Ah well, as the snow finally vanishes perhaps we can start to think about the impending season of over eating and gorging.
I like this time of year. It's a time of tradition, both societal and family ones.
It's the time of year to put up my tree (do that on Monday), it's the time of year to dust off my collection of festive tunes and, believe it or not, I'm pretty sure somewhere I do have a copy of old Bing "Bong" Crosby singing the titular smash (as well as one by the saintly Ella). It's the time of year that I "traditionally" steal Anne's supply of marzipan left over from the Christmas cakes.
It's also time for a bit of a "new" tradition of mine (is there a statute of limitations on when something can be called "traditional"). Anyway I'm now calling it a tradition.
Yes. Its the traditional festive injury!! Well whoop-de-feckin-do.
It's the knee this time (the left one).
I'd like to say I don't know what caused it - but I do. It was caused by me being an arse.
It's been "iffy"/"niggly" for a couple of weeks now, but it's not really been getting any worse (not been getting any better truth be told). And all this time I've adopted the ostrich approach and buried my head in the sand in the hope that it will go away. Until Thursday night - when it went... big time! Did a five mile run round Dunbar and it was a bit sore. Then after the run, in the changing room, soreness left and made way for bloody agony.
Now. Not being a medical man I'm pretty clueless as to what exactly it is, and trawls through the murks of t'internet have left me none the wiser, other than reinforcing what I already knew. The knee is like "central junction" for all manner of tendons, ligaments, muscles and blue, red and purple fibrous what-nots. And one of those has gone "ping".
I've only my self to blame as a look back at my training log reveals that even on a "quiet week" I've been doing about 50 miles. In the snow! When I'm not even training for anything!!
It had been my hope that in 2010 I was going to do 365 runs. This self appointed "target" was not to include interval sessions.
By Thursday night (day 343) I had managed 347 runs. IF I did take into account interval training it goes up to 368.
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| A "knee". Not my knee, but a knee none the less. |
So. What now? Well on Thursday night I could hardly walk. By Friday I could hobble but stairs were problematic. Today I can manage stairs a bit. So, progress is being made.
Loads of anti-inflammatory pills and rest. Then next week. I might try a bit "damage limitation" and try a swim or a visit to a gym for some low/no impact cardio work. I might even dig out old [t]rusty, but I'm not sure on the wisdom of cycling with a knee injury? Depends on the type of injury I suppose (might just have to "suck it and see").
Yesterday saw me make regular visits out to the car park at work, armed with a plastic bag. I filled the bag with slush and then sat behind my desk with my home made "ice-pack" on the sore knee. Seemed to work.
Apparently, and I don't know the truth of this, ice packs should only be applied for ten minutes, as after that the tissue trys to adapt to the cold by increasing the blood flow (the very thing your trying to slow down). So the tip is ten minutes a go, maybe every two hours. It also saw me being forced into the lifts to go up all of two stories! I could feel the eyes of the wheezy-fatties on me as I stood there in the lift. "Your one of us now!"
Forward thinking? Well, I want to see how the recovery goes, then I might try to get out on Christmas for a four mile bimble.
2 comments:
bugger!
Mary, No one to blame but myself.
The knee has been “iffy” since the last fall three weeks ago.
Not only did I do 50+ miles last week, but a look back at my log shows that I didn’t have a day off in 13 days (doing 15 runs).
I should have called the post “A Muppet’s Christmas Carol”!
Keen to get back to running before Santa brings me my new Garmin though.
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