Ft. Lauderdale Shamrock 4 Miler RR and Surgery Recovery Update

Yesterday, I ran the Ft. Lauderdale Shamrock 4 Miler.  I was planning on running it and having fun, since I have been pretty slow on my runs and I didn't feel I had any speed on these legs right now.

Recovery has been going well, with me running 25 miles and the knee feeling great.  Still doing PT until next week (4 more visits) and they are giving me hard workouts while there.  It's like a strength training coach, let me tell you.  My legs are getting leaner and all I can think of is to continue these workouts in the future to see if I can lean all over, LOL.

This week was supposed to be a 35 mile week only and hence I thought the race would be a nice fun race.  I also ran at PT a couple of days, and I ran with my husband on Tuesday (5 miles) that I had not planned, so I finished the week at 41 miles and a 10 miler as my longest run.  And the knee is responding beautifully.

On Thursday, I woke up with a bad migraine, throwing up and stuff.  So, I had to cancel PT at the last minute, canceled Pilates and moved my 7 miles to Friday.  I wanted that rest day on Friday just in case I felt I could try to run fast on the race, but the migraine threw those plans out the window.  I felt better on Friday, so went to PT, and ran my 7 after Pilates.  PT was hard on Friday, where she had me hopping on the bad leg all over the place.  She was satisfied with what she saw, but it just showed me how much weaker that leg is.  By the third set I was leaning to the side and grabbing the wall several times.  Oh, well.  I suspect she will have me doing this again.  She also had me jumping and doing plyo work on both legs earlier that week and that went well.

So, with my knee sore from this and the 7 miles, I knew I was definitely taking the race easy.  I dressed in a cute Lucky Charms outfit from INKnBURN but didn't have time to shop for a hat or put makeup on since I went to bed at midnight and barely slept 5 hours.  



Parked near the start and got my bib and shirt.  Went and had some breakfast (banana and Ensure) and did a 1 mile warmup.  Since I wasn't planning on racing, I only did the mile to complete 5 for the day.  Had I known how my knee would feel, I would've run 3.

I met some of my friends and took a couple of pictures and lined up at the start.  It was around 69-70F and the dewpoint was OK (mid 60s); nothing too humid nor hot, but still, the first miles were towards the East and the sun, so they felt really hot.

Mile 1 - I went by feel to see how the knee would feel and I have to say I was a bit conservative.  I also had to weave around walkers and slower people since I lined up pretty towards the back thinking I would take it easy, little did I know, so the first mile was a bit slow but way faster than I had expected.  I have not even run faster than 11:30-11:46mm since I started running after surgery, so 10:10 as the first mile was pleasantly surprising.

Mile 2 - I grabbed a water at Mile 2 and decided to see if I could sustain the same pace as Mile 1 all throughout.  I was coughing a bit but my chest/asthma was doing great, especially without any long term meds. I used albuterol that morning because during my warmup I started coughing but otherwise, not a peep.  This mile included the turnaround back to the start so I slowed down a bit during it (I was running 9:4X) before.  When the mile came up it said 9:59mm and I was again, surprised in a good way.

Mile 3 - Mile 3 included the last water station and, although the crowd had spread a little, it was still a bit busy so I slowed down a bit to take some water.  Running towards the sun was a bit hard so I was thirsty, ha.  I was again running around 9:4X but finished at 9:57mm because of that.  Still felt strong.

Mile 4 - Mile 4 started with me feeling like I couldn't keep the pace.  Silly me since I started the mile in the 9:20s and later got up to 9:40s but I stopped watching the GPS after 3.5 and just gave it my all.  Saw the finish line and didn't even notice the clock.  Just push as more as I could, pose for a pic and finished. I had not looked at the GPS and I should have since the mile was sub-9!

A few days ago, I was hoping to break 45 minutes on this race to see if I could even run that fast.  I finished in 38:59, which is awesome!  Not what I could do before surgery, but at 6 weeks post surgery, I feel like my speed is coming back.

Very happy to have run this as I did and to have felt great throughout.  It was a boost of confidence to have the knee say absolutely nothing.  If I had rested yesterday and had not been dehydrated from the migraine, or if I had run a 3 mile warmup maybe I could have run closer to 38:30. But I don't care.  It was even faster than I hoped, and a benchmark to work towards my next race.


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