PIM e-mail -- Hot shower vs ice bath

Here's an e-mail I sent out to the people I suckered into joining my running group/training:

Hi Happy Little Runners~

Hope your all sticking to your training schedules and are starting to enjoy the feeling of accomplishment after completing your workout. I rarely enjoy the beginning of a run, but the feeling after makes it worth it all.
"Why do I like to run?"
"Because it feels so good when I stop!"

Some of y'all seemed to be MIA on Wednesday....You missed a good discussion on stretching. A handout is on the PIM website.

One thing that was mentioned was taking a hot shower and then stretching on the unusual occasion when you're not able to stretch right after a run. I'm assuming she said hot to warm up your muscles. But hot showers/baths are BAD after a run.

The best thing after a long, hard run is an ICE BATH.
Luckily, y'all aren't doing the mileage yet to get you to this point. I decided to do one after the Houston 1/2 marathon & I could tell that it really, really helped. (Plus, I had a beer and burger along with me in the tub.)

Something about cold preventing the lactic acid from building up, which is what makes your legs feel heavy later. I had read a lot about it on the Houston Fit discussion board & finally decided to give it a shot & I am glad I did.
A couple of hours after my long run on Sunday (6.2miles) I took a hot bubble bath. When I went to run Tuesday (rained out on Monday) my legs felt horrible. Of course, I also have run 26 miles this month so far and only ran 2.3 the entire month of February so that probably contributed quite a bit. But the pain was weird. It wasn't until after I was looking up if any one advocates a hot shower after a run (no one does that I could find) that I connected the heavy leg feeling and the hot bath.

Proceeded with care....
And have FUN!

Wahoo!
Anna

Bonus e-mail!
I forgot to suggest in my last e-mail to keep a log of your time & distance running. (Distance may be difficult for you now, but you can guesstimate.)
I've been discouraged at some of my times lately, but looked back at what I was doing in July when I started & then I realized how far I have come. It's been a big boost!

I use the training log on RunnersWorld.com, which is free & I like a lot. There is a route section whereyou get a street map and you can plot the points you run & it calculates the mileage. It was pretty easy to learn to use.
Also, it's sometimes surprising to see how many total miles are run. I just hit 60 for the year!

Wahoo (again)!
Anna

PS - Another way to track progress is to blog. My friend Viv, who I met in PIM last Fall & am running the Seabrook 1/2 marathon relay with on Saturday has been blogging about her training (and 60 pound weight loss!). After reading her blog for a couple of months http://imnotfittorun.blogspot.com/ I started doing my own http://anna-omaly.blogspot.com/ which helps me stay motivated.