Injury Strikes Back!

I'm currently on the bench as far as running is concerned.

About four years ago, while training for 10Ks, I managed to get Achilles tendonitis in both heels. I'd never had a tendon injury before, so at the time I didn't realize how frustrating these can be. It effectively put a halt to my training and by the time I was ready to run again (more than six months later) I had lost so much of my fitness and didn't want to risk another injury that I effectively gave up serious training.

Since then I have learned to work around this injury through weight training and lots of stretching and application of heat. My heels actually flared up a little durnig Skyline, but I was able to get past it and finish the race.

After Firetrails, I decided to take a few months off from ultras and focus on shorter races. During that time I also planned to work on two things that I think will really help my ultra performance. The first was to develop some serious leg strength to help me on long downhills. The second was to start running more in the new five fingers shoes from Vibram to develop my technique and strengthen my calves, ankles, and feet.

Everyone you talk to and every recommendation from the manufacturer says that you should ease into your five fingers shoes. I had done warmups, a tabata workout, and a 2-mile run in them in the past and figured I was ready to start using them for full workouts. A friend and I did a ladder of the following two Thursdays ago:

One minute on, one minute off, one minute on, fifty seconds off, one minute on forty seconds off... one minute on ten seconds off, one minute on twenty seconds off... one minute on, fifty seconds off, one minute on, done.

This is a fun little speed workout that I'd done before (but not in five-fingers). I was feeling great, but in the third-to-last work set my right heel started to feel weak. In the second-to-last set I was limping, and I skipped the last set and went inside and did it on the rower. In hindsight my body was not ready.

Over the next couple of days I realized that I had re-injured my old condition. Damn!

I decided to address the injury head-0n this time.

I have received several recommendations for sports chiropractic and rehab practitioner Dr. Harry Ho. Dr. Ho has a great reputation and has treated several high-profile athletes for various sports related injuries. He himself is an iron man triathlete (and in fact was unable to see me the end of this week so as to travel to Florida and compete in the 2009 Ford Iron Man, which I took to be a good sign).

Over the last few days Dr. Ho and his associates have employed on me novel and sometimes tortuous techniques to break down scar tissue, loosen muscles, and increase circulation in my heel. I really feel like things are improving, and that I am actually healing (and heeling) rather than just working around the injury. After this one is fixed I'm going to ask them to do the other one too.

When my friends get injured I always counsel them by saying that successful athletes are not successful because they never have setbacks, they are successful because they work through the setbacks, and that's what I keep reminding myself now. And truthfully this could not have come at a better time; I don't have any big races planned, I had decided to focus my crossfit training for the next few months on strength more than conditioning anyway (which means lots of squats, deadlifts, presses, and eating, and no jumping or running), and I am in a position financially to be able to afford proper treatment.

In the meantime I am biking on days when I would normally run, sticking like I said to heavy lifting and not dynamic movements for crossfit, and soon I hope to be able to start taking walks with Jen. In a way it's kind of nice to have a change, albeit a forced one, and I know that it will make me enjoy running all the more when I get back to it.