I Just Had An Injury Timeout

I’m alive. It’s true.

I know that I have been away for far too long, but here I am. I will spare you the explanations and reasons as to why I haven’t made a new post for so long. I am doing great physically and emotionally (At least as normal as I can be, since I have always been a little off from the norm!) 

Let’s just say that I have been really busy and had a bunch of stuff to do. Plus as I will explain below, I had to take an injury timeout.

[In my mind, I feel like a superhero but sometimes my body feels like an overweight, balding, old guy!]

Either way, I think it is time to get back on track and catch you guys up with my little world. As I talked about in my last several posts before my hiatus, I had been running more and more and starting to really enjoy it. Everything was going great this Summer and I was signed up for two half marathons, one in October and one in November.

I had some pain and as I talked about earlier, I discovered Chi Running and it made a huge difference. I had no more pain and felt good while running. I was increasing miles at a breakneck pace and running longer and longer every time.

Well, just like a balloon with too much air being pumped in to it, the whole thing burst and crashed down on me in August.I started feeling fatigue and a dull ache in my right hip flexor when I ran. I kept running anyways figuring that I could run through it and it would eventually get better.

Wrong!

I ran 8 miles with pain on a Wednesday in August. Instead of taking time off, I ran 6 miles on the Friday and had more pain. It was to the point that I was limping after I ran.

Did I take time off after this? Nope. Instead on Sunday, I limped down to the trail to meet my running partner and tried to run 9 miles! I only quit after he looked back at mile 8 and watched me limping and made me stop. He drove me home and I could barely get out of his car. I didn’t move for the rest of the day and when I got up to go to work I could hardly get out of bed.

[Overuse of the hip flexors while injured is just a disaster waiting to happen!]

I walked with a severe limp for about five days and a slight limp for a few weeks. I went to my chiropractor friend Jenn that trains hard and knows what it’s like to have a warped mentality when it comes to training. (She owns a Crossfit gym in Southside Pittsburgh, which should explain enough!) One of her chiropractors adjusted me and worked my hip and leg out. It started to feel better after each visit, but was nowhere near better.

My wife told me I better not run again until I am totally healed or else I was going to be in big trouble.

I listened. A happy wife is a happy life!

So I didn’t run and lost any ambition to train with weights and pretty much felt like a big slug. I went almost six weeks without running at all, until September 25th came around. This was the day of a 10K race in Pittsburgh called the Great Race. I was already signed up for it from months ago and it was supposed to be a warmup for the October half marathon. My wife, my oldest son (23 yrs. old), and a bunch of friends were all signed up for it. I didn’t want to miss it.

The day of the race I felt pretty good. At this point, I didn’t have any pain anymore, but I also didn’t run for about 6 weeks. I told my wife that if it started to hurt, I would just quit and walk.

She didn’t believe me. She was right. After around 1/2 mile in to the 6.2 mile race, it started to hurt again, just like before. Did I stop and walk? Of course not, I kept running with the thousands of other runners and finished with a little limp, a little more pain, and a whole lot of frustration.

What is it about wanting something that you can’t have? Now that I was injured and couldn’t run, I wanted to run more than ever. I limped for a few days, but actually felt pretty good by the end of the week.

I didn’t run again after that day in September until November 13th. Roughly another full six weeks off. I had no pain at all from about the middle of October.

Here is what I have done since.

Nov 13th- 1 mile
Nov 17th- 1 mile
Nov 20th- 1.5 miles
Nov 24th- 1.5 miles
Nov 27th- 1.5 miles
Dec 2nd- 1.5 miles
Dec 4th- 2.0 miles
Dec 5th- 2.0 miles
Dec 8th- 2.0 miles
Dec 11th- 2.5 miles

When I was running in August, before my injury, I was running at around a 7:30 per mile pace. Now I am at around a 8:00 to 8:15 per mile pace. I am going slower and only increasing my miles by a half mile per week or two. I have had absolutely no pain and have started weight training again, although I haven’t trained legs at all.

I feel like I am back on track and have finally learned my lesson. If it hurts, I will stop. I will give my body time to adjust and grow in to the increased mileage and increased speed. I hope to do the Pittsburgh half marathon in May 2012. I will keep you all posted as to how things are going.

I know that it will be easy for people to say that it was running that injured me and that running is bad and I should just quit.

In reality, it was all my fault.

If I had a nagging pain while powerlifting, I would give it rest and I would work slowly. When I worked up to my personal best deadlift of 610 lbs. in the 181 lb. class, I did this over the course of a few years. I didn’t go from deadlifting 450 lbs. up to 610 in a matter of months and I didn’t deadlift everyday regardless of injury or pain.

“IT TAKES MORE WILL POWER AND MORE STRENGTH SOMETIMES TO NOT TRAIN THAN IT DOES TO BLINDLY TRAIN WHILE INJURED”

There is a lot to be said for working through pain and pushing your body to the limit. There is more to be said for being smart enough to know when to quit pushing and take time off. I think it takes more will power and more strength sometimes to not train than it does to blindly train while injured.

I put caution to the wind and tried the tough guy approach to running. It did nothing but get me more injured and set me back months. The key now is to learn from this and train smarter in the future. It doesn’t matter if you run with the Chi Running style or any other style and it doesn’t matter what wacky shoes you wear. If your body is screaming Uncle and you ignore it, it will just scream louder until it gets your attention.

Please learn from my mistakes and be smart about your training. In the end, you will be better for it.

[Here's a short video that talks about the limits of stress and pushing your mind and body too far.]