Groin muscle injury…
Every couple of years, I become very familiar with a given muscle, ligament or tendon in my legs due to an injury. Earlier this month, I pulled two muscles in my groin, the adductor longus(F) and the adductor magnus(H) on my right leg. For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been going for aggressive physiotherapy and massages and these sessions are helping me get back to running. These session are so intense that they have been leaving bruises on my leg. I’ve cycling to work daily for just over a month as they cycling is good cross-training for these muscles. As well, I’ve been doing long sessions of indoor rowing machine which are helping to rehab the leg but spending 30 minutes on the rowing machine doesn’t equate to say a 30 minute run outside. It sucks when you get injured but since I haven’t been injured for a while I guess it was time. I’ve been doing some very specialized groin stretches which are strengthening the area. The injury has put a damper on a couple of road races in April that I was hoping to do. The running is coming back slowly with each workout getting progressively long and harder. I long for the day when the muscles are fully healed and I can run carefree.
The Old duffer and running
For the past little while I have been treating my legs with care as it has taken a little longer for my right soleus to heel than I would have liked. Last Sunday, I did my first 10 mile long run along the canal. I was on my way back and within 3 miles of the university when the hairs on the back of my neck went up. A speedster was closing and would pass me any minute. He thought I would be an easy target. He was in for a bit of a surprise and so was I. Very quickly he went by and opened up a lead on me. This irked me a bit. I caught up and increased the pace as it has been a while since I really stressed my legs. For the next two miles we both ran side-by-side with an ever increasing pace. Who would drop whom first? After two miles he disengaged. I eased up a bit as I could feel the lactic acid building in my legs. The university was quickly appearing on the horizon. I was feeling good as my legs were handling the pressure/stress. The old duffler did another surge and caught up with me. I responded with another surge and finished the workout with a smile of relief on my face.
On Wednesday, I did a 8 mile run and a 7 mile run on Friday. My strategy is to rebuild my base- training before add speed to the mix. On Wednesday, I will do my first set of 1,000 meters intervals. I’m a little behind my training peers but I accept that it may take a couple of speed workouts before my zest returns. Over the next little while I hope to do a 10km road race and may be a 13 mile half-marathon next month.
Seagate and Running….
Today as I was heading out my phone began to vibrate letting know that UPS was attempting a delivery. In an early blog I talked about problems with a Seagate backup drive and how it had to be uniquely packaged before a replacement would be sent. The replacement drive came this morning and the plan is to setup a RAID level 1 backup strategy. A quick thanks to the folks at Seagate for sending the warrantied replacement drive in under a week.br /br /Tonight, I did something that I have been desperate to do for about two weeks and that is to have a quality run outside. Two weeks ago while out for a routine training run I pulled part of my right gastrocnemius and a soleus . It happened at a good point in the run as I was 50 yards from the university. After a couple of days of rest I was able to aggressively stretch it a couple of times a day still with a fair amount of pain. I called a Tina and made an appointment for some active release technique, and some very aggressive massaging. I usually leave these sessions privately moaning. But the injury and the recovery make me really appreciate how lucky I have been recently to run injury-free. After last night’s aggressive massage I decided to be bold and take a run outdoors this evening. The run went well and the soleus started to complain as I approached the university. But it did feel good to go for a run. For the past week and a half, I’ve been cross-training at the gym by using the rowing machine, stair master, exercise bicycle, treading water and water running but they don’t compare with a 40 minute run outdoors. The plan is to go for a slightly longer run on Sunday and very gradually start building up my workout length.
