This week was 61 miles of running, 6 "miles" of pool-running, and 9 miles walking/jogging/cheering at the Marine Corps Marathon. I'll call it 76 miles for the week.
More tweaking of meds. To make a complicated issue as simple as possible - basically I take medications that replace the neurotransmitter dopamine (what my body is not producing very well now). If I take too little of these medications, then my muscles don't want to relax (because they never get the message from the brain to do so). If I take too much, then my muscles keep contracting (because they're constantly being told to do so). Two different things, but they feel very similar. The biggest differences are that I'm a bit weaker with too little dopamine, but my muscles are stiff in a predicable, steady way (like the day after a marathon). If I have too much, then I'm much stronger, but my muscles contract suddenly and sometimes unpredictably. It's pretty annoying.
I also take medications that can extend the duration of how long I can go between dopamine doses, or that can dampen the effects of too much dopamine medication. At the beginning of October my doctor and I decided to slightly increase one of the medications that dampens the effect of too much dopamine - the hope was that I could reap the benefits of more dopamine (being stronger and faster) without the costs (tight muscles that contract suddenly). Increasing this medication meant that I had to lower my normal dopamine dose slightly to counteract the boosting effect of this medication. It seemed like a small, almost negligible change that would hopefully yield some benefit.
After three weeks, I've decided that I was better off with the previous regimen. My running has slowed over the past few weeks, and when I tried to add a tiny bit more dopamine to see if it would help, it made things worse instead.
Example 1 was Tuesday's marathon pace workout - I felt a bit sluggish and tight during the first 5 miles, so I took a tiny (1/4 tablet) dose of dopamine before the second 5 mile set. And then things went massively downhill (in a figurative, not literal sense).
I wasn't sure if this was just a random thing or bonking or dehydration, so on Thursday I tried the slightly higher dose again. And same thing. Even my 100m strides on the track were stuck at just over 8 minute pace. And I could tell what was happening: when we run, our quads contract eccentrically with each stride just after the foot makes contact with the ground. On Thursday my quads were massively overcontracting (if that wasn't a word before, it is now). The faster I tried to run, the harder my quads contracted, slamming the brakes on each stride.
So that was a failed experiment. After Thursday, I decided to go back to the previous regimen, which was working decently for me. Saturday's tempo felt a bit better, though still rough. It takes a few days for the effects of a medication change to be fully seen (there's an immediate effect and a long tail effect) so we'll have to see what the next week brings.
Dailies:
Monday: 4 "miles" of pool-running and 8 miles very easy (9:57) plus drills and four hill sprints, followed by upper body weights/core. Foam rolling in evening.
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