Returned from physio today, following a full treatment including acupuncture. Physio was impressed with my rapid healing, gave me some additional strengthening exercises. I am optimistic that I will be able to run in 7-10 days, as long as I continue on the same trajectory. Early morning today was a pull workout (back, traps, biceps) with some core work, then an 18 mile stationary bike ride that took ~55mins. Felt a small amount of fatigue in my quads at the beginning of the ride, but things went better after that. Legs were likely recovering from the 28.40 mile ride yesterday that took 90 mins, plus the leg weights day from Wednesday. Nevertheless, I feel like I am maintaining my fitness, but itching to get off the bike and onto a run.
Picked up a couple of books from Amazon, namely Relentless Forward Progress, as well as Kilian Jornet's book, Run or Die.
I will do a review once I have finished them both, but excited to get into them. Also, I was looking at Stridebox - figured it could help keep me motivated through the pending cold months.
That's it for today. Happy trails.
Showing posts with label achilles tendonitis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label achilles tendonitis. Show all posts
Friday, September 6, 2013
Wednesday, September 4, 2013
3 Ways to Avoid a Running Injury
Training update:
Achilles continues to heal well, virtually no pain/sensation this morning with first steps. Headed to the gym to do a leg workout - Squats, Bulgarian Squats and Straight Legged Deadlifts followed by a 60ish minute ride on the stationary bike for ~19 miles. Legs felt fine through the squats, with a little bit of sensation in my achilles. Treatment continues with heat, stretching and ice as well as a follow-up physio/acupuncture treatment on Friday. Plan is another week off of running, pending that appointment and hopefully back the week following. If Friday goes well, I will start to get excited.
3 Ways to Avoid a Running Injury
These are all from personal experience as I have thought long and hard over what I have done to aggravate my leg, with no prior history of this type of injury.
1) Increase your mileage too quickly: Apparently a no-brainer, but in my case I went from 50ish miles to 80 in virtually a week with Week 3 at the sustained mileage being when issues started up. Probably a better increase would have been 10ish% which would be 5-10 miles per week.
2) Too much hill work, too quickly: At the same time I increased my hill running to incorporate 800-1000m of vertical climb daily from a typical 200-300m vertical climb. Plus I through in some hill repeats for good measure. While this type of work is generally less strenuous than speed work, the incline of the hills likely caused additional stress/stretching of my calf/achilles. Yes, I win the prize for intelligence.
3) Change your stride/shoes: Probably a better approach would be to phase each of these in over a 4-6 week cycle. My life is about extremes, so why should running be different. I changed shoes to a very lightweight and comfortable pair that had a drop of 4mm instead of my usual 8mm. While this has improved my efficiency and mechanics, in addition to the drills and focussed approach I was taking, it also stressed my calves. Which strained my achilles.
Hopefully the average runner can learn from my stupidity. Though I will likely repeat this again, I am certainly more aware of the smaller causation type relationships to my training approach. I will try to do better. I will try to do better. I will try to do better....
Achilles continues to heal well, virtually no pain/sensation this morning with first steps. Headed to the gym to do a leg workout - Squats, Bulgarian Squats and Straight Legged Deadlifts followed by a 60ish minute ride on the stationary bike for ~19 miles. Legs felt fine through the squats, with a little bit of sensation in my achilles. Treatment continues with heat, stretching and ice as well as a follow-up physio/acupuncture treatment on Friday. Plan is another week off of running, pending that appointment and hopefully back the week following. If Friday goes well, I will start to get excited.
3 Ways to Avoid a Running Injury
These are all from personal experience as I have thought long and hard over what I have done to aggravate my leg, with no prior history of this type of injury.
1) Increase your mileage too quickly: Apparently a no-brainer, but in my case I went from 50ish miles to 80 in virtually a week with Week 3 at the sustained mileage being when issues started up. Probably a better increase would have been 10ish% which would be 5-10 miles per week.
2) Too much hill work, too quickly: At the same time I increased my hill running to incorporate 800-1000m of vertical climb daily from a typical 200-300m vertical climb. Plus I through in some hill repeats for good measure. While this type of work is generally less strenuous than speed work, the incline of the hills likely caused additional stress/stretching of my calf/achilles. Yes, I win the prize for intelligence.
3) Change your stride/shoes: Probably a better approach would be to phase each of these in over a 4-6 week cycle. My life is about extremes, so why should running be different. I changed shoes to a very lightweight and comfortable pair that had a drop of 4mm instead of my usual 8mm. While this has improved my efficiency and mechanics, in addition to the drills and focussed approach I was taking, it also stressed my calves. Which strained my achilles.
Hopefully the average runner can learn from my stupidity. Though I will likely repeat this again, I am certainly more aware of the smaller causation type relationships to my training approach. I will try to do better. I will try to do better. I will try to do better....
Monday, September 2, 2013
Rehab Update
Cycled for 45 mins yesterday clocking ~15 miles, at a fairly decent clip. Didn't have my heart rate monitor on but the pace felt like a Zone 2 effort as I was pumping out 103+ revs/min with ~150 watt output. Achilles felt fine after words.
Today I can feel it a little bit more than over the past few days. Still continuing with heat, stretching and ice 3 times a day. Walked around a bit with the family this morning before the rain came, and felt fine. Plan for this week is 4-5 cycling sessions with 3 at 45ish mins and one at 75ish mins. I will also try to get another physio/acupuncture treatment in this week, but it is pretty expensive. I am hopeful that I will be back on the road in another 1-2 weeks. I am trying to maintain my fitness that I had begun to build up. Still a long way from where I want to be, but no real planned races until a 50k in April and a 50mi in May as part of the Ontario Ultra Series (http://www.ouser.org/index.html) which will be my first official foray into ultra distance races. I am itching to get out and get on some trails to build up my trail experience, which has been severely lacking, more out of access than desire (closest trails of any decent length are 15-30 mins away from our house).
Nutrition is still going well. I transitioned to 100%ish plant based diet about six weeks ago and I have had good positive effects (I will share more detail on this as we go). Suffice it to say that I feel more energy, long runs had been great and I am slimming out a bit which is just great for the spring racing season.
Happy trails, stay tuned for more.
Today I can feel it a little bit more than over the past few days. Still continuing with heat, stretching and ice 3 times a day. Walked around a bit with the family this morning before the rain came, and felt fine. Plan for this week is 4-5 cycling sessions with 3 at 45ish mins and one at 75ish mins. I will also try to get another physio/acupuncture treatment in this week, but it is pretty expensive. I am hopeful that I will be back on the road in another 1-2 weeks. I am trying to maintain my fitness that I had begun to build up. Still a long way from where I want to be, but no real planned races until a 50k in April and a 50mi in May as part of the Ontario Ultra Series (http://www.ouser.org/index.html) which will be my first official foray into ultra distance races. I am itching to get out and get on some trails to build up my trail experience, which has been severely lacking, more out of access than desire (closest trails of any decent length are 15-30 mins away from our house).
Nutrition is still going well. I transitioned to 100%ish plant based diet about six weeks ago and I have had good positive effects (I will share more detail on this as we go). Suffice it to say that I feel more energy, long runs had been great and I am slimming out a bit which is just great for the spring racing season.
Happy trails, stay tuned for more.
Sunday, September 1, 2013
Injured - Achilles Tendonitis
Following a few great weeks of running post vacation, I am sitting out with a bum achilles. Last week I ran a couple of days, longest was about 8 miles, but in pain for much of it. I have been cycling at the gym two days a week, but Friday decided to visit a physio and get this thing checked out. Nothing was working, not foam rolling, self massage, stretching or any other witchcraft.
The Physiotherapist confirmed achilles tendonitis on my right achilles with some fairly substantial medial swelling. Cause was a very tight and knotty calf muscle. She treated me with a combination of sonar, ultrasound, laser and acupuncture. The acupuncture involved some rapid insertion on my calf to work out the knot (effectively popping the balloon so to speak) then leaving the needles in place all over my calf and foot. Worked very well, and the twinge was mostly gone.
The plan now is for heat, stretching and ice three times a day. It is day three and I am noticing improvement. Basically no running in the short term, though I will try to keep my fitness up with cycling on the stationary. I will likely take another physio treatment next week to continue the healing process. I am hopeful I can return to moderate running in 1-2 weeks so that I can continue to build my endurance base.
Emotionally I am itching to get out there. Prior to the injury was running 70-80 miles a week, pacing was great and I was feeling strong most days. The base was coming along for next spring's ultra season (my first) and I was hopeful for a fall tune-up at a 10 mile + distance. In all likelihood I will have to forego this and focus instead on continuing to build my base as well as get some experience doing more trail running.
I will share more here as we go through it. I plan on at least weekly or greater updates including diet, my background, some learnings, and just sharing my renewed love of the sport and push to ultra distance events.
Off to do my daily physio.
The Physiotherapist confirmed achilles tendonitis on my right achilles with some fairly substantial medial swelling. Cause was a very tight and knotty calf muscle. She treated me with a combination of sonar, ultrasound, laser and acupuncture. The acupuncture involved some rapid insertion on my calf to work out the knot (effectively popping the balloon so to speak) then leaving the needles in place all over my calf and foot. Worked very well, and the twinge was mostly gone.
The plan now is for heat, stretching and ice three times a day. It is day three and I am noticing improvement. Basically no running in the short term, though I will try to keep my fitness up with cycling on the stationary. I will likely take another physio treatment next week to continue the healing process. I am hopeful I can return to moderate running in 1-2 weeks so that I can continue to build my endurance base.
Emotionally I am itching to get out there. Prior to the injury was running 70-80 miles a week, pacing was great and I was feeling strong most days. The base was coming along for next spring's ultra season (my first) and I was hopeful for a fall tune-up at a 10 mile + distance. In all likelihood I will have to forego this and focus instead on continuing to build my base as well as get some experience doing more trail running.
I will share more here as we go through it. I plan on at least weekly or greater updates including diet, my background, some learnings, and just sharing my renewed love of the sport and push to ultra distance events.
Off to do my daily physio.
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