hurt again

about 5 Saturday runs into the season, the 14 mile la jolla half marathon course preview, the shit hit the pavement. we met and left for the run at 7:05 AM and headed towards "the hill" which for the record is no hill. its a 450 foot vertical climb in one mile...yowza! i started off doing the 10 minute run, 2 minute walk as prescribed by the coach to alleviate the pounding on my knees, but every time my watch would tell me to walk, the two girls that i most wanted to beat would jog right on past me. then i would get to start running again, quickly catch up only to be passed again when i had to walk. irritating didn't quite cover it, so i just decided to run, no walking at all. i took off, i ran like a woman possessed by the running gods and i wasn't slowing down, not even for the beast of a hill to come. i tackled that bad boy with a vengeance. i felt good, no great. i had a strong stride, my mind was focused on the task at hand and if it started to wonder, i'd slap it back into the present and concentrate on what i had to accomplish. i finally passed by our coach, running in the opposite direction, and he said i was doing great, i wasn't far behind our top runners and to keep it up. hell yeah i was gonna keep it up. i was rockin it! so that's what i did. i finished about 5 min behind our two seasoned runners and a full 10-15 minutes in front of the two girls i had eyes to beat! the problem now was that i literally could not walk. i was in tears. i had pushed way too hard and now i was in so much pain. i waited for everyone to get back and then took myself to the house to ice my aching knees and pray they didn't explode because that is most definitely what it felt like was going to happen. i called the doc as soon as i got in the car and left him a message trying to relay my pain without falling apart on the answering machine. i guess i didn't quite get my point across...he never called me back.