PUBLISHED 10/20/2006
Khalid Khannouchi was at Friday's elite athlete press conference for Sunday's LaSalle Bank Chicago Marathon, but only to help unveil a new shoe his sponsor, New Balance, was launching during race week. Because of a bruised bone in his right foot that he got during April's Flora London Marathon, Khannouchi won't be on the starting line.
He stepped on a rock around mile 17 or 18 of the race, Khannouchi said, but thought nothing of it. It hurt when it happened, but when he finished the race in just over 2:07 in fourth place, he was pleased and pain free, he said. It wasn't until he began doing twice a day training again several weeks later that he discovered he had a problem.
"I wanted to get prepared for Chicago," Khannouchi said. "I didn't want to take time off because I had had so much time off recently because of the injuries (to his other foot). So, I was getting right back into training. I took two days off after the race, then started running again. When I started training twice a day was when I noticed it."
He had a bone scan, MRI, and other tests, which showed the bone bruise, he said. And the injury has been slow to heal. He's still running five to six days a week and will go in for follow up tests on Tuesday, hoping that he'll get the all clear to start back to full training again.
"I don't want to take any chances and train on it when it's still hurt," Khannouchi said. "The big city races come around every year, but the Olympics are only every four years. I want to make sure I'm healthy for the Olympic Trials next year. If I get back to training soon, I hope to run a spring marathon, but if I don't then the goal is to run the trials. I want to run some short races to prepare, but the goal is to be healthy for the Olympic Trials."
