I finished IMWI, i took about 3 weeks off from any running. I just started runing again last week for the philly marathon. My feet, hammies, and shins are killing me now. I never had any serious pain while training for my IM. My first run back wasn’t a killer distance it was about 5 miles.
What is the deal?
You probably need a little more time to recover. I experienced the same thing after my first marathon. I took another week off and I was fine.
Congratulations of finishing IMWI! What an amazing feat (maybe common place on this forum, but still an incredible thing to do, and it sure impresses me).
When you are doing an IM, you are repetitively straining every muscle in your body. You are also creating a ton of lactic acid, which is the by-product of muscle action. Lactic acid causes your muscle to contract, and to go into spasm (not a cramp, but a knot in the muscle). Your body has the ability to flush out lactic acid, but not at the rate you are creating it. As a result, your muscles are on overfill. As the muscles contract, they put pressure on the origination and insertion points. The fibers are just too short to do their work properly.
You need a really good, really deep muscle, massage. You’ll be pleased when you see the results that a good massage therapist can give. She/he will press out the lactic acid, which will therefore draw blood into the muscle, which nourishes the fibers. If you stretch afterward (but not before) you’ll feel fantastic.
You can read about why muscles cause pain at: www.julstro.com. It will make sense to you and will explain why a 5 mile run was overtaxing your body. It’s just logical, and it will ease your mind when you see that you can reverse this problem quickly.
Wishing you well,
Julie Donnelly