it years back by wearing one of those goofy socks with a strap to bed that won’t let the foot arc, along with some simple arch supports. And the biggie is putting on supportive footwear, even slippers or Chacos the very second you exit bed in the morning. Also, as weird as this sounds, get one of those rolling pin type massagers and work over your calf and thigh muscles, along with hand massage on your Achilles tendon. Turns out when the tendons upstream of the foot itself get tight or adhere to fascia, the PF becomes the whipping boy and the party of pain begins.
Good advice there, Kindly Old Doc Herb. I’d forgotten about putting on supportive footwear first thing. And I’m very bad about stretching, as in doing it mostly never.
My chiropractor, Doc Lori, Dog rest her and keep her, used to grumble that I would make her job ever so much easier if I would only start stretching and take up yoga.
Thanks Herb! I went mostly without shoes around the house today. Pain did not improve. Duh.