Sunday, April 30, 2017

Training Blog April 24 to 30, 2017, a tiny step forward, hopefully.

  So this was another week of very little but I did manage to do a couple of "runs".  I went to yoga on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.  I ran two miles in 16mins on Thursday and 3 miles in 24mins on Saturday, both of those were with Melissa and Uta.  I got massage and acupuncture on Saturday after the run.

  The back is still a bit wonky and I'm not doing forward bends in Yoga but other than that and right when I get out of bed in the morning.  The calf feels fine but I did get some soreness after both runs that doesn't feel quite 'right'.

  The problem seems to source from my back/hip on the right side and I'm doing exercise for that area and hopefully with that I'll be able to build up real slow to some real running.   I'm not super confident because the area just doesn't feel right but at the moment I don't have a better plan.

Sunday, April 23, 2017

Weekly training, or not, blog April 16 to 23, 2017

  I went to yoga on Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and twice on Sunday.  I saw Anna on Monday and got a massage but she did have me jog for 20 feet or so to see if there was anything glaring wrong with my stride.  The verdict, I'm not extending and I'm not fully pronating but compared to past sins I don't actually look that bad.

  So I was planning on running Friday afternoon but instead I threw my back out doing some weeding in the garden.  It actually wasn't that bad but I wanted to play it safe.  I got up still feeling tight but not too crazy bad on Saturday morning and then when I was eating breakfast it totally spasmed.  As someone who has had low back surgery I have had my fair share of 'throwing the old back out' but this one was a personal worst.  I couldn't believe it.  It was some real pain.  I couldn't move I actually thought I might be stuck on the floor for a long while.

  Now I can't take muscle relaxers because my spine wasn't fused so I needed a fix.  I went to yoga and basically laid in the the hot room for 90% of it and I did a lot of heating and Mckenzie back relaxer exercises and as it slowly loosened up a bit a lot of lacrosse ball massage.  Finally tonight after second yoga I sort of invented a new exercise/lacrosse ball massage movement that got it to let go and I find myself suddenly like 95% better.  I'll probably hold off another day on running because at this point I've missed so much time one more day doesn't really matter but I hopefully good to go.

 

Sunday, April 16, 2017

Training Blog April 10 to 16, 2017 Just a lot of Yoga

So I tried running on Wednesday, the leg felt 100% all day so I figured I'd go for a mile or two and see.  It felt fine if a bit weak for the first minute then steadily got a bit worse and by the time I stopped after one short loop of the neighborhood, 3/4 of a mile, it was pretty sore.  Then it felt pretty set back the next day or two.

  These leaves me with two basic theories.  Possibility one is that I have a small tear in the muscle.  Which means I need to wait another week or two and it will come back around.  Just keep up the same treatment.  Possibility two is that I have a fibula stress fracture and I'm feeling referenced pain in the muscle.  I very much doubt this one but perhaps.  This would mean another 3 weeks off and that the extra cross training isn't helping me much.  I can solve this by getting some imaging. I may or may not do that.  There is no real treatment for either.  As such and given that I'm not in love with info for info sake I may just wait and see how it comes along, but I do have this week off from school so I'll end up doing whatever Melissa and Anna think is best.

  Other than the little run I did a good bit of Yoga and cross training.  I went to Bikram on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday.  My yoga practice is in a good place.  I joke with Anna that if I was paying her for cross training to help my yoga I'd have to give her a raise.

  I've missed enough time that I am going to have to rework my training plans which is very disappointing but that is how the cookie crumbles and one of the great things about New England is there are always other races you can target.

  Hope you're doing better than I and that the weather is as nice where you are as it is here for me.
-

Sunday, April 9, 2017

Training Blog April 3 to 9, 2007, still banged up.

  Calf was shitty all week. I got a massage on Monday afternoon, tried jogging on Tuesday.  Made it less than a minute and stopped.  It isn't super painful but it gets a bit worse with every stride.  So it would be counter productive to push it.  I went to Yoga on Wednesday, Thursday and Sunday.  I also got massage and accupuncture on Saturday.  I tried running again this afternoon and again made it about a minute.  I'm doing a good bit of mobility work on it each day at home and overall it feels pretty good. I just have this one crazy knot.
  On the plus side I have been getting caught up on yard work and work work so that is something.  Really hope to get rocking this week.  Hope you are doing better than me.  -Nate

Sunday, April 2, 2017

Training week March 27 to April 2, 2017 Not Too Old to Make Mistakes...

Monday AM road 4 mile with Uta, 31:40
               PM road 10.1 mile solo, 1:05:33, ended up with bilaterally tight calves.

Tuesday PM cold rain so I did 10 on the treadmill in 1:01:18- this seems fast in comparison to my regular runs but was actually a lighter effort then my normal runs which are pretty hilly, both calves pretty tight.

Wednesday PM plan was to do a fartlek if my calves weren't too bad. did the first 3 miles of my 10 mile loop as warm up then started on 10x30 second fartlek, the first two felt pretty good but my left calf spasmed after the 2nd one.  I stopped and stretched and it felt pretty good so I decided to just jog the full 10 mile but not turn around, going back from whence I came I could be home in 3.5 miles verses 6.5 more if I continued the loop.   So for a couple miles things felt pretty good then it started to tighten up again so I stopped and stretched.  When I started up again I it didn't feel so hot and about a half mile later I was going up a hill and it spasmed worst then the first time.  I stopped and could tell it was pretty bad.  So I made the not fun choice to walk home, 55 cold minutes later I was home and not too happy about it.

Thursday PM 90mins bikram yoga.

Friday off

Saturday  snow removal

Sunday AM bikram yoga 90mins.

Summary generally after any recovery I try to take my time building back up but I decided to try something new with only taking one week down I thought I could jump in and go normal full on.  I thought I would get a bit sore.  So I was a bit surprised my calves were super tight after day one, that is why I dumped the AM run the next couple days and I had planned a tougher workout on tuesday and decided to try an easier one on Wednesday.  Not easy enough.  The calf feels a lot better now but I tried running on it and it wasn't quite ready for that.  I'll get it worked on tomorrow and do some more yoga this week and hopefully be back in the saddle by the end of the week.