h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

THing is I don't get any pain at all from walking (I do it a lot). And obviously cycling is much lower impact than running but I cycle a lot and don't get any knee pain at all.

Hmmm...

FB

Well I just looked up ITB syndrome again - I thought it was cycling specific but it appears to be very common amongst runners too. All advice from me is therefore out the window. Hmmm indeed.

Many, many years ago I joined in the jogging boom. Built up to 15 mile runs and bang, some kind of knee injury. Rested for a week and tried again. Pain. Rested for a fortnight and tried again. Agony. Rested for a month and tried again. Failure. Rested for two months and no problem. A lesson learned about too much too soon and spent many happy injury free years as a result.

When I say 'rested' I mean not running. I cycled, walked and swam. Fact is, if it hurts, its damaged. If its damaged it needs time to heal. Better to give it two months to heal than try to push through the pain and end up knackered. Unless you have an Olympic games on the horizon in which case forget everything I just said.

"Better to give it two months to heal than try to push through the pain and end up knackered." [Pebblederook]

I agree.

No further pain at all today. On consultation with my sports scientist mate he reckons it is possible it was just tightness in the IT band. He suggested a load of stretches to do, and doing some foam roller work.

Then, and on the treadmill, start practising with a couple of hundred meters, increasing a bit every day. Then not go on the roads until I can do a couple of klicks on the treadmill with no pain.

So fingers crossed i'll be alright.

In other news I was able to swim 1000m front crawl without stopping. It was only a couple of weeks ago that I was struggling to swim 50m so Boo Yah!

FB

Well been gradually working up the distance and today for the first time manged to run race distance (5K) without any pain.

So something in the proper trainers, leg muscle work in gym, foam roller and IT band stretching (probably some combination of all of the above TBH) seems to have worked. SO I think I'll just keep up all of them. I forgot how knackering running can be when you haven't done it for a while. Despite al the swimming and cycling I do it is a very different sort of exercise.

FB

Was the big day today. I got injured this monday annoyingly which really compromised my race. But I was able to complete in 01:34:42 so I am utterly delighted.

Like JFK I can now say:-

Ich bin ein Triathloner



FB

Great to hear. Nice one.

Well done sir!