I've lost that running feelin'

It's odd how skills come and go. Sometimes I can kip like the dickens, most times I can't. For several months, running was probably my favorite thing in CrossFit - the Thanksgiving day trail run was a joyful revelation.

Then it all fell apart. Or at least I started falling apart.

My ankle is giving me real grief, and I've lost the thread for my running. Part of it is overthinking it - Gita led a mini workshop on POSE running, and I spend so much energy trying to figure out how to land on the correct part of my foot that I can't just RUN. The other part is that I've been running in my new Puma shoes, which are supposedly good POSE shoes due to the flat sole and lack of cushioning. The downside is that the ankle that I sprained is yelling at me a LOT, particularly after periods of inactivity (ie, sleep), and it has that bruised-bone feeling I was getting before I bought my "bad" running shoes.

I've switched back to my old shoes for running, at least until my ankle heals. It's my hope that the pain is my body adapting to a lifetime of week feet and ankles, and that I can switch back and forth between the shoes, with increasing periods of POSE shoes, until the joints are finally strong enough to handle it. Until then, my running is just going to suck, I guess.

I had some brief periods of feel-good running tonight. Every time it happened, I realized I was running heel-strike (ie, wrong). So further adjustment is clearly necessary.

Run 800 Meters
21 Kettlbell Press left 1.5p/1.0P
21 Kettlebell Press right 1.5p/1.0P
Run 800 Meters
21 Kettlbell Push-Press left 1.5p/1.0P
21 Kettlebell Push-Press right 1.5p/1.0P
Run 800 Meters
21 Kettlebell Push-Jerk left 1.5p/1.0P
21 Kettlebell Push-Jerk right 1.5p/1.0P

32:07, 1p press, 1.25p push-press & jerk
Splits: 9:54 | 11:24 | 10:39

This was not a good time, compared to others, but I'm still pleased. I got that gray kettlebell over my head 84 times, and while I wouldn't say it felt EASY, I would say it felt solid. I even got the black up a handful of times afterwards in practicing.

Ever since the disastrous (and infamous) KB ladder that wrecked my shoulder, I've been nervous about putting heavy bells above my head. They just didn't feel stable, like my elbow could bend the wrong direction, or the whole thing could crash on my head. I didn't have that problem tonight. There was some aching going on in the shoulder, but nothing alarming. And I think I might be getting the hang of the KB jerk - they felt distinctly different from the push-press tonight. One mental cue that I found helped was to think of my bicep and forearm as a platform that the bell was simply resting on, and my job was NOT to push it up, but simply to jump it up off the platform. Once the bell was airborne (and therefore weightless), I could activate my arm muscles to guide it up, but not until then. For whatever reason, thinking about it in this way made it considerably easier.

Several of us stayed after for a while to practice heavy KB snatches. We're all clearly worried about Saturday's Firebreather WOD: 100 1.5p KB snatches for time. I did a few with each hand and, while HARD, felt fairly stable, which is reassuring. I still think it may take me 30 minutes to do this WOD, but that's OK: when it's done, I'll have another Level II skill checked off, and that thought makes me happy.