Generally, people say that post-race you should take one day of rest per mile raced. So, for a half-marathon that equates to about two weeks. I can’t say I disagree. I mean, I need time to heal and get my legs back to a state where I don’t feel achy or wobbly. At this point the immediate soreness that I felt on Monday has faded. That doesn’t mean that I’m ready to go though. Internally, I’m still working though a few fatigue issues as is exhibited by yesterday’s post. I might be ready to go by Sunday, but meanwhile I need to work harder on being lazy. After work today I decided to take a long walk. About 65 minutes later I was really feeling a lot of discomfort under my left heel. If I were to compare it to something, I’d say it felt like it was bruised. Makes sense to me. So, question is: why am I not resting my legs more and just taking it easy? Why am I forcing myself to stay active? What does it prove? Why am I willing to risk injury? Seriously. I really need to force myself to really consider the importance of rest and regeneration. These rules of thumb exist for a reason.
Tag Archive: injury
Uncomfortable reminder
It’s been a while since I’ve complained about this phenomenon on this blog, but today with the onset of warmer weather I’ve been reintroduced to the associated discomfort. After training for so long during the cold weather months I was caught off guard by today’s humidity. It was a bit odd because there was rain forecasted, but nothing was really falling from the sky. The rain only came down during my run, but only in short bursts. Frankly, those few moments of rain were a welcome respite. The rain cooled me down, as well as relieved a bit of my pain. Oh, what pain? Well, the humidity was causing me to sweat more than I have been in the past while. At around the 5K mark or so I started noticing a bit of nipple soreness. Al I could think was “Oh hell no!” I didn’t want to deal with that on my longest training run during the current training cycle, and certainly not so early into it. Since it was so early, I immediately started worrying about it progressing to the point of bleeding. This is not how I wanted things to go. I swear, the only equivalent I can think of is someone taking sandpaper to your nipples and applying slowly and lightly.
I managed to get myself to a point where the pain was tolerable and not distracting. Of course, when I got home and took off my shirt, that’s the point where I really noticed how bad things were. I didn’t want to take a shower right away because I knew I’d be in for a world of pain if I did. Anyway, I guess the point of all this is that often I forget about these small necessary things when it comes to training. It takes a bit of physical discomfort to remind me of these things.
Too early to panic
Yes, indeed, it’s too early to panic. The bruises and the strain that I picked up yesterday are still with me today. My knees have some large dark areas that look like they’re about to turn purple by tomorrow. I haven’t yet taken any time to apply ice over the areas, but I will. It’s not that I can’t run with them, but they’re just far too distracting. I don’t want to end up racing while being constantly reminded of my tender areas.
As for my right calf, I knew that I had a tube of some Motrin Active Pain Relief in my bathroom cabinet. The cream was a full-sized sample that came in the race kit for last year’s Angus Glen Half Marathon. Seriously, that’s one cool thing about Angus Glen (besides their awesome lunch offerings): their kits usually have full-sized samples of useful stuff. Well, I popped it open and rubbed it into my right calf. The thing smelled like a cross between toothpaste and a medicine cabinet. It certainly worked rather well. My calf isn’t feeling quite so bad, but I still feel the issue there. Word of warning: if you ever use a muscle cream, make sure to wash your hands afterwards. I didn’t after applying, and minutes later my was feeling both warm and numb.
On top of all of this, I picked up a strained left shoulder this morning. I was talking to a colleague about my exploits last night, and during a moment of enthusiastic re-enactment I pulled something. Honestly, I can’t help but feel like my whole body is sort of rebelling against me. Sure, that’s kind of an exaggeration, but all of this pain is just poorly timed. I still have tomorrow to rest and heal myself. I have to trek over to Burlington to pick up my kit. After that I have to get to my improv class. I need to make sure I don’t over do it like I did last night. No more mistakes. This is it: I have to take things seriously!
The stein and the cookie junkie
All this time I’ve been saying that I need to be careful with my legs such that I’ll be rested and uninjured for my big race. And yet, here I am lying in bed with a sore left knee and a strained right calf. What the heck happened? Well, really it’s been a rather full night. Again, I wasn’t really intending on it being a full night, but hey, what are you going to do, right?
After work, I went over to an Irish pub close to Yonge and Bloor to meet an old colleague. I hadn’t seen him in months. It was good to get a chance to bitch about the state of work and how everything is becoming a strange stage play of intrigue, possibilities, in-fighting and backstabbing. Oh yes, indeed. I started out with a pint of Strongbow, which was nice and mellow. I didn’t intend on drinking all that much, but after we finished our first drinks I ordered a pint of Sapporo. My colleague did the same. After a while, my colleague peered over and saw a guy at the bar drinking from this big-ass mug. We were both so taken by the size that we asked the server what the deal was with the mug. She corrected us and informed us that it was a stein. She said that we could order one of three beers with it. I think my colleague was reluctant, but I decided to dive right in and egged him on to do the same. Well, when the steins arrived we were in sheer shock over how big the damn things were. Sure, they didn’t look so big when the other guy had it, but to us they were enormous. To our Asian sensibilities it was perhaps a bit more than we could handle, but we were determined. Those steins were our Everest. We did eventually conquer them, but only after some hesitation. By the end of the steins we decided to just end it. After paying our bills we parted ways. I decided to walk eastward to at least burn off some of what I had just ingested.
So what happened after drinking? Why am I slightly sore and injured? Find out more after the jump!
Slip on the ice
Interesting how I spoke about bad footing last night. During this morning’s run the temperature was hovering at around freezing. Due to the wavering temperatures there was an inordinate amount of ice and slush on the ground. The route has this long downhill aspect to it. I accompanied someone at the back of the group. As we were going down the hill we were careful to avoid the pools of cold water that were collecting at street corners. At one point, I ran around one of the puddles while the other person jumped it. Due to the slippery conditions though she ended up jamming her right foot. Brutal!
I immediately had flashbacks to last year when I slipped on an ice patch myself. We stopped, then walked it out for a bit. She tried to start going again, but the discomfort was just too much. I tried to be positive about it: at least we have a week to go before race day. She has an opportunity to ice things down and get her feet back into good condition. So, all isn’t lost, right? Still, I recognized the sudden sense of panic that came over her. I did my best to get her to relax and refocus. Yes, we walked back for the majority of the route, but I think I did a good job getting her to not feel sorry for herself. Injuries are a fact of this sport, yes? We can do all of the preventative things possible, but every now and then something will sneak in there and throw you off course. All you can do is just deal with it as best you can, then move on.
We still have a week left. I do not want to be injured.
Fear of bad footing
The weather outside is rather mild. On my way to the subway station earlier today, as soon as i stepped out of my building I was greeted with a couple of drops of water on my head. At first I assumed I was just getting hit by water dripping from the power lines up above, but I quickly realized that it was actually light rain; it was far too warm for the moisture to actually be snow. The day before, the sidewalks were caked in snow. Back then, as I walked my ankles were being bent this way and that. It’s a wonder I didn’t break anything because the thick unshovelled snow was making my ankles bend in ways that they were not meant to bend. Well, today, with the milder weather, the snow on the sidewalk turned into pools of cold slush and collected water.
My biggest problem with all of the weird weather at the moment is the general fear of stepping on something that will cause me to lose my footing. How, or why is this even a fear? Well, I’m getting really close now to the Chilly Half Marathon in Burlington, and after last year’s disappointment I really don’t want a repeat of what happened. If you recall, after months of dedicated training, I had slipped on an ice patch just outside of a subway station. I wasn’t even running at the time. I was just walking along minding my own business, then *BAM*. I thought I’d be able to continue but the act of limping to the hotel to pick up my race kit on the day before the race was enough to make me reconsider. And so, that’s why I have this fear this year.
As a result of me teaching the clinic, I’ve really trained cleanly this during this cycle, making the majority of the required runs. I’ve put much effort into getting things just right, and I’ve made so many improvements. We’ve been so fortunate weather-wise this year. Instead of getting beaned continuously by volley after volley of heavy snow like last year, or like the United States this year, we’ve gotten off fairly lightly. That’s part of the reason why I’ve been able to train like I have. And now it’s getting so close to the time where I have the ability to test out how well I’ve trained. Perhaps I’m putting way too much pressure on myself. Sure, it’s rather normal to want to do well, however, more than ever I just don’t want to fail due to something out of my control. I don’t want to be disappointed again. Yes, maybe I could just hide out at my place and not venture outside for the next week, but that would just be silly, would it not? All I can do is trust that I’ll be able to make it to next Sunday without any issues. No injuries, right?!
Hardcore discomfort
I think I really put a heck of a lot of effort into yesterday’s run and subsequent plyometrics class because I’ve been really sore since this morning. It’s not even with only one muscle group. I can feel it in my glutes, quads, hamstrings, inner thighs. As you can imagine, moving around was totally difficult today. Sitting down anywhere was an ordeal. I’ve had to slowly lower myself until I kind of just plop down. After work, I decided to try to walk it out, but I totally felt every single nuance in the sidewalk’s slope. Even the slightest uphill section became this large mound that I had to tread gently on. I couldn’t hold my usual stride, so all of my steps were slow and deliberate. I walked like this all while at least attempting to maintain some semblance of control and/or dignity. It’s all I could do.
On the one hand, I’m just plain tired and wish that I didn’t have to deal with this discomfort. On the other hand I know that my leg muscles will become even stronger after they recover. That will help me out immensely when running. So, I guess that means that I’m willing to just put up with it all. The only other times that I’ve dealt with such discomfort have been right after my large races, but even then the discomfort from those is usually localized. I just haven’t had so many leg muscle groups affected all at once before. It’s a strange feeling.
Anyway, tomorrow is another day. Hopefully I’ll be better off by tomorrow morning or else my run later in the evening is going to be torturous.
Jason vs. stabbing pain
I had just gotten off the streetcar and was on my way down to track level to get to the subway. I had hill training planned and needed to get home early enough to make it up north to join my group. I had full intentions of getting in a short nap on the subway to get some rest in before my planned vigorous activities. As I walked down the stairs though, I must have misstepped or something because all of a sudden my right knee was attacked with this stabbing pain right below my right knee cap. My walk turned into a limp. The seats on the subway aren’t known for being roomy, so when I sat down my legs were put in some weird position that I could extricate myself easily from without kicking some old woman in the ribs. So I sat like that, and eventually the pain kind of faded. However, when my stop came and I got up it all came rushing back. Walking home from the station was difficult. When I got home, I just had to sit down and think. What now?
I’ve had this type of knee pain before in the past. Usually it clears pretty quickly. Sometimes I’m actually able to run on it on the same day. So, I decided to give myself half an hour to decide what to do. I started getting ready and even tried dashing around my condo just to see if I could handle the load. In the end, knowing how tough a workout hill training is, I decided to not go. I emailed my group leaders and emailed the store manager to inform them all of my situation. I wanted to ensure that my group was covered. In the end, I got wind that they were all fine.
It really gets me down whenever things like this happen. I mean, I really want to be there for my people. The manager made sure to remind me though that if I’m injured, I’m injured. It’s not like I’m shirking my responsibilities, right? Once again, the best thing I can do now is to rest well so that by the time Sunday comes around I’ll be ready to make the week’s long run.
Recent Comments