Injury and attitude

Last time I promised an entry on my new training philosophy but it seems more appropriate to talk about injury and attitude at this time since this has been at the center of my universe all week and I don't know when it is going to end.

So last week I started the training week looking forward to putting in a great few weeks of training before my next race and BAM! Monday morning I am in the pool doing paddle drills when I felt a sharp pain in my shoulder. Luckily it was towards the end of my workout so I finished up and tried to pinpoint the location of the pain. After an hour or so the pain went away so I decided that I would take care of the shoulder and try again in a few days.

Tuesday and Wednesday went as planned except for some rain that forced me inside on the trainer on Tuesday. Thursday I got back in the pool and immediately felt the pain in my shoulder again but it was more dull this time so I suffered through. After swimming I finally put in a run after 10 days off from running altogether for scheduling reasons. It was 6 miles with some hill sprints thrown in and towards the end of the run my right knee started to feel funny. I did not think much of it but Friday morning I hopped out of bed and felt the knots right away. I had a track workout scheduled and I was actually looking forward to it (I love track work). So I taped my knee with KT tape and showed up only to quit after only 400 meters because my workout partner noticed I was limping. This really annoyed me and I was not a pleasant person to be around. Luckily I was not going to be in the office all day. I was driving to different job sites and would be alone to sulk in my own injury induced sorrow.

Not injury related but On Saturday I was going to do a long ride. I was excited because This was something that would not aggravate any injury I might have. Then BAM! 5 miles into the ride I hit a piece of glass and had a complete blowout. Not just a flat tire but one that ruined the tire too. I figured this was a great opportunity to try out the old dollar bill in the tire trick. If you have never heard of it you are basically using a folded dollar bill inside the wall of the tire to keep the tube from bulging out the side and blowing out again. Well it worked beautifully for about 2 miles as I headed towards home. Then the tube blew out through the dollar. In the end I walked about 3 miles home and had to jump on the trainer instead.

All that aside I figured Sunday would be better so I went to test the knee and rand 4 miles before I felt any pain. Ended up walking 1 mile out of the 8.5 I ran and it was a slow run but there was some promise in there because of the Friday debacle.

Today was another test of the shoulder and immediately I felt that sting in my shoulder. Depressing, but at least the knee is getting better. I will probably get to the Physical Therapist later this week and see what the extent of the damage is but with a race coming up in two weeks I am a little nervous about it.

So what about attitude you say? Well, I learned a lot about panic, frustration, anger, and acceptance this last week. What I decided is that it does no good to panic and frustration is normal. Once acceptance sets in you can actually make progress towards recovery. I rearranged my workout schedule to increase the amount of recovery for running and swimming and figured that more cycling can't be bad. I have started to take care of the injuries and play it safe. I will replace some workouts with weights too. I will see a doctor and give an update soon. For now i have to keep my eye on the goal and not let the frustration of injury get me down. I can see how easy it would be to just decide to sit on the couch the rest of the season.