Cause for Concern?

The training plan called for 12 miles today, a distance I've been banging out lately without too much thought. Acknowledging that my hips are sore, I thought I might cut it back a bit,perhaps to 10, or even 8. With that mindset as I set out on a beautiful morning, I was disappointed to feel such an acute pain in my left hip (the one which has never bothered me before), that I stopped after a mile to stretch, then turned around less than a half-mile later. I logged a little under 3 miles, and ran straight into the gym, where I did 45 minutes on the elliptical machine, which didn't cause the flaring pain on each step that I experienced while running.

I'm not exactly panicking (yet!), but I'd be lying if I didn't admit being a bit nervous about missing key mileage and especially Sunday's goal marathon pace run. I will stretch, ice and foam roll tonight, try a few easy miles on the nice soft trails tomorrow and then play Sunday's run by ear. I can't imagine being able to run that far at MP, but I'd like see where I am. If I'm too sore to do it this weekend, I may throw 10 or more MP miles into the following Sunday's 17-mile run.

Hope you're running healthy and strong, and good luck to all my friends, forum-mates and others who are running the Boston Marathon on Monday, April 21st.

-ESG