I've been worried about this race owing to a nagging knee-cap injury. I've had more or less swelling due to water-on-the-knee from an injury back in January where I slipped on a chartered sailboat in the BVIs and whacked my knee. It was swollen but okay when I ran the B&A marathon in March, but has gotten tighter and more sore in training since, especially going down hills. I had gotten to the point of walking downstairs sideways.

So, I went to the orthopod yesterday and got about 6cc of fluid drained (aspirated?) from the outside of my left kneecap. Looked like pee! After that, he injected 2ccs of cortisone. It felt better almost instantly. After I got up this morning, I was bouncing down the stairs to make coffe and was half-way down before I realized it had been at least a month since it had last been that easy. So now I'm all psyched for the marathon on Sunday. No pain, so no worries.

We're now 9 days to the Frederick (locally and affectionately refered to as "Fredneck") marathon (Here). As usual, I don't feel ready. My left knee is swollen (on the outside, water on the knee) and hurts. I went to the Dr. and he said I'm not damaging it. But it aches all the time. And my left ankle hurts too. In fact my left shoulder hurts as well. Maybe this is because I'm not left-leaning enough? And I have trouble breathing this time of year -- allergies of some kind or another.

This will be my fourth marathon, so I guess I no longer worry about finishing. I'm pretty comfortable with that. It's just the manner of the finish. I think my hopes of breaking 4:30 are not realistic this time around.  I ran 5 tempo miles Wednesday and 12 easy miles yesterday (Thursday). The easy miles were much harder than they should have been. I'm concerned about how well this marathon will go.

My plan for the next 9 days is to run an easy 5 miles Monday, get the Dr. to look at my knee again Tuesday, run an easy 2 miles Thursday and then do the Marathon on Sunday. I'm hoping the Dr. can drain the fluid and inject something to keep it from bothering me. That was what he indicated when last I saw him, anyway.

Straining onward...