Back in action after injury

Hey Steemit, it’s been a while huh? What’s new with you?

image source

I’ve been out of action for a bit with work and dealing with an injury, as well as multiple other dramas. But now it’s Labour weekend and I’ve got a bit of time off to sit down and do a little writing again.

If you caught my last blog post you’ll know I participated in the Ginger Runner Global Run this year. It was a bunch of fun even if I didn’t win anything or even make it into the recap video. Maybe next year.

But the very next run was disastrous for me. It looks like I’d been pushing my body just a bit too hard training for GRGR18 and it all broke down at about 10kms into my morning run. I was getting an odd pain in my left thigh, just a bit above my knee as I came down the hill towards the 10km mark on my usual 10km circuit.

This in itself is not unusual. My body often give me random pain at this point to try and get me to stop and go home. If I keep going, by the time I get 500 metres past the turn to my house, the pain goes away and doesn’t bother me again. It’s not real pain.

But this time it didn’t go away. It got steadily worse until I was forced to walk, and then limp, back home. My leg was very sore all day, even when I walked into town to get a haircut in the evening.

This was not good.

The pain was very different from all the other pains I’ve had before. I quickly got the feeling that this was not muscle pain. I could move my leg with no weight on it and it was fine. as soon as I loaded my leg, by standing in it, the pain would return.

So probably a stress fracture then. Not what I needed right now.

So I’ve taken a couple of weeks off, trying to let it heal, and it’s taken its own sweet time about it! I finally got on a treadmill yesterday and managed to belt out 10kms with no pain at a reasonable pace. So it looks like I’m on the mend and on my way back.

I have a race in three weeks that involved lots of hard climbing and descent, and I’m not sure my leg is up to that yet, so the next couple of weeks will be all about finding out. I’ve found a hill not far from my house (about 3kms) that is about 500 metres long and gets steeper the higher you go – perfect for doing hill repeats on. So starting on Monday I’ll be heading out there to try and get 5-10kms of hill repeats in before breakfast.

At least if my leg starts to hurt I can just stop and walk the short distance back home before I do too much damage to it.

One of the cool things about doing this ultra-running thing, and what really got me into this in the first place, is learning about how far I can push my body before it all starts to fall apart. Going straight from running 10kms each day to running 20kms each day was probably too much of a step to take in one go.

So I’ll try again, and this time, I’ll take smaller steps. I know that 20kms each day before breakfast is do-able. I was doing it for two weeks before it all fell apart. I just need to be little bit less enthusiastic about my timeframes for getting to the point where that is sustainable. My goal is to make the 20km distance as easy for me to run as the 10km distance is now. (and then 30km, 40km, 50km….)

At some point I will find a distance that I can’t get past, and then I’ll know what my true limits are. But I think I’m a long way from discovering that yet.

I hope your running is going well, and you are not doing what I’m doing i.e. you’re being a bit smarter about your training than I am ;-)

Keep an eye out for more posts from me as I make the most of a couple of days off.

---

Steemit etiquette

• Do write meaningful comments
• Do discuss the topic in the post
• Do tell me about how we share an interest
• Do take the time and effort to actually read the post before commenting
• Don't ask for follows
• Don't ask for votes
• Don't say you have voted for a post and then not vote for it
• Don't say you have resteemed a post and not resteem it
• Don't write short coments like 'Nice post'
• Do be the sort of person you want reading and voting for your own posts.

---

Do you like games?

Check out my Steemit Ultra Marathon game where you can win 20SBD for first place, 10SBD for second and 5SBD for third. Get your virtual running shoes on and get ready to run!

---

Also don't forget to check out my Dad's blog

Who else can tell you stories about impersonating an officer, stealing a military aircraft to go on a booze run, or steal military aircraft and go on an unsanctioned bombing run - and that's all before he turned 18!

Check out @len.george and find out what other madness he got up to!

---

Are you new to Steemit and trying to figure out what it's all about?

Head over to: https://www.steemithelp.net/. It's the best place to get a handle on what the platform is all about.

---