Welp, that sucked. DNF at TNF 50.

I had already decided I was done when I took this. Barely made it past sunrise.

Emotions are pretty raw at the moment.

Saturday morning I started The North Face 50 Mile Endurance Challenge. I barely made it past dawn.

The pain in my foot started manageable. I thought, ‘If it stays like this, I’ll be good to go.’

It didn’t.

I ran about 10 miles and was moving well. When I was hiking hard up the 3rd major climb of the day, I started to run again and I felt an excruciating, stabbing pain in my right foot. I walked the next three miles to the Tennessee Valley aid station where Stacy and Steve were waiting to cheer me on and called it a day just after dawn at mile 13.6.

I have no idea what is wrong with my foot. It went from discomfort this week to not being able to walk without excruciating pain.

Warning Signs

All things considered, this training block went really well. I was careful.

But something was just off this week. I know my body. I know normal aches and pains and I know when something drifts into the realm of more serious.

I think the fact that this pain popped up so close to race day made me feel like it was just a touch of taper-itis and was all in my mind.

It wasn’t. It was in my fucking foot.

If I am thinking back critically, I think the culprit was racing the 10k last weekend in new-ish shoes that were too narrow for my foot. I think that may have started a chain reaction that left me in this predicament.

Aftermath

Stacy and Steve lovingly drove me back to Steve’s. We had a delicious breakfast at MH Bread and Butter, which was a positive.

I can’t seem to walk which is a negative.

I immediately called kaiser to get an appointment and got it x-rayed Saturday afternoon. Nothing showed up and I was left with a plantar fasciitis diagnosis but that didn’t seem right.

Ah, the self-diagnosis.

Well. It could be a few things.

1. Based on the pain, it feels broken. But there isn’t any swelling or bruising and the x-rays were negative so that seems unlikely.
2. Another option could be stress fracture. Although x-rays were negative, based on random people’s opinions on the internet, stress fractures don’t often show up on x-rays so you need either a bone scan or MRI. (I’ll be working on convincing my doctor to order those for me tomorrow).
3. After a google deep dive, severe foot sprain is also in the cards. I don’t know much about this, though. I think this is what I am hoping for.
4. The last and possibly most likely option is a severe case of plantar fasciitis. I’m pretty sure this is worst case scenario based on Nick’s 2.5 year odyssey.

Now what?

After an unsatisfying kaiser appointment on Saturday, I had another appointment Monday afternoon with my regular doctor. I went into this with three clear goals:

1. Hopefully I’ll get a more satisfying diagnosis
2. Getting a walking boot to help me move around
3. Developing a clear plan of attack.

Needless to say, I am super bummed out right now. Not so much because of the DNF but because I can’t even walk. I can’t help Stacy around the house. I can’t walk the dog. Of course, I can’t run at the moment either, but walking is the priority.

If I am off my feet for an extended period of time, I have a feeling I might be increasing my blog posts to more than once per week.

I am going to have a lot of shit on my mind.

[Update: Monday, 11/27: I got a bone scan and it showed a break in cuboid bone. Looks like boot for 4 weeks and limited activity for 4 more weeks and I should be able to slowly get back into running after that. Could be worse.]