The good, the bad and the ugly

The Good:
Over the past week or so I have managed to alter my foot strike and gait just slightly in order to minimize the pain in my foot. I was worried this might just transfer the pain elsewhere (to my knee or hip) but, so far, all is well. My foot still hurts but it is much less than before and certainly not enough to quit running.

The Bad:
This past Wednesday my training called for a tempo run. This requires me to run harder than normal for short intervals. As soon as I started the first speed interval my foot hurt. A lot. Being the smart person that I am, I ignored the voice in my head that said "You should probably stop" and I pushed through the rest of the run. My foot was very sore for the next day. Lucky for me, the next day was a rest day and after that I had a day of cross training before I had to run again, so there was time to recover. However, it seemed clear that tempo runs aren't going to be happening while my foot is still hurting. This is unfortunate because these runs are what help you increase your endurance.

The Ugly:
Wednesday was also the day I went to see the sports medicine doc. He took X-rays and ordered an MRI. On Friday we got the results. The verdict? I have a stress fracture in the second metatarsal bone of my left foot. For lack of a better word, this sucks. The doctor was sympathetic to my situation and told me it was up to me as to how much I run on it but he would advise lots of cross training and no running until it heals (i.e. stops hurting). There's no way to know exactly how long that would be but probably many weeks. As dedicated as I am, there's no way I'm good enough to do only cross training for the next 10 weeks and then go and run 26.2 miles. So, given that my foot isn't hurting that much now that I've learned how to run on it, I'm going to continue with my training as is, probably ditching the tempo runs, and just see how it goes. I ran 6 miles yesterday with no problem. If, as I continue to increase my mileage, the pain gets worse then I'll reasses the situation at that time. I've just come too far (and I'm too damn stubborn) to throw in the towel at this point.