UPDATE: This is the New Normal?

I traded some e-mails with Mario Fraioli, another semi-elite runner who had the exact same injury as me during the summer of 2009, and he noted the following:

I still feel these symptoms to this day. Some days worse than other but no increase in sharp pain. Just a dull ache that is bad some days, not so bad on others. Hard to pinpoint it, but worse after hills, coughing, prolonged periods of sitting or any other extended period of my midsection being crunched in some way.

Can't answer this definitively, but I've had symptoms to some degree for most of the last year. That said, they haven't kept me from training, though my volume/intensity is far from high (65 miles was my biggest week this year).

Basically, keep an eye on it and use pain as your guide to dictate increases in volume/intensity. Take a little longer than usual to recover after your first few workouts and monitor how you respond to particular sessions (and situations, ie sitting, bending down, etc., outside of running). Also, are you doing any targeted core work?

It's amazing how spot on his assessment is - it mirrors mine to the "T". Mario has been dealing with his issue for close to 18 months vis-a-vis my 6. The only thing he doesn't have is my upper, right leg issue, which, in all honesty, is the straw that breaks my back. Obviously this isn't a good sign of what's to come, but at least I know I am not going backwards and all this achiness is "normal".

COMING SOON: 2010 Year in Review...